The Troubadour

Megan Warner and Dustin Robison in the Voyager Control Room

Hello Troops,
How about another stroll through the Space EdVentures YahooGroup archives? I'm working slowing thorough all my old posts in my first Space Center blog before The Troubadour. We've reached the end of March and the first week of April, 2001. The people and simulators mentioned in the posts below:
Voyager, Magellan, Galileo, Odyssey, and Falcon. Aaron Yeager, Admiral Schuler, Aaron Yeager, Scott Slaugh, Brian Hawkins, Brad Cummings, Mitch Comfort, Lorraine Houston, Soren Seibach, James Porter, Stephen Porter, Kyle Herring, Matt Long, Jameson McDougal, Bryson Lystrup, Brady Young.

Josh Babb Training the Voyager's Left Wing Officers

Historical Post: Great Daytime Fieldtrip Staff. Central Getting All New Electricals. A Dead Mouse in the Ships. A Live Mouse in the Ships. Mrs. Houston's Desserts. The USS Falcon, What a Pain in the You Know What!

March 31, 2001

Hello Troops,
Just a few thoughts on this last week.
1. Smith Grocery store food poisoned me. What a way to suffer through an overnight mission. I bought some lunch meat and ate it before the overnight mission and paid dearly for it. It's Saturday evening right now and I'm still suffering. This isn't anything a couple of photon torpedoes launched from orbit into the PG store wouldn't handle.
2. A special thank you once again to our great daytime staff for working an entire week without 1 day off. We usually have 1 business day per week but I gave in to a teacher's crying a month ago and gave away the day off this last week. The school that we gave up the day for didn't even come prepared! The kids were not briefed for the mission and didn't even have boarding passes. Again, nothing a few photon torpedoes can't handle from a passing starship. Of course, the targeting would have to pinpoint a few classrooms at 2:00 A.M. in the morning in Huntsville, Utah. What a fireball that would make. Wake up the whole town. I'll bet they never forget their boarding passes again.
3. Summer registration are pouring in. Last week we deposited over $10,000 in registrations.

Central Elementary

4. The contractor that will be putting in the new ceilings and electrical features in Central School was by this last week. He has some great ideas for the school and the space center also. The Voyager will have a new dropped ceiling with recessed fluorescent lights and track lights running along the walls. The Magellan will also get new lighting and a new ceiling. In addition to the new lights in the ceiling the contractor said they would put lights in on the stairs - kind of like the lights in the carpet at a movie theater. This will be the coolest!
5. A special congratulations to Aaron Yeager of our daytime staff. Aaron is also a flight director for the Odyssey. Aaron was just accepted into UVSC's flight school. Aaron begins training to become an airline pilot next month. You Go Aaron!
6. District electricals came and fixed the blue bulb burn out problem in the Voyager. We are still waiting for the Voyager's smoke machine to be cleaned and repaired. (hint hint Kyle)

Kyle Herring Not Happy Being Reminded of the absent Voyager smoke machine

7. We found a mouse again in the briefing room. Again, nothing a photon torpedo can't take care of.
8. The Odyssey crew think there is a dead mouse somewhere in the Odyssey control room. See, I told you there was nothing a photon torpedo couldn't handle. So, if you work an Odyssey mission this week and smell an interesting aroma please rest assured it is not a new aftershave lotion your flight director is wearing.
11. You don't know how unlucky you are! On Wednesday Mrs. Houston brought one of her award-winning fresh apple pies and ice cream. Now, don't go getting wrong ideas. We really do work hard during the day. It is only an evil rumor that we sit around and eat good food. That rumor is being spread by Mr. William Schuler as he tries to deflect attention from what he really does all day!!! :)

The USS Falcon in Central's Cafeteria: Bubble one is the Bridge. Bubble Two is the Lounge.

12. The Falcon crew told me that as they took the Falcon apart after the overnight mission that this was one of the worst flights they ever worked. The Falcon was beset with problems throughout the mission. Then we read the reviews and saw that the kids really did like the mission and didn't realize there were problems. Now, if the Falcon can pull off those kind of reviews for what they thought was a terrible mission then why do the rest of us knock ourselves out for perfection and get the same reviews as the Falcon. Life isn't fair! But.... as I've always said - nothing a photon torpedo can't take care of.
13. We have the best staff and volunteer of any organization in the world (except the Peace Corps). Maybe I shouldn't compare ourselves to them. Afterall - the Peace Corps! Peace and the Space Center? The Space Center, where everyone wants a phaser for himself and two for his ego.
14. I'm feeling the rumblings of my stomach so I'd better prepare to make a quick trip to the water closet.

Well there it is. An overview of last week at the Space Center.

THE SPACE CENTER: TAKING THE WORLD ONE MISSION AT A TIME.

THAT IS ALL.........................................

Mrs. Houston Responds to the Post Above

Anyone (Admiral Schuler) who spreads evil rumors about the daytime staff not working hard is going to get a four hundred pound twinkie beamed directly into their living room inside out! Especially after a five day week of 33 to 35 students.
Yes, we do get to enjoy good food once in a while and we deserve it! I reserve the right to bake anything I want, whenever I want, and give it to whomever I choose. And If you want to be the recipient of any of it then don't pass ugly rumors.
Simply,
MOM

Historical Post: Staff Discounts on the Simulators, 2001 Prices

April 1, 2001

Hello Troops,
Scott Slaugh asked about the current discounted prices for the simulators for Voyagers and Blue Shirts for every 300 pts earned. Prices for the 2.5 hour missions.

Voyager: No discounted prices.
Magellan: $62.00
Odyssey: $40.00
Galileo: $25.00
Falcon: No private Missions.

Again, Any of you that will not use your discounted flights please go to the poll and offer them to another volunteer that needs them.

Thank you.
Mr. Williamson

Historical Post: Congratulations to the Programming Guild

April 1, 2001

Hello Troops,
I would like to take a minute to comment on something I saw this last Wednesday. I was at my desk when our Hypercard teacher, Brian Hawkins, came in and told me I had to come in and see what was happening in the advanced class.

Brian Hawkins on the Magellan's Bridge at the Captain's Station

I was amazed at what I saw!

Scott Slaugh is working on the coolest way to detect cloaked ships. This program will be an excellent addition to the Voyager's science station.

Mitch Comfort was working on a new form of tracking patients in the Voyager sickbay so the Dr. will know when to give out the tickets.

Matt Long was creating a new sensor station "radar". This is impressive, to say the least. This "radar" screen will show multiple targets: targets that can change position and can also fire on the ship showing the incoming torpedo.

I also received an email from Brad Cummings telling me of his new ideas.

My congratulations to Brian Hawkings and his students. These up and coming programmers are coming up with really impressive stacks that will keep the Center at the peak of "coolness" for several years to come.

Mr. Williamson

Historical Post: Falcon Simulator Headaches and New Computers

April 2, 2001

From the Desk of Admiral Schuler

As you all know Falcon is a joy to set up and the Mac's in it are, shall we say, less than state of the art. That's OK, the alternative of using the intel PC's in conjunction with Timbuktoo(?) and Hyperstudio are more frightening than our clunky Mac's. I generally set up the
network in Falcon and since I have color coded the cables and hubs it has substantially reduced set up time, and more importantly frustration. Just make sure modules 1,2,and 3 are in the right position or the color coding makes no sense, but only an idiot would do something that stupid (hrumph!).

Setting up the Falcon for the Overnight Camps was a real pain. This was taken just before the bubble was inflated and stretched over the control cases.

Our big problem last Friday was (as usual) the communications computer, one that has consistently been giving us trouble. All of the other computers worked fine. A few of the computers have been problems and we are in the process of replacing those units. When that is done we should have the networking problem under control.

Randy Jepperson and Mark Daymont operating the USS Falcon

The eventual solution will, of course, be iMac's networked via an airport; that will reduce setup and take down by half and improve our ability to do multiple missions. But that will be down the road quite a ways. The sooner the better as far as I am concerned. But until then
these old Mac's are fine. Our current machines are plenty fast enough for our purposes. Even these old Macs offer a networking and programming solution, superior to that of what we would have had to do to get the PC's to do what we want. New is great but living with what you have is reality.

That is all,
Admiral Schuler

Inside the Falcon

Historical Post: A Tribute to the Simulator's Doctors and Engineers, Blue Shirts and The Rest

April 3, 2001

Hi,
This is a tribute to all the doctor dudes, engineer dudes, blue shirts etc. etc. who make the space center a nicer experience. I mean, what would an intruder alert be without the doctor dude running around screaming "we're all gonna' die!", or the help of the blue shirts with
the engineer while tex is saying "balance that power"(I've never been the engineer before, but I hear it is, on some ships, very hard.)? They are all great because they all know basically what is happening. Plus, those who need to act are good at acting, and those who need to do the techno-stuff do a good job.
A Volunteer

Historical Post: A Magellan Update, New Training Tapes! New Controls! All Hail the Magellan!

April 7, 2001

Hello Troops,

I along with many people have been asking will it ever be possible to finish the programming in the Magellan? Will the program ever function properly? Will I ever stop nagging Soren to fix things over and over again?

On the Magellan Bridge

It is my pleasure to announce that the Magellan program is officially complete. All modifications have been made and all have been tested. Many thanks go to Mr. Soren Siebach and Mr. Stephen Porter for their constant assistance and for their dedication to stick with this project for the last 6 months.

The Magellan's Bridge

It is also my pleasure to announce that as of today the Magellan now has training tapes. This is going to cut down training time considerably. Special thanks go to Mr. Stephen Porter, Mr. James Porter and Mr. Soren Siebach. Five hours making training tapes and fixing computer bugs is not something that anyone wants to do on a Saturday after an overnighter, but they hung in there and we completed it.

Just a little news from the Magellan.

Mr. Williamson

Historical Post: Surviving an Overnight Working as Mr. Williamson's IIFX Person.

April 8, 2001

Hello Troops,
We had another good week at the Center.

1. Congratulations to the Magellan team that stayed late into Saturday to finish the Magellan. The Magellan will be much better with the training tapes and the stressed tested programs. Thank you to Stephen and James Porter, Soren Seibach, and Brady Young.

2. The Galileo's amp has gone to the big simulator in the sky. Mr. Herring will be out shopping for a replacement. Speaking of speaker systems - it was discovered that the Magellan's two subwoofers haven't been working for quite a long time. The Flight Directors couldn't understand why their deep dark bad guy voices sounded like a screaming Boy Scout just entering puberty! What a relief to discover the truth.

3. We had three missions that started with a crew and flight director but no Voyager or Pioneer volunteers! Yes my friends, three missions where the assigned worker didn't show up! Just a word of friendly advice to all our workers - the fastest way to get off the boss' Christmas and promotion list is to miss a flight without some kind of notice. A special thank you to Jameson and Katie for filling in for our no-shows.

The (orginial) entrance to the Odyssey

4. Mr. Yeager was true to form on Friday afternoon. He set the Space Center record for getting the loudest screams from any crew in the Odyssey. Several of us were in the briefing room as his creature burst through the replicator to attack the unsuspecting crew. It was delightful to see and hear.

Aaron Yeager today

5. The Voyager still doesn't have its smoke machine back from repair. Wait...... I guess it is still sitting behind the gift shop counter in pieces......(Hint, Hint, Kyle)

6. Bryson Lystrup did a great job working the bridge of the Voyager. Mitch Comfort had his first experience working 2nd chair during the Voyager overnight mission. He was still shaking when he left nearly 2 hours after the overnighter. I'm not that bad am I Mitch? Am I? OK, so I'm focused. Just how focused was I? Well, it was a rough command crew - at least give me that one. Thanks, Mitch and Soren. You haven't really worked at the Space Center until you've sat in my second chair and lived to tell the tail

Well troops, I'm going to play a game of pool. Thank for all you do and I'll see you soon.

Mr. Williamson

The Imaginarium

Making the Holiday Extraordinary