Scene:

Your narrator walks downstairs, aiming for a mid-afternoon pick-me-up from the vending machine. Arriving at the foot of the stairs, he sees a test rig surrounded by five people.

Co-worker, known for droll humor and dry wit: “It’s not rocket science.”

Narrator [hitches up belt]: “Well, that’s what I went to school to do.” [pause] “What are y’all testing?”

Co-worker: “How many people we can get to stand here, watching the computer.”

Narrator: “What’s your goal?”

Co-worker: “Eight is a successful test.”

Narrator: “Well, I’m gonna fuck it up and walk away now. Bye!”

The narrator retrieves his quarry and returns to the scene, finding a sixth hanger-on standing near the test rig. “Seven!” The narrator turns to head back up the stairs, and seeing a co-worker, makes an about-face.

“EIGHT!”

Exeunt.

12 Hour Day

Originally uploaded by Geof F. Morris

Somewhere, some Daylight Shifting Time proponent is thinking:

“Hey, dude. Not only did you get to see the sunrise today, you got to see the sunset, too! What a great workday!”

I want to find that asshole and punch him in the face.

[Why, yes, I rather do need a vacation. Why, yes, I'm a bit bitter that the one I had planned to take starting on Wednesday got screwed up. Why do you ask?]

Hey hey hey, we shipped some flight hardware … on Leap Day. This has been a possibility for a solid six weeks, and I’m giddy that it happened. Mostly, I’m just tired and want to sleep for about six weeks. But I’ve still got four programs and two proposals to manage [a third ships out this afternoon, huzzah]. I don’t know that life is gonna slow down much for me until March ends, but … I sure hope so. I kinda miss having the energy and passion to write.

The NASA teleconference system always asks for the same thing before joining you to the call: “Please state your name, followed by the pound sign.” No, most mornings, since we’re a staff meeting, I say, “Teledyne Brown, Huntsville” or “Huntsville” or “TBE Huntsville”, because we’re the only group from our company and city tying in. As you’re joined to the conference, some of the numbers ring out, “[recording of what you've said] is now joining.”

This morning, I responded, “Puddintane! Ask me again, I’ll tell you the same.”

There was a brief delay, and then everyone laughed. But I could tell that they really wanted to throw shit at me.

I have considered other options:

• “James Tiberius Kirk, captain of the starship Enterprise.”
• Various politicians. Were I Frank Caliendo, I’d do it with impressions.
• “Who has two thumbs and doesn’t give a crap?” Only to see if someone responded, “Bob Kelso“.

The nuclear option is, of course, “YOUR MOM.”

Some days, it’s a wonder that they put me in positions of responsibility.

Me and Atlantis

Originally uploaded by Geof F. Morris

Well, this is as close as I’ll get to seeing Space Shuttle Atlantis lifting off. The Shuttle’s Engine Cut Off sensors—which NASA Administrator Mike Griffin has derisively referred to as “Launch Prevention Devices”—has again delayed the launch of STS-122, this time waving off the Saturday attempt. I got the phone call about an hour ago, and at that time, I indicated that I’m going to drive back tomorrow. Thus ends my attempts to see STS-122 lift off in person.

It was a good week, though. I wasn’t really in to all the rah-rah crap that they wanted to do, because I didn’t see that as a big deal. But it really kinda is. I’m fired up to get back and keep doing the good job that I’m apparently doing at work, because it’s really easy to feel that What I Do Is Important.

Having several days to hang out with Josh was great. We’re certainly different than we were sixteen years ago, but we have such a strong bond from growing up and a like-mindedness that allows all those years to melt away quite quickly. As a military brat, you grow up thinking that you’ll just have these friends for a year or four until you go on to your next base; it sucks, but you learn to adjust. But this week, Josh and I have proven that all the reasons for which we were friends for seven years are the reasons we will still be friends at 70.

I was struck by something Josh said as we walked out to get lunch today: “[This week]’s been just like when we were kids.” I think he meant in two ways—not only us being friends, but in the kicking ass and taking names that we did growing up. And yeah … it has been like that.

To my parents: thanks for all the time and energy you invested in me being a smart, hardworking kid over the years. They’ve paid off, but you’ve known that for a while. [Mainly when you didn't have to pay too much for my college education. ] To my friends, thanks for putting up with some of my … weird obsessions about work. [And with sometimes putting it above my relationships with people, because I certainly do that.] To my colleagues, thanks for making me look good, because y’all deserve this award even more than I do. And to my bosses, thanks for the chance to try—because it was as much a chance to shine as it was a chance to go down in flames.

And to Atlantis: get off the ground, will ya? The DCSU FSE hardware we built this year needs to get off the SSPF floor, and it can’t do that if you don’t go. So GO!

There is no way to post this without tooting my own horn, so … blow, baby, blow. I’m a Space Flight Awareness Honoree.

[Yes, my reaction to this was, "You've gotta be kidding me. I'm just management! I don't do anything!"]

I’ll be down at KSC first week in December for 1E. I’m allowed to take a guest with me; obviously, I asked Doug right away, but he’s not sure that he can go. Anyone interested? Preference given to people I know, especially single females.
Update, 14 Nov: I have someone to go with me, and because folks have asked and I found out yesterday, there were 275 Honorees in this cycle. [And no, I did not get a Silver Snoopy. Those come from the crew, and I don't do the kind of work that would ever merit getting one. I work with plenty of people who have them, though.] Now Mom can honestly tell people that her baby boy is one in a million, seeing that we passed 275 million folks in this country quite some time ago.

Co-op: [hands me data] “Here’s everything I have. The first couple sheets are exact quality records, the next two are photocopies of build paper, and the rest is all stuff I wrote down on an indentured parts list.”

Me: “Excellent! Just the kind of data that we need.”

Co-op: “How do you want me to organize this?”

Me: “Well, we need weights and part numbers.”

Co-op: “We’ve also got serial numbers …”

Me: “Good point. Just … get started with the data entry, and the organization will come to you. Promise.”

And that’s the truth: faced with a blob of data that you know only in part, you’re best to get it all entered and then figure out how to make it pretty. You could spend a half-hour with a plan for all this, and something on page 47? Gonna kick your ass. Better to just get started.

[And now my co-op is going to see this on Facebook, since I import notes there, and she'll know that I care. 'Cause I do. 'Cause she's kicking ass. I'm just trying not to tell her too much so she won't get complacent. ;)]

So come around 10:30 this morning, I was a little annoyed: I’d killed all of yesterday, with all of its bad travel [ask anyone who follows me on Twitter, they were tired of my tweeting about travel], and traveled here for a two-hour meeting where I didn’t learn anything that I didn’t already know about this design last month when I was in town. My first instinct was to see if I could get out of town and back home, but there were no flights that were not ridiculously expensive. And hey, taxpayers, I’ve already spent enough of our money making this trip, so it made no sense to spend a lot more money coming home.

So instead, I decided to take lemons and make lemonade. I proceeded to have a terribly productive afternoon purely by being a short walk down the hallway from all the people I interact with here in Houston, rather than playing phone tag with them. Not in their cube? No worries, I’ll go touch base with someone else and come back later. I touched base with about a dozen folks on five different projects.

All in all, it ended up being a good day, especially for the big hardware delivery we shipped the first half of two weeks ago and will ship the second half of tomorrow.

And no, it wasn’t cool just because there was NASA TV on the TV in conference room with a crew in orbit and docked to ISS, moving around the hardware we spend a couple thousand hours a year each worrying about, but that helped.

Loading the Crate

Originally uploaded by Geof F. Morris

In the truck today.

Integrated next month.

In orbit in February.

Today was a long day, but it was a good one, because we shipped.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to bed.

P: “It’s always dark in [my office].”

Me: “Juuuuust like I like it.”

P: “Maybe it’s because …”

Me: “I have a dark personality?”

P: “Maybe that’s it.”

Me: “You’re just now figuring this out?!”

Ain’t gonna lie. Mood improves with coffee, though. The sad thing is that I’m maximally productive at some level of irritation. The trouble is keeping from being so irritated that I go back down the curve …

Too Darn Hot

Originally uploaded by Geof F. Morris

This is the temperature gauge on my WRX as I pulled into my driveway. It’s been 100F+ every day for a week, but this is the first time it’s been 104F after driving around for a bit and moving air across the thermometer.

I am so thankful that the air conditioner in my house is working. The system at work is unable to keep up with the thermal load being thrown at it: I start the day at 74F or so, and after noon, I’m above 80F. Suffice it to say that I come home sweaty every single day. Feh.

Now, it’s time to settle in and watch STS-118 go to orbit. My group at TBE built the carriers for Battery Charge/Discharge Unit and the Control Moment Gyroscope that are riding on the External Stowage Platform-3 at the rear of the Endeavour’s payload bay. [If I lapse into acronym speak: TBE built the BCDU and CMG FSE flying on ESP3 attached to the ICC. ]

Go, Endeavour, go! I need something good today after an otherwise craptacular one.

I just freaked myself the hell out.

[phone rings]

Me: “Hey, Chris.” [ohnosecond] “Wait a minute, I don’t have caller ID. I have no idea if it’s Chris or not.”

Chris: “You don’t? Well, it is me.”

Me: “What the. That’s freaky.”

Chris: “That’s scarier than you normally are.”

Six days to vacation.

Well, since Yahoo! has this, I guess it’s safe to post.

LOS ANGELES, California — April 16, 2007 — Teledyne Technologies Incorporated (NYSE:TDY) today announced that its subsidiary, Teledyne Brown Engineering, Inc., has been awarded a $5 million contract by the Cargo Mission Prime Contractor, Lockheed Martin, to manufacture Flight Releasable Attachment Mechanism (FRAM) carriers that are used to release payloads from the Space Shuttle Cargo Bay.

Under the contract, Teledyne Brown will build a Large Adapter Plate Assembly (LAPA) and multiple EXPRESS Pallet Adapters (ExPAs). The LAPA will be used to transport Large Orbital Replacement Units such as pump modules to the International Space Station (ISS). Because of their design, the LAPA and ExPAs allow robots to pick up and move the carriers without an astronaut leaving the ISS.

The scope of work includes precision machining of aluminum components and final assembly, system engineering and integration, quality assurance as well as safety and mission assurance. All of the hardware will be manufactured at Teledyne Brown’s facilities in Huntsville, Alabama.

“This contract is the result of a competitive procurement for hardware that fits well with Teledyne Brown’s experience and core capabilities,” said Robert Mehrabian, chairman, president and chief executive officer of Teledyne Technologies.

Teledyne Brown is one of two companies in the United States that has manufactured this hardware. Since 1999, the company has built 18 systems that include several versions of this hardware.

Teledyne Technologies is a leading provider of sophisticated electronic components, instruments and communication products, systems engineering solutions, aerospace engines and components and on-site gas and power generation systems. Teledyne Technologies has operations in the United States, the United Kingdom, Mexico and Canada. For more information, visit Teledyne Technologies’ website at www.teledyne.com.

Looks like good work to me …

Well, I started coming down with a cold late last night. Joyous. I have been a one-man snot factory today. Hopefully none of my friends here picked this up from me at our gathering last night. [I was feeling kinda meh, y'all, but I thought it was a sinus infection and not a cold, and I really wanted to see everyone.]

In other news, things at work continue unabated. The week off was awesome, and I’m glad that I took it, because if I hadn’t, the crazy events of the last two days might have put me over the edge. [It's all been good, very, very good. If this business is feast or famine, well ... let's just say that we have more leftovers than you did at Thanksgiving and Christmas combined. And no refrigerator. It's cuh-razy, y'all.] As it is, my head’s still spinning, but it’s like, “Wow, this is nuuuuuuts.” In a good way.

Posting may be light while we absorb the glut and while I fight off the rhinovirus.

Time to go back to the well yet again: An Equation of Motivation.

This year, I have a pretty high c—things have been going well, even if I’m tired and frustrated—but my h factor is pretty high. [Especially as I think about work pretty often during non-work hours.] I’m sure that f is pretty high, too, because, well, I haven’t seen the folks in a while. [See also: busy with work.]

What about you?