��Marslanding photos with Ray Bradbury, on January 2nd, 2004, in Pasadena, California. �

This is sort of a makeshift type of web-page, but bear with it for now...

Note:
Once you get to the page...click on title marked 'MarsLanding' photos, on the left...and afterwards click on FULL PAGE to get detail in order to read the copy. Otherwise, it isn't clear.

Hopefully things will improve here in quality in the coming week.

So, to access the page:
click on, or type into finder: http://www.catchaway.com/Gallery

(or catch some of my older music, and you can access the above noted web page thru this here page, too)...) http://www.catchaway.com

[This message has been edited by Nard Kordell (edited 01-31-2004).]

Thanks for sharing the photos with us, Nard. I really enjoyed them!

Thank you!

I saw him sitting in a chair for invalids...

It's a pity! And this Man is talking that he wants to get on Mars!

Really don't know what to think about it..

Wonderful photos, Nard! Thanks for sharing them!

Nard: Thanks much! Wonderful shots with a very personal feel in each one you have included.

Your art work is stunning. What is the medium?

As for RB wanting to "get to Mars" and being in an adaptive chair, so what's the concern?!
(Does "Walking on Air" ring a bell with any of you?) He has already been there many times -yes! Now we can also enjoy amazing adventures Spirit and Opportunity are affording the world. How much of what he has written will be affirmed by these landings.......?

It was a young child (a girl of 9 or 10, I believe) who so appropriately named the spacecrafts.

NASA lost contact with the Mars Rover lander for at least 24 hours, but they think it's just in "safe mode" (like a computer that's "asleep") and they plan to "wake it up." They expect to hear about 3:00 this upcoming a.m. Keep fingers crossed!

Dandelion:

Actually, according to a NASA interview I watched on CNN, they heard from it. They then asked how it was doing and if there was any thing wrong. Listening to one of the NASA big wigs talked about it, I see they programmed the Rover to respond to questions ...as if it were human, with emotions and feelings. That was very interesting. So they ask it, like, doctor/patient questions.

California time is 3 am, in a few hours, ...they hope to get further info.

But it did respond to that earlier question, which was basically, Can you hear us? ...to which Rover replied, Yes! At 3 am they hope to carry on a conversation....
_____________
Probably heard by now that Rover did respond by 2 different communications. For a total of 30 minutes at 3am Pasadena time. Directors have to sort thru the info and see if they can find out what's going on there.... In the meantime reports say of European satellite discovery of elements of possible water on Mars.

[This message has been edited by Nard Kordell (edited 01-23-2004).]

A-OK, 10-4, Roger that, Good Buddy!
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/releases/2004/30.cfm

elron:

Ray Bradbury has been talking about going to Mars for at least 70 plus years. Way back when he ran about like a rocket, in those seemingly always new, white summer tennis shoes, he also dreamed about living forever, thanks to one Mr. Electrico, whom he met at a circus one summer, in Waukegan, Illinois, and promised him immortaility. All this, long, long before you, elron, even thought your first thought.

But the gravities of this planet, gravities meaning the realities that slow your running legs, and make it a bit harder to dream about living forever, take their toll . And with Ray there is no exception...but he is NO invalid.

I visited him just about 3 weeks ago, at his home, and amidst all his hours of writing, his getting out and speaking, his working on one project or another, receiving calls, putting together an Irish play with his own theater company (a play that just opened), working on a new book, and ...well, I could go on, elron.....amidst all this, he even spent time talking with me about all sorts, including religion, of all things. See, this does not fit the profile of an invalid... I take enormous exception to your comment.... Maybe you didn't quite mean it that way...

Ray, having had a nearly fatal stroke, and the passing of his wife just this past Thanksgiving, has not dimmed this man ...who still dreams of going to Mars. (He even humorously wrote about perhaps even being buried on Mars, in a Campbell's Tomato Soup can....)

I sat behind him at the Marslanding event in Pasadena, with about 2,000 other people of every walk of life on this planet. Ray, at 83 years of age, sat thru the whole event with everyone else, and then spoke to this crowd after the Marslanding that brought everyone to their feet with applause.

As per the last few words in your post, hope this helps you in sorting out ..'what to think..'.


[This message has been edited by Nard Kordell (edited 01-24-2004).]

Just thought to thank you, Nard. And the website is looking great. I'm glad you have let us in on how much work Mr. Bradbury is still doing. Just where in the hell does all his energy come from? It bewilders me.

The next time you see him tell him some idiot from the internet says hi and thanks.

Echoing Nard: Bradbury uses a wheelchair, but when we visited him last June, he was anything but an invalid. Intellectually, he was very, very active. Excellent sense of humor. Kind. A million projects going on at once. Opinionated. I saw nothing that could be construed as being an invalid.

I wish I had his energy. It is miraculous to see what he accomplishes in spite of his stroke and more limited mobility and vision.

Nard: Enjoyed your web site. I checked your updates and got it re-bookmarked this morning (as my system crash wiped out EVERYTHING I had).

Here's the very latest...pictures from the newest lander, Opportunity.

click on, or type into finder: http://marsrovers.nasa.gov/gallery/all/opportunity.html

You see...
...when it's 8 below zero in the morning in Chicago, and the high temperature is only going to be 2 degrees, you think about Bradbury country, 'way out West', and the endless Summer that it is.

Well, click on the following, or type into finder exactly, and you'll see what it looks like, live (if it's daytime and a school day you'll see lots of people in "short sleeves"!!!)...all this about 5 miles from Ray's homestead. Nice, warm, friendly sunshine. AAaaahh!!
http://www.uclajapan.gr.jp/webcam.html

[This message has been edited by Nard Kordell (edited 01-30-2004).]

Personally, when I'm not thinking about Ray all the time I think of him most in the spring when everything begins to get really green. Not here yet, BUT all our snow is melted, we've had rain, wind, and today, ACTUAL SUN!

Here are pictures from Mars as of Feb. 2nd, 2004 http://marsrovers.nasa.gov/gallery/all/opportunity_p004.html