My 63 year old look at the universe, and the Queen of Outer Space

Recently on the non-Trump news, scientists reported the discovery of amino acids in yet another comet. 

These same amino acids were found in a comet in 2006, and again in 2016.  What does the discovery of all these acids mean?

It means that the building blocks of life are common in space, and that life may be abundant throughout the universe.

I am of the firm belief that life is very, very abundant in the universe. 

Many people of faith believe life exists only here on Earth.  If they’re referring to human life, they’re probably right. But I bet there are 100 million varieties of intelligent life in the cosmos that could teach us a thing or two.

Unfortunately, we’ll never get to know them, or they us. 

Too many sci-fi movies, books & tv shows have compartmentalized outer space, inadvertently brainwashing us into believing we’ve been visited by aliens since the ancient Egyptians—and it’s only a matter of time before we’re landing on new planets ourselves.  It’s never going to happen, folks.

YOU:  We don’t need to travel that far, Doug.  The star closest to us is Proxima Centauri, and that’s only 4.25 light years away!

ME:  Without the ability to travel at the speed of light, it would take us 70,000 years to reach Proxima Centauri. 

I don’t want to be a wet rag, but nothing besides light can travel at the speed of light.  “Warp speed” like on Star Trek, that’s fiction.  

However, our telescope technology is amazing.  Who knows what we’ll be seeing in 10 years?  25?

Look at these 2 images of deep space using the Hubble Space Telescope in the 1990s, and a more recent image using the James Webb Telescope.

Those aren’t stars or planets—these globs of light are GALAXIES.  The updated photo on the right shows us galaxies we didn’t detect before.

And each of these galaxies contain billions of stars, and those billions of stars usually have solar systems (planets & moons) in their orbits. 

Psst--the galaxy closest to our own, Andromeda—even if we COULD travel at the speed of light, it would still take 2 1/2 million years to get there.  Just saying, we’re never leaving our own galaxy.

Scientists estimate there are 2 trillion galaxies in the universe.  And I have no doubt that on countless worlds, beings are doing their own stargazing and wondering who or what is out there.   I just hope most of them have better leaders than we do.  Or less gullible followers. 

Finally, this is something I’ve had stuck in my head for 50 years, and as long as we’re in outer space…

When I was around 12-13 years old, my parents were headed out one evening and Mom asked me to run in her bedroom and get her good cigarette lighter from the top drawer of her dresser.  I go in there, pull out the drawer, and notice a yellowed newspaper clipping underneath her small wedding Bible in the right corner. 

It was an old advertisement for “The Queen of Outer Space” at our local drive-in.  I took the clipping into the other room (where Mom was applying her make-up) and asked why she had this in her dresser. 

She said “Oh, your dad took me to see that after we were married.” 

I said “But what was so special about this one?  You told us about the great movies you saw when you two were dating like A Place in the Sun, On the Waterfront…. but The Queen of Outer Space?  You don’t even LIKE science fiction.  Or Zsa Zsa Gabor.” 

She said “Honey I don’t know what to tell you—now put it back where you found it and get my damn lighter!” 

I learned it had a sneak preview at the Waynesburg Drive-in on August 16, 1958.  Exactly 9 months to the day after that showing, my older brother Duke was born.  I think the mystery of the Queen of Outer Space clipping is solved.

Aw fudge, once again I’m on the inside looking out—I’m sure it’ll end soon

I’m a little bummed.  Yesterday (Wednesday) I was supposed to head to the Lutheran Center for a pot roast lunch and 50’s root beer float, but spent the night before with a lot of body aches & fever.  When I finally got up, my head was congested and throat hurt to swallow. 

C’mon, I just got over the flu a little over a week ago!

I’m guessing it’s a lousy cold, with really awful timing.  Colds always remind me of that one episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show where Mary gets sick and mumbles to herself “Colds are 3 days coming, 3 days with you, 3 days going…” 

I sure hope this one doesn’t last 9 days.

Still, I consider myself lucky.  The day before this cold hit (Tuesday) I did make it to the center (my first time there since our trip to the aviary last week) and got to see some of my favorite people—Geri, Colleen, Mary, Paul & Evvie.  

Lunch was chicken stuffed with broccoli & cheese, orzo, green beans, chopped fruit.  There was also some wonderful slivers of blackberry pie.  I have to admit, I was pretty surprised when they announced a second grade class from a nearby elementary school would be paying us a visit.  Shortly after, the place pretty much exploded with children but I say that in a good way.  These kids were all 7-8 years old and you couldn’t ask for a sweeter, more fun bunch.

One little girl came over to my table and plopped down in the seat beside me.  She wore such a serious expression that my first instinct was to try and make her smile, but decided against it and just talked to her like I would anyone else. 

I asked her name, did she have any brothers or sisters, own any pets.  She told me her name was Ophelia, she had 3 sisters and 1 brother, and a cat.  I said “Your brother has 4 sisters?  Is he your slave?”  She did smile but said no, because he was 2 years older.  Makes sense to me!

Here’s our lunch—stuffed chicken, orzo, green beans and blackberry pie.  The kids made us laminated placemats with messages of caring.

Something just occurred to me—back in 1968, before we moved to the farmhouse and still lived in town, my cub scout troop made Christmas “snowball” ornaments to hand out to the old folks at the local nursing home.  And now here I am… I’m not ready.

Well, I don’t have a lot else to share here—just wanted to check in and keep the old blog fresh, like the milk in my fridge.  And speaking of fresh milk, I believe I’ve found what I was looking for, for now at least.

If you recall, I recently wrote about the 2% milk from the store going bad in just a couple days, so I needed to find an alternative.  I tried oat milk, but it was too thick for me with a chalky aftertaste.

A couple other bloggers suggested Fairlife Ultra Pasteurized Milk which also comes in 2 percent; when I went to buy it, I noticed my market had a generic version for a much lower price.  Like the Fairlife, it also has a month-long expiration date and was only a dollar more than regular milk!   So I got a carton and it has stayed fresh and delicious for over a week now.  I am blown away, ultra-pasteurized is the way to go.

I still want to try the coconut milk, and the Fairlife—but for now I have something I can enjoy.  I’ll never go back to regular milk again.   And on that happy note, some juice and a hot bath are calling.  Thanks for reading. 

 

“It’s for the birds” applies here in more ways than one

On Wednesday a few of us from the Lutheran Center took a little road-trip to visit the National Aviary.  The day started out pretty chilly (around 40F) but 5 seconds after this photo was taken, I was in a rainforest setting and wishing I’d brought my loincloth.

I was kind of bummed that none of my peeps (Evvie, Mary, Debbie, Geraldine, Dennis) elected to go; Dennis yelled “It’s not an eating trip, Doug!  I like eating trips!” 

Well Dennis, I will have you know that I enjoyed the best grilled chicken & bacon wrap of my life at the Aviary’s Kookaburra Cafe—so there!

Weirdly, my phone—my NEW phone stopped taking pictures in color towards the end and my chicken wrap only came out in black & white!  I was really bummed about this, you know how I am about my foodie pics.

Here’s a few boring pictures of my visit there.   I really think the aviary is someplace you have to visit in person to appreciate fully—some of these birds really astonished me with their personalities.

These 2 GIANT tropical birds kept shouting “Hello boy!” & “Hello down there!” 

I honestly believe this peacock believed it was directing human traffic

I liked this one passageway with dozens of paper mache birds hanging from the ceiling

One of two toucans here, a woman kept trying to get this one to say something.  I said “I don’t think toucans can speak” and she said “What about Toucan Sam?”  Um…. that’s the cartoon mascot for Fruit Loops.

Speaking of dodos, I really liked this oversized oil painting of a dodo bird

These 2 bald eagles were beautiful, but I felt uncomfortable seeing them in this cage.  (The staff assured me they’re happy here.)

This pink flamingo is much prettier in person—right around the corner, there was 20 more, standing at attention

I think the penguins were my favorite exhibit—they would wait until all eyes were on them, then go crazy with splashing water at us

And finally, my delicious grilled chicken & bacon wrap with tomatoes & purple onions—my camera suddenly stopped taking color photos and I still don’t know why.  (I fixed it on the ride home by doing a phone restart.)  The End!