On the Start of the New School Year...

Hello Troops,
It doesn’t take a seer to imagine what’s happening throughout the towns, villages, and hamlets across this vast Alpine School District. Children are filling their backpacks with pencils, pens, erasers, notebooks, calculators and rulers in preparation for tomorrow’s first day of school. Clothes are spread out over beds while boys and girls make the most important decision of the day - what to wear. Does this match that and does that go with this? Some mothers stand by as consultants, others wouldn’t attempt to get involved in a clothes discussion with their teenager - It’s too risky. Dads are blissfully and permanently excluded from ‘What to Wear’ discussions. Most men are not blessed with the correct rods and cones in their eyes to see the subtleties of fabric and color required for clothes matching. Best to stick with what we know best; sports, electronics and television.

I dreaded the first day of school as a child. I dreaded what my new teacher would be like. I dreaded the thought of learning new math. I mourned the loss of my freedom. No more carefree days spent on my bicycle exploring the streets and avenues of Rapid City, South Dakota. No more lazy afternoons at the public pool. No more long walks home from a day of swimming with my friends. No more treasure hunting under the bleachers at the ball parks. No more sugar stops at the Dairy Queen on Cottonwood Lane filling up on 1 penny Red Vines with our 'under the bleacher' findings.

The end of summer meant an end to our summer backyard sleep overs, and with them went our double dog dare midnight romps through our Canyon Lake neighborhood. Those early 1970's midnight adventures bring fond memories of my gang and I. We prowled our turf - finding imaginative and unholy matchings of toilet paper with trees, cars, fences, bikes and other things best left unmentioned as per instructions issued by the Rapid City Police Department.

We made our own fun in those days. You had to. There were no DVD’s or video machines. There were no iPods or computers. You got up, put on your swimming suit and Tshirt, did your chores, scrounged for money in your mom’s purse or between the couch cushions and hit the road with your friends on your bikes. If we had enough money we cycled several miles to the Kresge's at Bacon Park. Kresge's had a diner with 50 cent hot fudge sundaes. If you got bored waiting for the pool to open you cycled to the spillway on Canyon Lake Dam. Who needed a Lagoon when you had a mossy, slimy dam spillway to slide down? What a blast it was tumbling down the spillway into the creek below, then crawling back up, sometimes making it and others slipping and toppling back down - taking your friends with you.

It was important to our mothers to come home for dinner. As soon as supper was inhaled we were back on our bikes, setting a course for the dirt hills. The dirt hills were magical. We split into teams, staked out our forts and proceeded with vicious and sometimes bloody dirt clod fights.

Those were the good old day of my summers........

Now, its time for school. Summer is over so we put summer things away and get down to business. I urge all of you to work hard in school. Set good goals and do everything you can to reach them. Remember, you’re in school to learn and teachers are there to teach. It is a partnership. The vast majority of teachers really do care about you and your grades. They want you to succeed but can’t force you. You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink. That saying applies to you and your education. Drink deeply. Satisfy your cravings for knowledge. Learn to think and reason so you can become a productive member of society. That’s is all we ask. Is it too much?

Remember, us old timers are not going to be around forever. You will grow up and take over for us. That can be frightening. Do a better job than we are doing in the way you care for this country and planet when its your turn to make decisions. America’s best years are before us, not behind us as many might say. Find a way to make the world a better place because you’re here......now.

Enjoy this year. Make new friends. Grow and develop into the kind of person you want everyone to think you are.

And to our young volunteers and staff - I’ll see you here in the trenches.

Mr. Williamson

A Modern Odyssey. The Saga of Heroes.

From high atop Mr. Olympus they came in a shimmering chariot called Galileo. These immortals landed in a small obscure hamlet in a place called Utah. Their quest was to live among us and learn the mortal ways. At Zeus’s bidding they were commanded to give the children of men a moment of time in a silver chariot forged in Hephaestus' fire.

Hundreds of mortals experienced the Galileo, this Olympian Chariot of Fire. Its true immortal identity hidden and its glory diffused so as not to overwhelm their senses - thus causing them to immediately transfigure and reappear on the golden, windswept Elysian Fields.

The Olympians took mortal names and form. Referring to themselves as Kyle, Stacy, Taylor, Emily, Jon, Megan and perhaps others whom I never saw. And so they lived for days with us.

Now they are gone. The place where the Galileo stood is empty with no marker or stone to commemorate the supernatural event which transpired there. The immortals have returned to Olympus to make their report to Zeus.

Are we not all blessed for their visit? For in the end, the memory of what we saw, heard and touched will remain with us until the last breath leaves our lungs and the boatman appears at our bedside to ferry us across the dark waters of the river Styx to join our brethren in the land of eternal twilight.

________________________________________________________

Friends, I want to thank Kyle Herring and those that responded to his call (Stacy Carroll, Taylor Thomas, Jon Parker, Megan Warner, Emily Perry, Spencer Robinson and others whom I may not know about) for assistance. They performed the impossible. They worked tirelessly, nearly around the clock to prepare the Galileo for the Utah County Fair this past weekend. The ship was dismantled and trucked to Spanish Fork, then reassembled under a canopy. This was the first time the Galileo was dismantled, then reassembled. Much was learned and changes will be made. We learned a large truck with a hydraulic lift is a necessity (their broken backs, ribs, fingers, heads, and spirits all agree). We learned setting the Galileo up on asphalt is a no no. The ball bearing wheels created divots in the pavement as the daily temperatures climbed. We relearned the lesson about never trusting Mother Nature. This was an event requiring dry weather. Instead we got rain three of the four days we were down there.

I was there Thursday afternoon when the Galileo officially opened for tours. There were many excited children waiting in line. The tours continued over the weekend, one after the other, in an endless stream of the curious. Questions were answered and pamphlets distributed.

A group on tour during the Fair in the Galileo

Every evening the staff went home to sleep except for Kyle. Kyle couldn’t leave the safety and security of this new simulator in the hands of Fairground security. Kyle decided to sleep in the Galileo Wednesday through Friday nights. That is dedication. That is the definition of going the extra mile. There is nothing more I can do than to say “Thank you Kyle,” and leave it at that.

Kyle made a video journal of his Fairground sleeping experience he posted to his Facebook account. I’m included them in this post. (Reminded me a bit of the Blair Witch Project.....)

Once again, a sincere thank you and congratulations to our Space Center team for pulling something off I thought couldn’t be done in the short amount of time we had to do it.

Mr. Williamson

Troops. The Daily Herald did an article on the Galileo at the County Fair (included below in this post). The article appeared in Sunday's Paper.

New mobile flight simulator debuts at Utah County Fair

Kira Johnson - Daily Herald | Posted: Sunday, August 16, 2009 12:10 am

With the neon blue glow of overhead lights purpling her lips, the low ceiling making her look abnormally tall, flight director Emily Perry grins at 11-year-old Colin Collyer who's currently perched in tactical.

"What we do is we take people just like you and we give you guys a mission objective and we send you off into space and each one of you has a position," she says. "We give you these jobs so that you and your team can fly around and blow stuff up and you save the universe."

Perry, 20, a Provo resident studying history education at BYU, is giving a tour of the Galileo Mark VI, The Christa McAuliffe Space Education Center's newly commissioned mobile flight simulator, which is two weeks shy of final completion. The Galileo Mark VI, built with the help of a team of BYU students, is meant to replace the Galileo Mark V at the Christa McAuliffe space center, located at Central Elementary School in Pleasant Grove.

The space center staff spent this past week on its debut flight, a trip to the Utah County Fair in Spanish Fork.

"We needed to test the moveability of the center," said concept creator and manager David Kyle Herring. "We thought it would be a great opportunity to test it and show it off and maybe even raise some money to help finish the project." The space center is still about $5,000 short of their final goal.

Collyer, his Dad, Brian, and his two sisters, Regin and Bryn, are seated in leather chairs bolted to the floor facing a large flat-screen monitor mounted in the front bulkhead. At each of the stations where the Collyers sit, brackets mark where future touch screen monitors will convey information pertinent to each simulation. Behind the bridge of the ship is a short compartment flanked by a pair of padded bunks.

It's a tight space, made to stimulate the imagination and approximate what it feels like to serve onboard a space shuttle.

Originally the Galileo Mark V was built in 1999 with a life expectancy of three years, said set director Stacy Carrell. Ten years and nearly $40,000 later, the center is finally ready to replace the original with a lighter, more tech savvy version. With the help of a team of manufacturing engineering technology and mechanical engineering majors at BYU, the space center team has designed a module that can be taken off campus.

"The simulator is the most sophisticated one that we have so far," Carrell said. "We're using a lot of new technology that we've never used before, upgrading things and advancing things, taking what we've learned building other simulators and bringing them to this one."

The BYU team of seven students who built the frame began the process last September as a capstone course.

"When we were finished we had a structural skeleton that could be taken apart and put back together so it could be loaded on a trailer and hauled around," said Terri Bateman, a part-time faculty member in the mechanical engineering department.

Bateman was the faculty mentor for the capstone team that constructed the frame.

"When we first started working on the space ship program, Kyle told our team that we should experience the missions ourselves," Bateman said. "I recognized right off the bat how complex this program that they've put together is," she continued. "There are TV screens that are telling you what to do, there's lights and sound. Each child has their own computer. It's really complex all the things they've put together to make it a multi-sensory experience."

The Galileo is the only one of five simulators at the center that has the exterior representation of a space module.

The other four are built into the school campus, one of which doubles as a computer lab during the day.

When finished, the Galileo Mark VI will take the previous module's place in the school's cafeteria.

Together the five simulators can handle up to 60 students a day.

This trip to the fair was the first time the ship had been disassembled, moved and reassembled, and already the team is learning that the new model poses its own set of challenges.

Victor Williamson, the center's director, said the Galileo is merely an extension of a student-driven program that has been working for years to enhance the learning experience by simulating real-world situations.

"Instead of a unit taught out of a book, now there are simulations where students are thrown into experiences that are as close to real life as possible," Williamson said. "It takes longer to teach in a simulation, but the learning stays much longer than when it's taught in traditional methods."

The space center has hosted nearly 220,000 students, teachers and parents over the past 19 years.

"We put these kids in these adult roles, and they have adult situations," Herring said. "We do a really good job at throwing problems at them and doing it in such a way where we don't overstress them out. We have made kids cry before. There's a lot of stress on one of these missions because they have to work as a team."

Personal Log: Adrian Stevens, Quartermaster - Entry 8

This is just for fun. Any resemblance to people who work at the space center is intentional, although these characters aren't really them. Any resemblance to an actual mission is your imagination.

Aleta Clegg, desk slave for the space center Supreme High Commander of the Universe, and guest blogger

Personal Log: Adrian Stevens, Quartermaster - Entry 8

Del’Brugado spat curses as he retreated. “Take them!” He shoved his men our way.

They hesitated. Anyone with a touch of sense facing five angry Klingons would turn and run. Del’Brugado’s men had no sense. They muttered threats as they slowly advanced.

I raised the rifle and squeezed the trigger. Nothing happened. The marauder grinned, showing a prominent gold tooth. I charged forward, slamming the rifle butt against his teeth. He staggered, holding his now bleeding mouth. One of the Klingons picked him up, tossing him into the bulkhead. He crumpled to the floor.

I switched my hold on the rifle, grabbing the barrel. Another marauder ducked Rakrr, picking me as the easier target. I swung the rifle, crunching the butt into his skull. He dropped.

Another one grabbed me from behind. I kicked, scraping my boot along his shin. He howled and jumped but he didn’t let go. I tossed my head back, cracking it into his chin. He swore. I kicked again. He grabbed my elbows, pinning them back. He lifted me off my feet. I wriggled like an angry cat, kicking and screaming insults, too angry to feel the pain.

Another pirate attacked me, thinking me helpless. I landed my boot in his belly. He reeled into a Klingon fist and went down.

The man holding me shifted his grip just enough I could slip free. I turned on him, clawing his face and kicking his shins. He retreated with his hands held protectively in front. Hruk’Tal clobbered him from behind. I kicked him as he fell.

“Small, but fierce.” Hruk’Tal nodded his approval.

“Duck!” I launched myself to the side as a marauder opened fire.

Hruk’Tal roared as the beam bit into his arm. The thick sleeve of his coat smoldered. He spun, fists and feet flying. The marauder disappeared under a heap of angry Klingons.

“Clear for the moment.” Herring’s crisp voice cut through the sudden silence.

Hruk’Tal lifted the limp marauder. “What shall we do with these?”

“Lock them in a storage closet.” I slapped the closest door control panel.

“Kill them,” Rakrr growled. He spat Klingon insults and kicked the nearest unconscious body.

“They may have information we can use.” Herring stroked his chin. “We lock them up for now.”

Hruk’Tal motioned the Klingons to gather the marauders. “We kill only in the heat of battle.”

They shoved the pile of limp bodies into the storage closet after stripping off any useful weapons.

“How do we keep them from escaping?” Rakrr asked. “I see no lock.”

“Like this.” I wedged a knife stolen from a marauder under the door controls, popping it clear. I twisted the wires inside until they tore free. “No one’s going through that door until they put those back.”

“I trust you know how?” Herring raised his eyebrow.

I shrugged. “We leave that to Carroll and her crack troops. Where are they?”

The ship rocked.

“The ship is under attack. Now is the time to strike!” Hruk’Tal slammed his fist against his chest. “Today is a good day to die.”

“Not if I can help it,” I muttered.

The lights turned red. Sirens wailed through the hall. We staggered as the ship lurched. Smoke billowed from vents overhead.

“Shields are down,” Herring observed.

“We shall take the bridge.” Hruk’Tal raised his head and howled his battle cry.

“What about Taylor and the control unit?” I asked Herring.

“The shuttle bay is just down the hall. With this,” he shouldered a very large phase rifle, “I should be fine. Keep them distracted, Stevens.”

“Come, small warrior.” Rakrr clapped his hand on my back almost knocking me over. “We shall avenge our fallen comrades.”

All five Klingons howled, a hair-raising chorus. They raised their weapons over their heads. I lifted the belt knife into the air and howled along with them. I wanted my own share of payback.

Someone shot a pulse of phaser fire into the hall. The six of us charged towards it, howling all the way.

Del’Brugado had at least fifty troops on the ship. It took the Klingons less than an hour to beat them all senseless. We left them locked in rooms all over the ship. Del’Brugado barricaded himself on the bridge. That stopped the Klingons.

“We cannot breach the doors,” Rakrr complained after a fourth failed attempt to beat his way through.

Hruk’Tal raised his hand for silence, cocking his head to one side. “They are starting the engines.” His forehead ridges deepened as he frowned. “Small warrior, can you open a door or just lock one?”

“I can try.” I edged forward, peering around the corner. Del’Brugado wasn’t above taking potshots at us if we showed our faces.

The twenty feet of hall stretched empty to the closed door to the bridge. I wiped a nervous hand on my leg and clutched the knife tighter in my other hand. The Klingons crowded behind me, pushing me into the open. I ran for the door, the Klingons on my heels.

I popped the cover from the controls, twisting the knife under one edge. The tangle of wires inside mocked me. I yanked a handful free. Sparks spat from the panel.

“That did not open the door,” Hruk’Tal said.

“I’m guessing,” I snapped. “I’m not an engineer.” I tapped the bare ends of two wires together. Nothing happened. I tried another pair.

“This is taking much too long.” Rakrr tried to wedge his massive hands in the door to force it. The surface was too smooth, too tightly closed.

I shoved a handful of wires into another tangle. Lightning danced across the panel. I jerked my hands back, not fast enough to avoid a shock. Smoke billowed from the wall. The door slid open just far enough for Rakrr to jam his fingers inside. His muscles bulged as he shoved it open.

Phaser beams caught him, tossing him backwards. His hair smoked as he crashed to the floor of the ship. The other Klingons charged inside.

I dropped to my knees next to his limp body. I wasn’t sure where to check a Klingon for a pulse. He twitched, muttering guttural curses. I patted his shoulder. If he was still growling, he should recover. Klingons were tough.

I dove through the door into the chaotic bridge. The Klingons were beating the bridge crew. Del’Brugado edged away from the battle. I slipped behind him.

“I really don’t like you.” I slammed the pommel of the knife into his head. Del’Brugado, leader of the Fellucian Marauders, dropped like a rag doll.

I yanked his boots off, throwing them through the door into the hall. I used his tunic and trousers to tie him securely to the railing. He glared as I finished, waking up enough to yank at the bonds. I waggled the knife under his nose.

“Nice underwear. I hope you don’t mind everyone seeing it.” I grinned at his angry scowl.

“You’ll never...”

I shoved his socks into his mouth and tied them in place with his sash. “I think we won and you lost.”

“We have control of the ship,” Hruk’Tal announced. “Victory is ours!”

I joined in the chorus of Klingon howls.

***

Admiral Williamson steepled his fingers under his chin. I shuffled my feet, unnerved by his measuring stare.

“A most interesting report,” he said after a very lengthy silence. “Am I to understand that you have been granted the singular honor of receiving a Klingon warrior name?”

I blushed. The victory party on the bridge of the captured cargo ship had gotten slightly out of hand. Del’Brugado would never forgive us for the picture we’d sent long range to every contact listed in the ship records. The Klingons appreciated the joke.

“Klingons have a strange sense of humor, sir.”

“They claim it was your idea. They wanted you to have the credit.”

“That was generous of them.”

“They also requested you be sent as the Federation Ambassador to the Klingon Empire.” Admiral Williamson leaned back in his chair, rocking slightly. “I am almost tempted to send you.”

“I don’t know the first thing about diplomacy. I know supplies and a ship galley.” Me? Ambassador to the Klingons? I’d start a war within five minutes of arriving.

“We found a polite way to refuse. Tensions are high enough without adding you to the negotiation table.” He tilted his head, watching me like a bird eying a juicy worm. “Captain Herring requested you as his quartermaster. You are assigned to the Voyager. The refitting is almost complete.”

The Voyager, flown by Vasha and the handful of crew left aboard, had shown up just after Commander Carroll finished installing the remote driver for the cargo ship. We’d transferred prisoners to the Voyager and set course for Starbase 14 with the Galileo and the cargo ship.

“I’m afraid the Delphi project will have to be scrapped, though,” Williamson continued.

“What was Delphi?” I asked. He seemed in a mellow mood, maybe he’d answer.

“An experiment in AI controlled ships. We haven’t got the bugs worked out yet. So, your job is safe. We still need humans to fly our ships and humans require food. You have six hours before the Voyager leaves drydock. And, Stevens, prepare for a long flight. Captain Herring is investigating the marauders. They are too well organized for pirates.”

His chair thumped back into place as he bent over his paperwork.

I saluted the top of his balding head. Quartermaster on the Voyager under Captain Herring. What would he ask of me on the next mission? I shook my head, unable to even guess.

***

The story will continue in a new private mission, War Games, for the Odyssey and Galileo. It should be ready to fly by summer 2010.

If you enjoyed reading this, check out some of my other stories on www.jaletac.com