STORRMs of All Forms

I posted this on Facebook awhile ago but not here. This is the overview for the STORRM project I've been working on (yes, you can play Where's Nujoud in the video too). It is the rendezvous and docking sensor for Orion being test flown on this shuttle flight (STS-134 currently 11 days into the mission). This is just one of the things I do, but I've been a part of the team for almost a year and a half. Personality conflicts have been a major factor all along and that plus real-time ops has been fairly tiring this week. I'm supposed to be doing this and my "regular" work but regular work has now been essentially dropped until at least next week.

But even with all that, it is almost getting lost how PHENOMENAL the data was on rendezvous Flight Day 3 our sort of warm-up day. Our prime objectives will all be hit on Undocking and Re-Rendezvous Flight Day 15 (yea, Memorial Day weekend) and expectations are really high. I will definitely post some data photos when they get released publicly later. Right now you can find images from the camera (which look like all the other photos of ISS) on the MPCV-Orion Facebook or Twitter pages. The real meat of the experiment, the flash LiDAR, have not yet been publicized.

Bad to Good in 4Hrs

This weekend Zara started sleeping extra and didn't seem as hungry as normal, but still drinking plenty of fluids. It seemed like maybe a growth spurt or just one of those things toddlers go through. But Monday at school she was even sleepier and was full on asleep when i picked her up which was very strange and durign the evening she went downhill and was just lethargic. That got a call to the pedi and a first thing Tuesday morning visit to the doc. By that point though she stopped putting out any sort of liquids or for that matter taking them in until the massive antibiotic shot dose kicked in during the afternoon.

It was, as suspected, a urinary tract infection but man what a difference a few hours can make. Seeing your kid with that little amount of energy is not fun at all, but seeing them start laughing again so quickly is amazing.

Eye Can See!

Ok, I really could see all along, but it is pretty decent again. I had my post-op follow up yesterday and given all the growth back over my eyes, I'm still not perfect. The right eye is 20/30, left 20/40 which makes for a weird visual to be unbalanced. But they are both way better than before and should get better little by little over the next couple weeks until they are fully healed.

All in all, I'm already pretty happy about my vision so I can't wait until I am fully healed. This morning since I had to come in super early to the MCC, I drove in the dark for the first time and wow what a difference. Before I had to wear my glasses driving at night because that was a total mess (daylight I was okay without them). So it was pretty neat to do so (safely) this morning with just bare eyeballs.

As for the MCC, STS-134 launched and this is the mission we are test flying the Orion Flash LiDAR rendezvous sensor on and I've been training the crew to operate. It is kinda nostalgic to be back on-console for something. Awwww... Mission ops, *tear*.

Eye Update- Day 3

No more burning or dry eye sensation (nice surprise when I woke up) and they feel fine. But I have full on bad vision as predicted today. I am totally using old man size font on my computer, but can comfortably work with the brightness turned down otherwise. My eyes aren't getting tired in seconds like they were if I was looking at anything bright. I must say this is the weirdest part of the whole experience thus far. I have always had really good near vision and can read minute details, so not being able to read large font clearly is kinda scary. Preview of old age and the eventual need for reading glasses I presume.

Eye Update- Day 2

I found out what those pain meds were for. I still haven't taken most of them, but I did wake up at 1am and had to go drop in some of the eye numbing ones. My eyes just felt like they were burning and I couldn't sleep anymore like that. Downside of those meds though is they made my eyes so tired even after I woke up I could barely keep them open while awake.

The pain is back down now, but everything is a lot fuzzier today. Hopefully that means the healing is going quickly. I think I am a lot more light sensitive today too. Dumb thing was I put off a paper review for my microgravity college team I'm mentoring and had to do that *very slowly* just now with lots of eye breaks. Even now I'm glad I am a much better touch typer than I used to be and can do this with my eyes mostly closed.

Elephant Eyes

Yesterday I played golf in the morning with John and my friend Chris from work. My swing needs a lot of work and I just can't get seem to get consistent on my shots. Oh, and I got my PRK laser eye surgery in the afternoon. I was pretty nervous about the surgery, but a relaxing morning outside should be prescribed to everyone. As for the surgery, piece of cake. My eyes have been very consistent over each of the three visits so the doc was so comfortable with my surgery we got bumped up in line while they figure out what to do on someone else's eyeballs who wasn't as straightforward. We went in at 2 and left by 3:40. Really the whole thing took less than 5 min an eye. The general process being numb them, mark them with a ring, take an electric toothbrush and scrub the epithelial layer off, poke around and clean that off for a min, and than zappity-zap, done. Stick a protective contact on and out the door. Although, once again to actually get me numb I needed more than normal quantities of meds, apparently something "strong enough to numb an elephant's eyes." I had a checkup this morning, everything looks great and I'm already seeing 20/20 (was 20/80). My vision overall should be couple weeks to its best and possibly, maybe that means 20/15 by then.

Given the massive amount of pain meds and panic disorder meds (for during the surgery) I was prescribed, I expected a worse recovery for sure. I haven't taken any of them and opted to just "hold still and not freak out" during the surgery. I know today and tomorrow are supposed to be the most painful and Mon/Tue are supposed to be worst vision while the ol' epithelial grow back of over the center of my pupil. But really, I'm just sensitive to light (monitor brightness turned way down right now), my eyes feel a bit dry, and I have only a slight headache. Nothing hanging out inside with the curtains drawn and some eye drops can't take care of. I do have to do some medicated drops for many weeks, but small trade to make sure they are healthy.

Year and a Half Pint

Today we had Zara's 18month checkup, couple weeks late with everything going on but whatever. She was a really good girl for that and a follow-up this morning at the dentist about her chipped tooth. But strange to have her recognize what's going on at the doctor before things are done to her. So... she knows what the little tray with vials and syringes is for. That got her trying to climb up over my shoulder to get away even before she got stabbed.

Otherwise, she is doing great. We've lost count of all the words she knows and I now default to the assumption she knows what I'm asking/telling her anymore. She is able to identify which dog is which when you ask her even though we never explicitly tried to teach her that. We started potty training and thus far I'm happy about the way its going. We aren't trying to go cold turkey, but just get her used to it. She has had several successes and we are starting to have mutual understanding of when she needs to go. Oh and she FINALLY cut her first molar... with three more right behind.

On a totally unrelated note, I am in fact getting eye surgery Friday. The third eye doctor I talked to wanted to go with the more conservative PRK, which is also what I believe the second one would decide on had I gone to the follow up. Even if they didn't, I'm not comfortable with the risks Lasik would present for me if they said it was ok. PRK has a lot more healing time but is less risk overall and has been around longer. Jaime had it and I am using her same doc so here's hoping everything turns out as great as hers. Excited for the better vision sans spectacles, but still nervous about all the possible "bad" things however low the probability.

I missed posting about Easter prior to all the travels a couple weeks ago, so here are some pictures from Zara enjoying her egg hunt and playing with them afterwards.

Distractions

Last weekend we got to have a great family weekend in San Antonio at a Hill Country resort. John got invited for a golf weekend with several contractors and wives came along. Since we just have Zara, we brought her too and got a nanny during the evenings so we could both go to the dinners. We had a great time with John getting to play 4 rounds and me 1 on the best quality courses we have ever played on. Zara and I also got to have a great time playing in the awesome pool area, going for walks, and won a prize in the kids rubber duck race. Although, her prize was for the slowest duck, but its just as well since she doesn't really know first from last. All in all it was a great getaway.

Back in the real world, today was Innovation Day at JSC. Not sure what that is really supposed to mean, but several Orion Test Articles and Mockups were outside and many of us were manning them. Lots of the JSC people were great to talk to and it was good to catch up with a lot of people I hadn't seen in awhile. But more than once, as I answered a question for someone they looked up and interrupted me with "ohhh, SpaceX is here!" And shortly thereafter, walked off. Sweet, story of our program.