It’s been an interesting past month for me. I took the month "off" from the TPCUG and went on vacation. My son and his family were visiting, and we did some Disney and some other Florida things. One was a trip to Titusville to see a satellite launch. I had researched at the NASA web site and came up with a good one because it was to go off at near 6 PM, and we’d be watching from the west so the missile would be highlighted by the sun just after liftoff. It was perfect. A couple of days later my wife and I decided to look at the Apollo 13 movie we had on tape. We lived in Cape Canaveral during those days and were pretty involved in it, and I have to say I really choke up when I see that film.

Hold on – I’m getting to the computer part. .. .. .. I was watching the film and was reminded that the trajectory numbers had to be moved from the Command Module’s "computer" to the Lunar Module "computer" by hand. I was once again reminded that the whole computing power in the entire array of space equipment wouldn’t be greater than a Commodore 128K computer of 1986. Probably not any more than some baby toys of today. And how lucky I am that I’m able to program a computer, and even that I’ve actually built some number of them. Wow, isn’t life great?

I need to remind you again as always … we need to bring in new members. Remember there’s a prize for bringing in the most members. So harass your friends and neighbors; make a nuisance of yourselves and drag some new faces in. See you at the next meeting. u