Lee_Ars

NASA contractors involved in all aspects of program support obviously use Excel, and a successful launch has a monstrous number of dependencies that don't directly relate to the happenings on Pad 39.

I've had to put in a frantic call to a vendor before because an issue with one of our site internet uplinks arose about an hour before the launch, and if the uplink wasn't functional, we wouldn't be in compliance with our mission support obligations and either the countdown would have to go into a hold or we'd have to shift our support ops to a backup site.

Having lived in that world for a decade, I completely get how what appears to be a rando Excel support ticket from Missoula, Montana could turn out to have flight-critical impacts. NASA's support sites are spread all over teh place in order to peanut butter that sweet government funding to as many districts as possible.

Source: worked at Boeing's Houston site and provided ISS & shuttle program support.

edit - thanks for the gold, kind rocket-loving stranger! By way of return payment, here's a small imgur album of pix I took the last time I was at the old Apollo Mission Control room in building 30 at JSC. (These pics are from last October—the room is currently being renovated and restored to an even higher level of fidelity.) And, if you'd like to read about how Apollo mission control worked and what each of the consoles does, I wrote a huge piece on that topic a few years ago.

"To peanut butter" - to spread out, as one spreads peanut butter on toast. To "peanut butter the funding" means to spread it between multiple sites so that everyone gets a piece.

Personally, if given the choice, smooth. But I recognize that peanut butter is fucking tasty in all its forms, and crunchy is also hella good. My motto is to never turn down free peanut butter.

get down

What's your take on the question that deadlocked the National Funk Congress? Does one "get up," or does one "get down"?

edit - lol, i'd forgotten that article already has your response in it!

"Our leaders' refusal to budge, let alone move it from front to back, has crippled the move-your-body politic," said current U.S. Mothership Ambassador George Clinton, one of the most outspoken critics of the deadlock. "These legislators must keep it real and understand that no matter what party policy may dictate, they cannot fake the funk. What the partisan people in the House need to realize is this: If they ain't gon' get along, the time has come for them to take they dead ass home."

"Work with," not for. Kranz was org'd to the Flight Control Division, and Duke was an astronaut, and astronauts didn't work for FCD.

As an astronaut, Duke reported to chief astronaut Al Shepard and was dotted-lined to Deke Slayton in the flight crew office. (Shepard had replaced Slayton as chief astronaut before Gemini got started, but the two of them essentially managed the astronaut office in a somewhat collaborative effort and functioned as two sides of the same coin, as far as the crews were concerned.)

(Apologies for the pedantry—just wanted to supply some context!)

Not sure if you're still taking new questions, but since you're with *ited, I wanted to ask some questions about the mysterious global services tier:

1) I've been on *ited flights before where I've upgraded to 1st with miles, and saw a couple of global service people (they boarded with the GS group) sitting in premium economy. Aren't GS people automatically upgraded prior to miles upgrades? I thought it was the ultra-ultra-ultra service tier.

2) What exactly are the global services entry criteria? I know it's invite-only, but would love to know exactly how much these people are flying.

3) Is there any VIP tier "above" global services? Like, if for some reason a AAA celeb or famous athlete has to fly commercial and they're on your flight, do they have a giant flashing red circle around their names in your system?

4) I primarily fly into and out of IAH, and United just reconfigured the terminal C entrance so that there's now a huge (and well-guarded) Global Services checkin area behind smoked glass. In your opinion, is there any chance they'd let a usually-Silver-sometimes-Gold plebe like me into the GS area to look around if I asked, or would that just result in me being tossed out onto the streets as if I'd tried to invade a high-class country club?

Also, I learned from this AMA that I can (and probably sometimes should) give small gifts to the cabin crew. Never thought of doing that, but it sounds like an awesome idea. Thanks!