Found in Flickr Commons range of free-to-use photos (not just space photos, but also vintage-ish old-school pictures) I was struck by this mesmerizing picture. Look at it? Doesn’t it make you and your daily troubles feel small? Are you complaining about the weather or having caught up a cold (just like I did)?

Guess what compared to the size of the average daily “problem,” this nebula somehow gets to blow things out of proportions (citing The Joker from Batman The Dark Knight)….

So if the Eagle Nebula doesn’t humble you, maybe you really are in a pickle. A pickle larger than this whole star-creating massive aggregation of matter, that is.

The Eagle Nebula (M16): Peering Into the Pillars of Creation (A nearby star-forming region about 7,000 light years from Earth.) · photo by Smithsonian Institution on flickr.com

I really get excited when I get twitter updates on the Mars mission Phoenix. As I said, space and the vast universe, we are planted in like a seed, lures me away with an even vaster fascination.

Also I wonder if we are all ever get to enjoy space tourism. According to the quote attached below, the future belongs to those who take off from Earth and head some place free from forces that kept us on Planet Earth from birth on.

The future belongs to those who can rise above the confines of the earth. (Alfred North Whitehead, English mathematician & philosopher, 1861 - 1947)

The Unisphere · Also a nice wallpaper! Click to get it in the orginal file size · by eqqman

Sputnik went “beep … beep” and yelled out loud: “IT’S ON”

Once upon a time, there was a satellite weighting 84 kilogram*. Produced by a country, that nobody would have ever expected to be able to kick off a competition, namely the Cold War (I am well aware that this was not the only reason why there was such a thing as the cold war, but still, I am sure it contributed to the whole broiling situation between the US and Sowjet Union). Russia was the first to send a satellite (that was capable of making “beep … beep … beep“) into the Earth’s orbit 50 years ago.

If you ask me the satellite wasn’t just sending “beep”s to Earth. It rather was screaming “It’s on” to Western space agency, NASA. In modern face-book-terms the Western world, considering themselves as more modern that anything else, was b!t@h-slapped. Their reaction? A Race For Space. Due to a lack of scientists, the government had to invest into reforming the school system putting an emphasis on science (Physics&Co, subjects that we take as granted). Their motivation was caused by a striving to catch up with the Sowjets. And wait, there’s a shocker: Both sides realized that satellites could (they are, indeed) useful for rocket launching/controlling.