The weather is so ugly here. There are dark clouds. And they are accompanied by oppressive humidity. What a contrast to the feel of the heat on your skin here than in the beautiful brilliant beach in Mexico, with the sea breeze, and the waves, and the blue water...

Ok, enough day dreaming. In theory I'm going sailing racing after work tonight, so life ain't too bad even here in reality.

We spent a lot more time outside of hotel California (the all-inclusive resort) this year. We took a jaunt to Cozumel, where I went on two SCUBA dives and Byron road around the island on a scooter while I was gone (earning him the title "scooter boy" from my new dive buddies).

We hung out in the little resort town of Akumal. I really liked that part. It was still a resort town. But somehow it just feels smaller, more genuine... There were palm trees growing on the public beach with people sitting under them. Fishing boats heading out for the day (though mostly on charter). Locals were eating whole fish in the beach bar next to the touristas and their fajitas while everyone's children splashed around in the water. And of course there were lots of snorkelers looking for the herd of sea turtles that hang out on the beach. Sure felt stupid that last year we paid the resort $40 to bring us over to these same sea turtles just a 5 minute drive up the road...

I caught myself a giant barracuda while deep sea fishing, otherwise we struck out. I feel bad, Byron really wanted to catch a pescadaro grande! Maybe next year...

I spent a lot of time on the beach. I love the beach. Its very peaceful. I read two books while listening to the waves.

Oh, mexico
It sounds so simple I just got to go
The suns so hot I forgot to go home
Guess Ill have to go now

James Taylor is so wise.

Tomorrow afternoon I leave for Mexico. My to-do list is pretty extensive between now and then.

But then I'll be sitting on the beach drinking a margarita. And going SCUBA diving. And exploring old ruins like Indiana Jones.

I think that will help me with my brain headache. Especially since I've determined we're leaving all technology (laptop, phone, ipods, etc) behind... Just a book and a beach.

It is up to the individual American (man or woman) to make the choice to serve according to his or her capabilities and desires. What the public apparently thinks gender roles should be should not dictate legislation or hinder the inherent right of every American to choose to fight for his or her country...

By far the most important traits to have out here are intellect, discipline, and a hard work ethic. Those characteristics know no gender, either. I am an operations officer for a logistics regiment because I am good at it. I see more than a few men who are not effective in their mission-critical jobs because they lack basic leadership skills, have a weak backbone, cannot write well, or are not well-organized, etc. Or they have a combination of all of these traits. Why should good, well-trained, capable women have to leave the area of operations, then? And to be brutally honest, I can kill an insurgent as quickly as anyone. Except they do not stand and fight—-instead they hide exploding booby traps for us or lob us with indirect rounds. (Our convoys were hit with three IED’s—-and found another two-—just in the last week alone.) If they were within shooting range, ANY Marine would be more than happy to take them out. Hell, most of the insurgents are rather scrawny and short, and taking them down with some buttstrokes or other basic martial arts skills which we all learn is easily doable. We are here to kill the bad guys and to do it violently, and we do not take this awful task lightly. Bring it on.

Go read Girl Sailor for some more first hand accounts of women in the Navy. She just ran a series or responses to the accusation "Women are a distraction in the ready room."

If your XO says "women are distracting" he may mean he is distracted. Giving him the benefit of the doubt, other men may be, too? Thing is, you are there and if they are distracted they have to deal with it. If you acknowledge it you give them due respect but put the ball back in the XO's court (as leader) to handle it. I mean, if his men get distracted by one harmless person in the ready room, how will they handle AAA in Iraq? Now that's distracting.

Oh, and Byron is home, yay! He totally surprised me with a bouquet of roses and by showing up at the doorstep at noon on Saturday when I assumed he was still asleep in his hotel room in Miami. He didn't surprise me completely, I started to get the idea he was on his way home about 30 minutes before he got to the door, so then I engaged in a game of "calling his bluff". Its still nice to have him back for however long he's here before IOE (that's his first actual trip with his new job).

Went to a Tres De Mayo party on Matt & Steph's beautiful patio. Their house has character. I want to live somewhere with character.

And of course, flying. I'd write all about it, but I don't have to, because Sarah's written about it, with pictures!

Vice President Cheney pinned Brown, of Lake Jackson, Tex., with a Silver Star in March for repeatedly risking her life on April 25, 2007, to shield and treat her wounded comrades, displaying bravery and grit. She is the second woman since World War II to receive the nation's third-highest combat medal.

Within a few days of her heroic acts, however, the Army pulled Brown out of the remote camp in Paktika province where she was serving with a cavalry unit -- because, her platoon commander said, Army restrictions on women in combat barred her from such missions.

"We weren't supposed to take her out" on missions "but we had to because there was no other medic," said Lt. Martin Robbins, a platoon leader with Charlie Troop, 4th Squadron, 73rd Cavalry Regiment, whose men Brown saved. "By regulations you're not supposed to," he said...

Let me get this straight, the Army would rather go without a medic rather than have a woman do it? That's absurd. Regardless of what you think of the military and the war, men's and women's lives are of equal value. And in this case, not letting this brave woman do her job risks a lot of lives...

Hopefully clearer minds are prevailing. It looks like the military is slowly being pushing into considering revising their policies on women in combat - not just because in many cases they can do the job equal to any man, but also because of their own particular skills as women.

In Afghanistan as well as Iraq, female soldiers are often tasked to work in all-male combat units -- not only for their skills but also for the culturally sensitive role of providing medical treatment for local women, as well as searching them and otherwise interacting with them. Such war-zone pragmatism is at odds with Army rules intended to bar women from units that engage in direct combat or collocate with combat forces...

"The current policy is not actionable," concluded a Rand Corp. study last year on the Army's assignment of women. "Crafted for a linear battlefield," the policy does not conform to the nature of warfare today and uses concepts such as "forward and well forward [that] were generally acknowledged to be almost meaningless in the Iraqi theater," it said...

Military officers in the field and independent experts have said it is both infeasible and contrary to the Army's own warfighting doctrine to prevent women from serving in proximity to -- or together with -- all-male combat units in today's war zones. They contend that if the goal of the policy is to protect women from capture or bodily harm, it cannot be done in the scramble of conflicts such as those in the Middle East.

I was going to celebrate by going sailing. However, the wind was gusting to 30 mph last night. As that is enough wind to assuredly capsize the little boat I race, and swimming in Clear Lake is unpleasant to say the least, we didn't race. Instead I went and had the traditional post-cert margaritas. Yum.

An interesting article on last week's botched Soyuz landing. Aside from the interesting part, the author finished it off with a run-on sentence that clearly indicates to me he had his thesaurus open to the "p"-section:

Pusillanimous pussy-footing with Russian paranoia about their passion to conceal their 'dirty space laundry', and diplomacy-dictated toleration of brush-offs and continued cover-ups...

But also with other things going on in the office contributing. I keep looking at the calendar and wonder how I'll find time, though I know that looking at the calendar I have the time. Its just not today or tomorrow. It will just have to wait.

I did take a break today to give some students from Rice a tour. I really like giving tours, they think my job is cool. Mostly because it is cool. Some days you just need to be reminded of that.

Today I texted Byron:
Me: My I.C. for the sim is a whole new rendezvous plan.
Byron: I'd like to rendezvous with you...

Only a few more days til my boy comes home.

Now I really need to study for my written, get a little more cross country time under my belt, and get a few more lessons in the real thing... But I think I am progressing pretty well toward my goal of being done this fall.

Work is giving me a headache. I have some analysis to do that I know how to do conceptually but it is very confusing how to set up all the tools I need to get it done. People have been very helpful with me, but sometimes I feel like they are talking over my head, and I don't like to feel that stupid. It interferes with my egotistical "I'm smart gosh darnit" complex!

So, I'm trying to take it one step at a time.

In the meantime, I really do need to prepare for my cert, since its happening in two days ...

The weather is beautiful today too. Yay pretty weather!

Tonight I think we're going to see Forbidden Kingdom Its a movie which should make Gavin's head explode because it has both Jackie Chan and Jet Li.

A funny e-mail exchange at the office:
Sarah: Dude, on another note, I just realized that we are all dating/married to pilots. 5 pilots, 3 non-pilots. That is really really weird and says something about our group, but I'm not sure what other than apparently Gavin, Cari and I are lame.
Me: Yep, y'all should learn to fly and then you can de-lame yourself and we can all buy an airplane or at least start a working flying club. I'm thinking Mooney 201.
Byron: Its because pilots are superior and smart girls want the best :)
Me: I warned you pilots had an ego problem
Gavin: Yeah, I think Jen is hotter now that she's a pilot :) 'course... I'm "piloting" a 1.5 billion dollar hypersonic robot to land safely on Mars, so maybe that works both ways
Sarah: I know how to pilot the space shuttle to a successful rendezvous...that's gotta count for something...
Cari: Um, I know how to “pilot” a horse better than any of you except maybe Jen?? That’s all I have to offer... Look at me with the reply-to-all.
Byron: i think to qualify you have to be riding on or in the aircraft.... i used to fly r/c planes when i was 13.....
Sarah: Hey -- not *my* fault they won't let me on a real space shuttle... ;)
Cari: Yeah, I'm with you. Darn security guards...

Another article on all three candidates position on the space program. The future does not look bright.

Any a spoof article about a space program intern:

"The key is you've got to make your presence known if you want any chance of getting on that shuttle," Hodson added. "It'll be great getting that one college credit for this internship, but going on a space walk will be something I'll always remember."

Hodson, whose resumé did not list any formal flight training or an academic background in engineering, mathematics, biological science, or physics, said he was positive that before the next launch, NASA officials would notice he had refilled all the staplers. And although Hodson falls below the specific standards of the NASA space physical for vision and blood pressure, as well as not meeting fitness, stamina, and strength prerequisites, the 20-year-old did meet the height requirement.

(Both links from Bad Astronomy).

My relatives make me laugh. My Aunt Nancy's desk makes me laugh.

I don't really have much more to say. If you're up for some reading, I found this article on the prison population of the U.S. fascinating.:

The United States has less than 5 percent of the world’s population. But it has almost a quarter of the world’s prisoners.

Indeed, the United States leads the world in producing prisoners, a reflection of a relatively recent and now entirely distinctive American approach to crime and punishment. Americans are locked up for crimes — from writing bad checks to using drugs — that would rarely produce prison sentences in other countries. And in particular they are kept incarcerated far longer than prisoners in other nations...

And another article on Obama's approach to the space program. I don't agree with the entire thing, but I agree that the future of the space program could be pretty scary with Obama, depending. We'll see I guess.

As the legend goes, when the Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortez landed in what is now Mexico in 1519, he ordered the boats that brought him and his men there to be burned. Obama seems to have something similar planned for NASA.

I'm looking forward to going sailing in a few minutes. Its another windy night. But its hotter outside, so hopefully I will be ok in my normal sailing gear of shorts and a t-shirt. I really should get some foul weather gear - I've been doing this enough years that I should have some appropriate equipment. I know what's going on my Christmas list for next year.

I'm also looking forward to Byron coming back in a week. Two months is a long time to be gone.

Make sure to listen to the sounds so you can hear Jose's exclamations of my awesomeness after we land.

Otherwise I did so much yard work my right arm is still a little shaky from lifting and moving branches. Yet, the yard STILL looks like a jungle. Well, I guess its a work in progress.

Nothing major planned for the week. Swimming tonight, sailing on Wednesday, another weekend at home next weekend, a flying lesson hopefully...