Saturday, July 23, 2005

The Joys of water

Thanks to the ever enlightening nexus of webcrawlers that is Slashdot, I've come across some amazing videos.

Remember playing with water-balloons as a kid (or even an adult)? If you watch closely as it explodes you can make out a ball of water, which quickly breaks apart (hopefully because of collision with a friend).

Well, NASA scientists, in their ever love of finding excuses to study interesting things, have decided to reminisce of their childhoods and explore water balloons, this time in Zero G.

Links:

Water balloons in Free Fall:

Website

Video 1
Video 2
Video 3

Water balloons in normal gravity:

Website

Video 1
Video 2
Video 3
Video 4


I love the way that the water stays glooped together. Its very surreal. Kind of makes you imagine creating larger and larger balls of water. (Can you imagine a spherical swimming pool?) Final Fantasy fans will hopefully get the Blitzball Reference.

But what if you add more water? What would a real water world be like? Nothing but water? (No rocky core). Voyager touched on the idea in Thirty Days (pic). Naturally they missed the opportunity to explore a wonderful idea.

Anyway. Some fun food for thought :-)

Wednesday, July 20, 2005

Lunar Goddess is honored once again

http://moon.google.com/

On the closest zoom you can almost barely see the landers. Well... not really but you should try it anyway :-P

Thursday, July 14, 2005

Tears


How many tears to mourn an elder,
and all the wisdom and experience lost?
How many tears to mourn a child,
a lifetime and a future destroyed?
How do you explain the tears,
to the stranger who does not understand?

How many tears for the lost security,
and comfort and peace?
How many tears for the destruction,
of the order, we worked so hard to create?
Will there be tears left for the villain,
who made it all come to pass?