Neil Armstrong: Dead Again

I caught the buzz yesterday that Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, of course, had passed away. My first thought was one of quiet resignation. Another hero fallen. And the entire time, my subconscious is screaming the background: "He's one of your heroes, moron! You KNOW he's already dead."

And so the rest of feeds reported. Tricked for an instant by yet another viral swarm of nonsense.

Still, my lapse of memory regarding this childhood hero of mine got me thinking about heroes in general and their influence in my life and my writing. Learning about Neil Armstrong and those early space pioneers when I was a child, years after the last Apollo missions, sparked an interest that endures to this day. Very few missions escape my notice (sadly, most of the awe-catching ones these days are unmanned). Cassini isn't making headlines anymore, but the images captured by that mission have reawakened a lot of my childhood wonder. And New Horizons has me counting the days until we get our first good look at Pluto. Less than two years to go!

I entertained the idea of becoming an astronaut for a while (as a kid, that is) but found myself drawn in other directions. And besides, why work on being an astronaut when space travel was going to be so common by the turn of the century everyone would be an astronaut anyway?

That assumption has not exactly worked out to my satisfaction.

Topping my likes page in the astronaut category these days is Col. Chris Hadfield. If you haven't checked out this guy, you really should.

My thanks to these gentlemen for their inspiration. First to Neil Armstrong for starting the fire and now to Chris Hadfield for keeping it alive.

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The fourth chapter of Zulu Time at ZukePop Serials and live and waiting for you fine folks to drop by. If you like the story and want to see it continue, please vote!

The summer shootout at Martinus Publishing has been a blast. This week is a scoring week for round two. A third writing round begins this Saturday. The three participants with the highest average score from these three rounds will move on to a final round.

My story, "Adaptive Strategies," will be coming soon in Emby Press' Monster Hunter Legends - Both Barrels.