Wanna drag?

[Philip Miller Tate]

I'm with you on that, Mike. Especially since I saw STS-110 launch  
from the Cape while on holiday. When am I gonna get that trip to the  
moon and personal rocket backpack like I was promised when I was a  
boy? And I'll never forgive Tony Blair for killing off Concorde. I  
never flew on it, but it flew over my house once a day.

Phil M1GWZ



On 24 Apr 2009, at 23:52, Mike O'Dell wrote:

>
> all i can say is thank goodness *somebody* is interested
> in unalloyed excellence. no focus groups, no bag-biting
> bean counters, no "optimization engineering",
> nobody whining about "is this really necessary".
>
> just go do something insanely difficult
> *supremely* better than anyone else in the world
> and make no apologies about it.
>
> SR-71, Concorde, Thrust SSC....
>
> all cut from the same bolt of cloth by people who didn't
> care that second place was also available if the going
> got too tough.
>
> we used to be like that. if seeing a real Saturn V doesn't
> make the hair on your neck stand up for at least a week,
> you have the soul of a brick.
>
> i wish i could find an online version of the essay Burt Rutan wrote
> for Aviation Week's Centennial of Flight issue.  unlike the other
> essays proudly extoling the virtues of progress and such, Rutan  
> demanded
> to know why the hell the best aircraft ever designed were in freakin'
> MUSEUMS and not flying! and where did innovation go?
>
> a truly righteous screed indeed
>
>   harumph
>   -mo
>