Earning my Ellie Badge

I finally earned my Ellie Badge!  I am having some grand adventures here in Washington.  Here are some of the things I have done in the last three weeks.

Anne, Kennedy, and Zovig

On October 24th, I got to travel to an elementary school in Virginia and demonstrate the Peeps in Peril lesson at a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) Fair.  It was wonderful having a chance to work with kids again!  I really miss it!

October 26th brought me to the White House (again!) for the Fall Garden Tour.

I visited a very special spot in the Rose Garden, where I had sat just a short 11 years ago.

I am fairly sure I sat to the right of that tree...

October 28th was the official briefing at Headquarters about the upcoming mission to Mars.  I got to watch the briefing live and was actually shown on NASA TV!  You can see the briefing at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5bi32hZ7bw&feature=youtu.be

Screen grab from YouTube 

On October 29th, my fellow NASA Fellow, Melinda and I were host to the Finham Park School from the United Kingdom.  Twenty 8th graders and three teachers came over to visit a partner school in Boston and finished up their trip with us.  Since there is not much to see at Headquarters, we took them on a guided tour of the National Air and Space Museum. 

Yes, I do own more than one NASA shirt...

On November 1st, I went outside of my comfort zone a little and went to a lecture/screening at the National Museum of the American Indian and saw Star Wars dubbed into Navajo.  It was AMAZING to not only see a film I was so familiar with in a different way, but to hear the director and two translators discuss the process following the film.

I have the same poster, but with the DC screening information on it.!

Members of the 501st!

The most interesting part of the night was listening to the translators talk of how they chose the words for the movie.  For instance, the word they used for "Uncle" Owen was the Navajo word for father, because in your clan, your father's brother has the same role as your father.  They also tried to match the syllables on the screen as best as possible so it would not looked like a poorly dubbed movie.  So "Docking Bay 94" stayed in English, because the Navajo word for the number ninety-four has eight syllables.  They were also careful in the word they chose for the Force, because the translators did not want to use anything that had sacred meaning to the Navajo.  They chose to dub Star Wars because of its universal reach - it was a movie that could be enjoyed by all generations.  A truly amazing evening!

On November 2nd, I got to meet Col. Chris Hadfield, former commander of the International Space Station.

See!  I DO own other NASA shirts!

He signed books and thanked everyone for waiting in line to meet him.  What a nice guy!

November 7th brought me back to the National Air and Space Museum for a lecture on the Overview Effect.  It was fascinating to listen to astronauts talk about our fragile Spaceship Earth and the new perspective they have when they view our thin atmosphere from space.  They talked about seeing the planet as a system rather than individual parts.  It was fascinating.

Astronaut Sandy Magnus

This is just the beginning of my adventures this year!  I really can't believe it myself sometimes.