Shoot! I should have looked over here before posting in MPSIMS about my experience last night.
I’m missing everything all of a sudden.
I bought the hype. I stayed up to watch what was presumed to be the best show around. What’s worse, I stayed up the entire night waiting around for the peak time to hit.
Here in Minneapolis, we got fucked!!! … and not in a nice way.
To begin with, I had to stay up 'til midnight to bid on a packet thingy on E-Bay. Normally that wouldn’t be a problem. Midnight? Fine, I’m normally up.
But this has been a bitch of a week. I’ve had about five hours a night max sleep each night since Monday- I’m spent.
Fucking Boo!!!
But, I need to stay up a snipe a bid at E-Bay and everyone and their brother is talking about the Leonid meteor shower.
So, I stay up and win the auction at about midnight. Then, … I sit around and wait. Three hours until this damn thing starts. If I set the alarm I’ll sleep right through it. Better to stay awake and not miss the ‘big event’.
I got so bored snapping around the tube watching that ever present con man who’s been selling everything from portable clothes steamers, to that hand held mixer, to now, computers that will ‘blow you away’ that I eventually couldn’t take it and wound up watching the NASA channel.
Anyone else see that drivel?
After watching about ten minutes of these guys completely miss their cues and leave minutes of dead air, with no commentary or anything ("Let’s go to Trixie in New Mexico. She’s going to read us some viewer mail. Trixie? ::Bzzzz zzzz zzzzz zzzzz crackle Bzzz zzzz zzzzz:: “Thanks Mike. I’ve got some viewer mail here I’d like to read…”). If it wasn’t that, it was the fact that no one person had the mike at the same level (“We start in Houston where Angie Anderson asks us what the chances are that she may get hit by a meteor. Mike?” ::Bzzzz zzzz zzzz zzzz crackle Bzzz zzzz zzzzz :: “WELL ANGIE. THERE’S NO NEED TO FEAR BEING HIT BY A METEOR, HA HA HA. BACK TO YOU”). Finally, their visuals sucked. SUCKED. They had what looked to be about a ten year old camcorder pearched up and shooting out what seemed to be some guys living room window. Worse still, they had the thing zoomed in on the big dipper. Whoop de fucking doo!! What the hell am I supposed to see with that crappy camera and that bullshit angle, huh? You’d think an organizations that spends billions a year on researching and designing machines that look at planets light years away from us with precision instruments would have something better than an outdated camcorder shooting out a guys window at the big dipper (It was even better the few times they moved the camera. You’d see part of a guys hand grab the camera and then violently move the thing about trying to get to the last meteor they saw. Too bad it was seconds old and gone by then. Nice try anyways NASA. Let me guess, you need more funding.).
It’s a wonder we ever made it to the moon with this kind of operation.
But, I wait. I struggle along and stay awake. A couple times I walked up to the roof of my apartment and looked around. Nothing. “Oh, wait, was that something over there? Ahh, I’ll come out when it peaks.”.
Three O’clock finally creeps up on me and from the commentary on NASA live, it’s practically an orgasmic event.
Woo hoo! Me likey orgasms.
I head upstairs once again and start peering around. I can’t lay down because of the rock aggregate roof, so I have to crane my neck and grin and bear the pain. “Ohh, hey, there was one. Cool… tick… tock… tick… OK, bring it on people!! Hmm, I wonder what that is over there. Ah, hell. Those are the clouds that they predicted. Boy, those suckers sure are moving fas… SHIT!!”
Within minutes the sky was completely obscured. I couldn’t see dick.
What a waste. My neck hurts, I’m tired, and I didn’t see anything.
Fucking astronomers! Who needs ‘em!!
