Bears In Space

   Bears In Space

Wow, CR sent me this article and I wanted to share it with you.  Boy I wish I could go on a trip like that. Back when Fatman had a job and flew places he would take me in a carry-on bag, but he never once took me out of the bag and let me look out the window. This would be so cool.

Here is the newspaper article that CR sent:

Out of this world: British teddy bears strapped to helium weather balloon reach the edge of space

By Andrew Levy and Claire Bates of the Daily Mail
Created 10:56 AM on 04th December 2008

It's not often that Britain can claim a win in the space race. But these teddy bears drifting nearly 20 miles above Earth have become the first soft toys to take part in extra-vehicular activity (to use correct NASA jargon) at such an altitude.

The soft toys MAT and KMS were named after the first initials of the pupils who helped make their space suits.

Along with their two intrepid colleagues, they were strapped to a beam attached to a foam-padded box containing instrumentation and cameras on Monday.

After rising to an altitude of around 100,000ft, a webcam caught their 'space-walk' for posterity before the helium balloon burst.

They then fell to Earth before a parachute opened automatically to provide a soft landing.

During the 2 hour 9 minute flight the radio on board broadcast the location of the craft to a chase team on the ground.

The team predicted the landing site using wind speed data and arrived in time to watch the teddy bears parachute safely back to Earth in a field four miles north east of Ipswich.

They landed just 50 miles from their launch pad by Churchill College in Cambridge.

During ten previous experiments, half have ended up ditching in the North Sea. One disappeared over Scandinavia before washing up on the coast of Denmark.

The teddy bears had to endure temperatures of -53C but had special spacesuits made by school children from the nearby Parkside and Coleridge community colleges. This stopped them from freezing solid on their epic trip.

Temperature sensors were stuck to the teddies' chests and connected to a laptop which allowed 'mission control'

to measure the extremes of temperature they experienced.

But the mission, led by aerodynamics student Henry Hallam, 21, had a more serious purpose than giving the teddies the ride of their lives.

The aim of the experiment was to monitor weather conditions in the stratosphere and determine which materials provide the best insulation against the freezing temperatures experienced on the flight.

Mr Hallam said: 'We asked the children to build the space suits for the teddy bears and we monitored the temperatures inside and outside the suits. It was great to involve these young people so they can learn about physics in a different and exciting way.

'The project was all about applying science into the real world. I think it's taught them a lot about running a real experiment.'

Thia Unsworth, 12, from Parkside College, helped to design the spacesuit for M.A.T.

She said: 'It was unbelievable to see the balloon take off and it's incredible to see the pictures of the teddy bears in space.

'I've always loved science before, but I now understand how it helps in the real world.'

Classmate Sam White, 13, helped programme the camera to take pictures in space and let go of the balloon on Monday.

He said: 'It was amazing to see it go up so quickly.'

The student-run Spaceflight society is working towards reducing the cost of sub-orbital spaceflight.

They have launched several payloads to near space on high-altitude helium balloons and are designing a system to launch a rocket from a balloon platform to out space for under £1,000 a go.

Source:  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1091896/Out-world-British-teddy-bears-strapped-helium-weather-balloon-reach-edge-space.html

Storm Bear Named Ike

Storm Bear Named Ike

In Galveston, Texas

CR sent me this clip of another bear who got loose and went to play in the surf duing a hurricane.

http://www.khou.com/video/news-index.html?nvid=282017&shu=1

JTB

Editor: Thanks to KHOU in Houston, Texas

I Have Returned From the Sylvia Beach Hotel

I Have Returned !

Let me tell you about

the Sylvia Beach Hotel.

High on a cliff over looking the ocean in Newport, Oregon, sits a four story Hotel built in in the early 1900's. Mama Bear is a writer and she wanted to stay there one night on our trip through Oregon this summer.  Every room in the hotel is dedicated to a writer, and decorated in that style.  Mama Bear got us a room decorated in Edgar Allen Poe style.

The wall paper was black and the bed was royal purple.  Over the bed hung a pendulum blade right out of the story The Pit and the Pendulum.  Fatman said the room sure fit that description,

It was a pit with a pendulum.

I really liked it however. We were way up high (Fatman griped and grunted everytime he climbed the three flights of stairs), and could see way down the beach and out to the ocean.  I spent a lot of time looking out of  the window.

It was really pretty.

The room was full of Poe stuff.

This was what Poe looked like.

Fatman was afraid that if he sat on any of the furniture it would break. I was so light I could jump all over everthing.

Lots of neat stuff here.

I opened one door however, and found this brick wall behind it.

The hotel had these two cats that went anywhere and everywhere they cared to. 

Mama Bear wanted to stay an extra day, but Fatman said it was too expensive and besides he dreamed last night about Anna Belle Lee, and someone name Evangeline, so he had enough of the ghost here thank you.

JTB

Editor's note: This is a wonderful Hotel check it out at: http://www.sylviabeachhotel.com/

I GOT BUSINESS CARDS: CORRECTIVE ACTION

My editor did not edit.

OK, I made a mistake.

But I fixed it!

I Got Business Cards!!!!!!!

I Got New Business Cards!!

Fatman's friend, Drlobojo, told me if I didn't advertise it was no wonder that I had no readers.  He also said I needed to post more times than I do.  He should know.  Heck, he gets maybe 3 or 4 comments on almost every post.  He must be good to do that.

So he helped me make me some of these cards to distribute when I am out in the country side with mama Bear and Fatman.  I told him I wanted 10,000 of them.  He said he thought 50 would be plenty to start with.  When I get really famous, maybe then I could have 10,000 made.

Also he made me promise to post at least every other week.  I said i would, but I don't know really, sometimes it is just so hard to think of something to say and Fatman is getting so BIG that it is hard for him to get anywhere very fast these days.  I figure if he gets much bigger there will not be room for me in the car.  I already have trouble fitting into the old Chevy pickup truck with him when we go places in it. I may put the boy on diet.

What do you think?  Did I get the address of my blog big and bright enough?  I wanted to use a close up of my face but Fatman said we were supposed to be attracting people to the blog and it would be better if the little kids didn't see my "whole" face right away.  So we settled for me and the doggy again.

This is the picture I wanted to use.  Maybe I should have editied out the peacock and it would have been better.

JTB