Watch this space! (get it?)

I met Buzz Aldrin. More to come.

Pushy Literary Theorist

I was honored and quite starstruck to do this interview with Mimi Smartypants recently. If you don't know who Mimi Smartypants is, leave this site and go to hers: www.mimismartypants.com. I'll see you back here in a week or so.

Back? Good. So you see why I like her so much. I was really curious to interview her because I have a lot of Questions and Ideas about what it means to be a writer in the Age of the Internet... As a writer of a Book, I'm constantly being told that books are not long for this world and that I am basically a throwback to a bygone era and may as well be churning butter by hand or setting cold type. So I was curious to talk about all this with a woman who is, to my mind, one of the very best writers working primarily on the internets.

But I failed to consider, in the course of preparing for and conducting this interview, that no artist (and I don't think it's a stretch to call Mimi Smartypants an artist) is really capable of analyzing her own work and her own place in the history of her genre. Of course, right? I mean, any artist who even likes trying to talk about such things is probably so wanky that you would never want to read their work. As Mimi puts it: "I do not have a lot of patience for people who have a grand manifesto about their creative activity." That.

Anyway, I hope I didn't permanently alienate myself from her good graces by pushing her on, for example, what sort of paper an undergraduate might be forced to write about her work in 2509.

I did, however, confirm that no-delete Thursday is real. It's real! Which blows my gourd. You don't want to see my no-delete anything, believe me.

I read a book.

On an earlier attempt at a blog, I started out recording the books that I read and my thoughts about them. Not formal reviews, just my off-the-cuff impressions. It was fun to record what I read this way, and to hear others' comments on books. But it wasn't long before this happened: I gave a book a meh review. I was disappointed because I really idolize the author and the whole book just didn't hold up to the genius I expected. Cut to me, several weeks later, shaking this author's hand at a bookstore reading, calculating how quickly I could get to a computer to erase (or edit) that review before The Author could see it. That was not a good feeling. So I haven't been doing the same on this blog.

But it occurs to me that I don't have to write reviews—I can just record what I read. All the better, since I seem to be unable to keep my Goodreads or Librarything updated... according to those sites, I haven't read a thing since my son was born but Goodnight Moon. Not that that book isn't a classic.

So in the spirit of this, I recently read:

Jeanette Walls, The Glass Castle
Junot Diaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
Jonathan Franzen, The Corrections
Margaret Atwood, The Edible Woman
Jim Keogh, Solving the Year 2000 Problem [guess which of these are research for my next book]
Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina [yes, again. What?]
Dave Cullen, Columbine

(I wanted to tell you how much I liked some for these because I forgot for a second that I'm not reviewing them. That will take some getting used to.)

I knitted something.

It's one of the great ironies of academic life: when we get lots of free time (I've been on leave since January) we actually feel that we have LESS time for non-work activities like updating blogs, reading for pleasure, home maintenance, and personal hygiene. This is because when you have unstructured time in which you are supposed to be doing something huge and insurmountable (in my case, writing my second novel) it feels like it's never acceptable to take the time to do anything else. After all, you're on leave! You should be producing! How many pages have you written today! Etc.

Anyway, that's sort of an excuse for how little I've been updating this blog lately, even with all the NASA news that's been going on. I hope to update you with my fascinating thoughts about recent goings-on when I get the chance (probably, when I get back to a normal teaching schedule).

For the time being, please enjoy one non-work-related thing I've managed to get done: I knitted matching sweaters for a colleague's newborn twins. Knitting might seem as though it should fall into the above non-work category, but knitting is what I do when I watch Netflix movies with my Associate in the evening, and so knitting projects have been continuing apace. Coming next: a hand-knitted reusable Swiffer cover. Oh, no, I'm not kidding.

MOSTLY FICTION Review

http://www.mostlyfiction.com/contemp/dean.html

This is a great site. Their "you might also enjoy" algorithm kicked up books about space I had not previously been aware of and am now totally going to read.

The Death of the Book!!! (dun dun dun)

You know what I'm talking about, right? Every other item I see in a magazine or on the Internets, especially among my Facebook buddies, is about how publishing and bookstores as we know them are ending, in a flaming mushroom cloud, right now. The publishers are completely freaking about how bad business is and they are preparing for things to get even worse. The main way they are preparing, it seems, is by publishing fewer and fewer of the kinds of books my friends and I care about. The remaining entrenched independent bookstores to survive the nineties are now starting to go belly-up one by one. Borders is trying to sell out, but no one wants to buy them, including Barnes & Noble. Often that Reading at Risk study by the NEA is cited at some point.

Scholars, there's nothing I can say to argue with any of this, as these are facts. And as a professional consumer AND producer of literature, I'm not in a place to take any of it lightly. If publishing and bookselling and, lordhelpus, libraries were to stop being what they are, that would be really bad for me and the people and things that I value. I'm working on another book right now, and I hope that at such time as I might finish it, some publisher will be willing to spend money to make paper copies of it, and that some bookstore might spend money to stock some of those copies on shelves-- both of which seem like sketchier propositions by the day.

But here's what bothers me about the way we tend to talk about this: I generally hear a tone that I'd describe as decrying— you know, decrying the plight of literature. But my question is: whom are we decrying?

We can't possibly blame the bookstores themselves for going under—if any of their decisions have led to their desctruction, it's their tenacity in continuing to devote floorspace to poetry instead of High School Musical DVDs. We might like to blame publishers, but the same argument sort of holds, right? Even if they have been reacting to declining sales by throwing more money at less literary books, it's in an effort to continue publishing books, which after all, is what we want.

The only people left to blame are the people who don't buy books, and this is what makes me squeamish. It makes me feel like we (you know, we consumers and producers of literature) are huddled in a little latte-sipping mob, sniping at the Philistines who should be spending their money on $24.95 literary hardcovers instead of Xboxes. And that's just troubling to me on a number of levels. One being that every new technology has pissed off the devotees of the technology that came before it, the purists (or Luddites, take your pick) who champion (cling to) the noble (outdated) medium they feel gives their art meaning. The first example to spring to mind is the people who freaked over Gutenberg's moveable type because it made irrelevant the skills of calligraphers and illiminators(?) who had theretofore cornered the market on bookmaking. And I get that, the clinging to the beautiful manuscripts, but I get even more the unstoppable force and undeniable democratic appeal of moveable type, which made knowledge available to more people, more cheaply, thereby changing the world forever. For the good, I think we can all agree.

I guess what I'm saying is that if people aren't buying books, it's not because they're stupid, it's because books, as a technology, are over. (One could make an argument that if you agree to live in a capitalist society, you must accept all of the results of capitalism, but I won't argue that.) I do believe that The People, in making these changes, are never stupid, scholars, even if beautiful things might get trampled in the process. I know, I know, if I think books are over why have I chosen to work in that medium and devoted my day job life to helping the young to read and write in that medium? I guess I hope that the art form itself is not really over, but there's a major transition, an upheaval, going on in the way people want to experience narratives. It's this transition that seems so badly glossed over and misunderstood by the sort of facile "oh god soon books will be completely replaced by [fill in ridiculous philistine invention here]." I tend not to be on the side of arguments that take that tone, a tone that, frankly, has not a small whiff of classism mixed in.

Because we, even we who do the decrying, watch TV and watch movies that come to us on DVDs in little red envelopes and play Wii and read the Times online and talk on the phone and type our musings into blogs rather than manuscripts intended to become paper books. WE do. We spend more time doing these things than we do reading words on paper (or we would if you don't count our day jobs). So I feel like we should take our noses out of the air and think about how to find a place for literature as we know it in and among a wash of newer media, all of which turn out some art and some crap, without blaming people for failing to uphold our preferred dying medium. WE should take the responsibility for helping the narratives we value (the ones based on words) survive somewhere in this ecosystem, rather than just copping Sorrowful (and Superior).

You know what I mean? No, you think I'm way off. I can tell.

IT'S CHALLENGER ANNIVERSARY DAY

Can you believe that another January 28 is upon us?

This year I am thinking about a new era for the US government— especially with respect to one of my favorite government agencies, NASA. Our friends in the spaceflight industry have been spooked by the new President's lack of a clear position on funding for NASA, and Obama has freaked everyone out a couple of times by, for example, suggesting that the moon-to-Mars project could be pushed back five years in order to free up money for troubled public schools and asking how much would be saved by canceling the Ares 1 project altogether. The verbs are important here: he is not "announcing" or "demanding," but "suggesting" and "asking." I think Obama is testing the waters, trying to figure out whether we the people who elected him would like to see expensive space projects canceled in a show of frugality, or whether we want to see money spent that will create jobs and build pride in the nation. And this "pride in the nation" thing is not an abstract concept I'm throwing about— the United States has achieved more in spaceflight than any other country, and with VERY few resources—we are taking about half of one percent of the federal budget. And don't let the false either-or about spaceflight vs. school funding scare you, either. For instance, we could SPEND MONEY ON BOTH. We have the money to spend.

Last week, everyone I knew was fired up by an inauguration in a way that I have never seen before in my life. Even those who are completely cynical about politics and the federal government are peeking out of their irony caves to sniff the air, and scholars, they are picking up the scent of hope. Be the Change? Yes We Can? These should sound cheesy, but they don't, because they are delivered with sincerity and because those messages are badly needed right now. President Obama: now is a great time to show the world that our government respects SCIENCE once again. Now is a great time to spend money that will create and maintain jobs in many fields in many states, and now is definitely a great time to give us all something uniquely American to be proud of.

Most of the Challenger astronauts stated at one time or another that, should they die in an accident on a flight, they would want spaceflight to go on. So today, with this in mind, I'm going to use the swanky new contact tools on www.whitehouse.gov to share my views on this.

The Columbia Accident Report

This is more interesting than I thought it would be.

The language has a strange combination of bluntness and evasiveness that readers of the Kerwin Report on Challenger will find eerily familiar. Readers of The Time It Takes to Fall will remember that Dr. Kerwin examined the wreckage of Challenger's crew cabin and the crews' remains in order to speculate on the possible causes of the crew's deaths. Before this report was released, everyone assumed that the astronauts had died instantly at the moment of the explosion, but the Kerwin report exposed the fact that they (probably) survived the explosion and (probably) were still alive when the crew cabin impacted the surface of the ocean. The suggestion that the crew all blacked out instantly from depressurization is, while comforting, far from certain—the report includes this disturbing passage (actually a bullet point, because NASA loves the bullet points):

• The crew seats and restraint harnesses showed patterns of failure which demonstrates that all the seats were in place and occupied at water impact with all harnesses locked. This would likely be the case had rapid loss of consciousness occurred, but it does not constitute proof.

The new Columbia report reflects the same fascination with consciousness or lack thereof; once again we are told that the crew blacked out when the cabin depressurized, possibly sparing them the suffering of being thrown about in the crew cabin, exposed to heat or cold, and knowing what was to occur. Students of Challenger can be forgiven for being skeptical about this comforting possibility. What went wrong with Columbia probably developed gradually (re-entry is a very slow process) and it's hard to imagine that the crew somehow escaped understanding what was going wrong.

In DailyTech, which you might have missed if you aren't an enormous geek, a debate emerged in the Comments area over the funds and effort expended on this study. Many readers felt that there's no point in pinpointing exactly what went wrong and why. These readers especially questioned the Report's deep interest in the crew's pressure suits and restraint harnesses, both of which seemed to have failed badly. Nothing to be gained by this further information, these readers say, and some go a step further to speculate that this report is timed to make NASA look bad just as Obama takes office in order to justify his slashing of their budget. (Question to DailyTech conspiracy theorists: wait, why is NASA releasing this report to justify their own budget slashing? Please advise.)

To me, the reason the expense and effort are justified seems obvious. But I'll let N. Wayne Hale, Jr., a former head of the shuttle program, answer for me. He said in the Times:

“I call on spacecraft designers from all the other nations of the world, as well as the commercial and personal spacecraft designers here at home, to read this report and apply these lessons which have been paid for so dearly.”

THAT'S why.

Breaking News

Scholars! You will never believe who I met last week: astronaut Jack Schmitt, Lunar Module Pilot on Apollo 17. I am still breathless from this encounter (literally: I was fighting a bad cold to begin with, and scraping myself out of bed to meet Dr. Schmitt seems to have turned me toward the bronchitis/plague end of the sickness spectrum. But enough complaining).

Dr. Schmitt is friends with University of Tennessee professor of geology Larry Taylor, who invites him here to speak periodically. The two met when they were both geology consultants on early Apollo missions, teaching the astronauts how to gather samples of lunar rocks and dust. NASA then tapped Schmitt to become the first scientist astronaut, and (depending on how you define it*) the last man on the moon. Professor Taylor was kind enough to invite me to meet with Dr. Schmitt one-on-one before his lecture in the Earth and Planetary Sciences department. Well, scholars, you can imagine my anticipation. What would you ask a man who had walked on the moon, given the chance? 

*Both Schmitt and Apollo 17 Commander Gene Cernan can be defined as "the last man on the moon" because Schmitt was the last to set foot on the moon (he was the first off the Lunar Module) and Cernan was the last to leave the lunar surface.

As you can see here, Dr. Schmitt is a delightful man. He seems quite young for his age (born in 1935, but looks like he's in his mid-50s) and was very friendly and open to meeting people (not just me, but everyone who showed up for his talk). He seems to truly enjoy talking about lunar origin theories, possible future landing sites on the moon, the political and technological feasibility of returning to the moon, and his own experience going to the moon— which is a good thing, because he's been talking about these subjects whether he likes it or not probably every day since his mission ended in December 1972.

I tried not to act like a starstruck fangirl, scholars, but it was hard to restrain myself, because—I'm not sure if I've been totally clear on this—Jack Schmitt actually TRAVELED TO THE MOON IN A SPACESHIP and then donned a spacesuit to WALK ON THE SURFACE OF THE MOON. When we shook hands, I fear I may have held on a bit too long, because I was reflecting to myself that his hand, the hand I was at that moment shaking, HAS BEEN ON THE MOON.

I gave Dr. Schmitt a copy of my book, because as you'll recall, scholars, he was mentioned in it by name. Apollo 17, as the last mission of NASA's great golden age, was something of a touchstone in the book—after that flight, there were no more manned missions until 1981 with the first test flight of the space shuttle. In fact, I set Dolores's birthdate as December 11, 1972, specifically to coincide with Apollo 17 for symbolic effect. Anyway, Dr. Schmitt seemed to appreciate the longing that people of my generation feel for the missions of the past, and the promise that seemed to be inherent in Apollo (that promise, of course, has gone unfulfilled (like so many promises made by one generation to the next)).

But what was odd about our conversation was the extent to which our interests in spaceflight almost don't overlap at all. As you know, I started learning about NASA history by way of the Challenger disaster, and my now voluminous (though random and dubiously researched) scope of knowledge centers mostly around the subtopics SPACE SHUTTLE HISTORY, SPACE DISASTERS, CULTURAL IMPLICATIONS OF ABOVE, and GENERAL AESTHETIC AWESOMENESS OF SPACEFLIGHT. This last category encompasses much more material from the Apollo era than from the space shuttle era — going to the moon was simply grander, cooler, more unlikely, and more beautiful, than anything else ever accomplished by humans. Je m'interesse de ça. One of the finer examples being this photograph:

You've seen this before. In fact, NASA speculates that this is the most reproduced image in human history. Next time you come across an image of the earth used in an ad, textbook, movie, matchbook etc., look closely for Africa and Antartica in these positions—chances are good that you are seeing the Blue Marble. Dr. Schmitt took this photograph (probably). 

What is fascinating is that Dr. Schmitt does not seem to take the same interest in the GENERAL AESTHETIC AWESOMENESS OF SPACEFLIGHT that I do. He seems to think the point of the Apollo flights was to learn more about the moon. He's not wrong, of course, and it's sensible that he would think this, since he's a geologist and his way in to the Apollo project was as an expert on the moon as a physical object. I thought it was generally accepted that Americans in the sixties supported the Apollo program to the extent that they did not because they wanted to know what the moon was made out of, but because 1) they wanted to beat the Russians and 2) going to the moon was fun and beautiful to watch (keep in mind that 1 and 2 were reversed for many Americans). Neither Dr. Schmitt nor I care a fig about 1, but he seems not to care much about 2 either, and 2 is pretty much where I hang my hat as a space enthusiast.

Of course, we did find some common ground. Dr. Schmitt and I chatted about the possibility of returning to the moon (he has actually written a book on this subject) and what it would take to gather the money and political will necessary. Dr. Schmitt feels (as I do) that government has to play a central role in spaceflight, but there also has to be an incentive for private enterprise to get involved, and Dr. Schmitt believes that helium-3 mining on the moon could offer a new energy source and provide enough incentive for energy companies to invest in travel to the moon to get it. I couldn't help but think back to the outlandish claims of how the space shuttle would "pay for itself" through private enterprise (and the space shuttle was a lot cheaper to operate than a mission to the moon will be), but whatever—if this kind of talk gives politicians the confidence/political cover they need to vote "yes" on a multibillion dollar appropriation for NASA, then that's fine. (In recent weeks, I can't help thinking that if Obama has the guts to bring back a WPA-style big-pending project, a moon shot could be a great mood-lifting jobs-creating component, couldn't it? Who's with me?)

What else? I asked Dr. Schmitt what he thinks about the alarmingly high (and growing) number of young Americans who believe the moon landings were faked (or harbor a significant amount of skepticism). My least intelligent moment in our conversation came right about here: I asked him what he tells people who are skeptical, and he said, in a slightly I'll-say-this-slowly-because-you're obviously-not-too-bright voice, "Well, I just tell them about my personal experience of going to the moon. And if they choose to think I'm a liar, I can't do anything about that." Well, yeah, I guess, that's a good answer. I wish I could use the phrase "my personal experience of going to the moon" in a sentence, don't you? Maybe I'll start trying to work it in.

Dr. Schmitt did agree with me that young people can be forgiven for their credulousness to some extent because, as unlikely at is seems that such a hoax could be perpetrated, it seems even less likely, to people who didn't witness it, that we managed to send human beings to walk on the moon and brought them back safely nearly 40 years ago, especially considering that we are not capable of doing so now. If you are an Occam's razor type person, and ask which one requires more assumptions, you can be forgiven for having trouble choosing. I was surprised that Dr. Schmitt did not seem as frustrated by the hoax credulousness as I am, signaling as it does a dwindling personal connection to these accomplishments on the part of America as a nation (I can become quite patriotic on this topic, scholars). Being a pragmatist, he has his sights set on going back to the moon ASAP and doesn't sit around worrying (as I do, obviously) about the cultural implications of the number of years it's been since we went last time. 

Oh, scholars. It fills me with shame to ponder how long it's been since I've caught up with you.

And so much has happened! The Time It Takes to Blog HQ has officially moved to Tennessee, where, you'll be pleased to know, the Time It Takes family is enjoying more square footage in the family compound, a Krispy Kreme right around the corner, and shorts weather right up through yesterday.

What else? Well, this happened. Scholars, I know this article is supposed to be a bit tongue-in-cheek, but am I wrong for thinking it's just as important to have achieved the election a president who is an Intellectual American as  it is to have broken the Nonwhite American barrier? And don't get me started about the non-issue of the non-election of the first Feminine American president.

I've also found it interesting to follow the coverage of Obama's likely NASA policies vs. McCain's... among the spacegeek blogs, a typical assumption seems to be that Obama would "spread NASA's wealth" from manned spaceflight to... I don't know... health care for underprivileged children, or something. Because that's what Obama's fixin to do with everybody's wealth, is spread it. This may be because space geeks tend to be conservatives (or conservatives masquerading as libertarians—you know who you are) so the assumption is that liberals=bad. But ahem, which party was it that produced the President who started it all in 1961, the before-this-decade-is-out President?

As you know, scholars, The Time It Takes to Blog is a nonpartisan blog, but the fact is that not one of the candidates of either party could have achieved the confusing combination of apathy and spendiness produced by the the Bush administration, with their wishy-washy lack of interest in what will replace the space shuttle (a mere 14 months from now!) combined with their kooky manned Moon/Mars plan. So in other words, there's nowhere to go but up. (Get it?) Also: as with so many other things, it's not really up to the President how much money NASA gets or what they do. And historically, having more Democrats in Congress is not always bad for NASA. (Confusingly, lots of Republicans aren't necessarily bad for NASA either).

What else? I've knitted several things and forgotten to take pictures of them. I have a great batch of new writing students. Some space shuttles have launched. 

More soon, I hope...

I knitted something

What is it, you ask? Why, it's an iPhone cozy, of course.















I think I invented it.

Hello, Scholars! Sorry for the long absence-- there has been a lot of drama here at Time It Takes to Blog HQ, with our impending move to Tennessee. Turns out, there are still mortgages to be had, but man they do make you sign a lot of papers.

What did I miss? A successful launch, a new lab for the International Space Station, a six-hour spacewalk, and toilet problems on the ISS. Scholars, I cannot convey to you the thoroughness of the breathless play-by-play coverage of the toilet's breakdown, possible causes thereof, possible fixes for, and finally the long-awaited treatment: new parts sent aboard Discovery on Saturday. Judging from the coverage, scholars, you'd think the toilet was the most important news, eclipsing all other events. What is it about bathrooms in space that so fascinate the space media? They tell us that bathroom-related questions are the most frequently asked, but I can't help but think this sort of coverage is partially to blame. Combine the bathroom fixation with that old media standby, NASA screwing up, and you've got a hit on your hands with this story. We're lucky the successful launch of Discovery made it into the papers at all.

Seriously?

Is there really no way to launch a space shuttle without crap hitting the orbiter? The astronauts are now spending their first day on Endeavour checking for damage to the nose rather than the more traditional activities, choreographing zero-g dance routines and throwing up.

In other news: The Time It Takes to Fall has been named one of New York Public Library's Books for the Teen Age. Most of the books chosen for this are marketed as Young Adult. So it's especially an honor that they had to seek mine out for this. Librarians are so cool.

Largehearted Boy

I am a guest blogger this week at Largehearted Boy, a very cool music blog. He invites authors of recent books to write about music that is relevant to the book in some way. I really enjoyed putting together a playlist of Dolores's favorite songs from 1985-1986 and writing about why she loves them.

Also see the playlist (missing some of the songs due to copyright) at iTunes.

Guest blogging

I'm a guest blogger today on Tom's Astronomy Blog, a very cool blog about spaceflight and (mostly planetary) astronomy. He's got great graphics up there every day. I so admire bloggers who update every day.

Check it out!

HAPPY PAPERBACK RELEASE DAY!

That's right, today's the day the paperback is officially released. Go down to your local bookstore and demand to know its whereabouts.

The paperback includes a Reading Group Guide, which I will include here for your perusal just as soon as I get the chance.

Paperback buzz

The paperback release of The Time It Takes to Fall is this week, scholars! Can you believe it's been a year since the hardcover was released upon an unsuspecting populace? Now you can buy it again in a smaller, lighter format, with a shiny foil effect on the cover and a Reading Group Guide!

This week the book is featured on Authorbuzz. Enter to win a free copy of the paperback or just share the Buzz.

I had lunch with George Saunders today.

That's all-- just one more thing I can check off the lifetime to-do list.

Challenger anniversary

Can you believe it's been twenty-two years?

Lately I'm surprised by how little memorializing there is when this day comes around... even for the nice round numbers like the twentieth anniversary. Maybe this is because most Americans alive now are too young to remember Challenger, or Reagan, or a real recession (but that's another post).

Today I'm thinking about the grown children of the Challenger crew, who are now in their late twenties to mid thirties. It must be odd to look back on this day and think about a parent they may not remember clearly any more. I hope they know that many of us who saw the disaster as children still look up to their parents and still remember what happened that January 28.