Pre-dinner picture :)
Thursday: We got into Webster, TX around 1:30 pm. We immediately went to our rooms and DIED. Kidding, but we did sleep until we were almost late for dinner. We had the pleasure of meeting the woman who got UNCP involved the Reduced Gravity Education Flight Program. The company was awesome, and I wish I could say the same about the Mexican food we ate. She also introduced us to "bubble-tea-shaved-ice-stuff." Basically, they took shaved ice and put whatever flavors (not syrup, but jellies and poppers) you wanted to have mixed in. I didn't personally try it, except for aloe vera jelly that Tiff made me try and it was gross. Everyone else pretty much liked it, though. Then we just decided to go back and crash for the night since Friday would be an early morning.
Friday: 5:00 am came early after such a long day Thursday. We reported to Ellington Air Field at 7:45 am. First on the agenda was receiving our badges (which preeety much makes us VIPs :)). Then we all received a safety briefing before we could do any work. After the safety briefing, there was more meetings and setting up our experiments.
After our experiments were all set up, we ate lunch (priorities, people) and then headed back to the Ellington. Oh, and just FYI, it's HOT in the hangar. Houston, June, hangar...you get the picture. Anyways, after lunch, we had to go through a pre-TRR (test readiness review). This practice run involved about 8 of NASA's engineers critiquing our project after the nitty gritty of the project was explained to them. Since I'm the team leader, I was the representative who voiced all of this to the engineers. My girls are awesome though and cheered me on the whole way. Thankfully, there were very little comments from the engineers on our project. Some of the teams had quite a few critiques. This wrapped up the Friday at NASA since government agencies close at 4:30 :) Then it was dinner time. We ate at Fuddruckers and besides me getting sick from the stupid veggie burger with rice in it, we had a great time.
Saturday: Woot! Party time! To the beach we trekked (after sleeping in of course :)). Galveston Island is only about 30 minutes from us so we spent the whole day there. It was all fun and games until we got back and poor Molly and I realized we were cooked. Alex and Tiffany got burnt too, but their little tanned-skinned-selves didn't get it covering their entire bodies. Being pale sucks! After going our for Samurai japanese and a quick run to Target for aloe vera and cocoa butter, we headed back and...uh...slept.
Sunday: Great balls of fire. We all forgot how much sunburn sucks. We decided to all be lazy bums and catch up on Law and Order SVU and eat pizza. Of course, we could barely move, but we still enjoyed our day. Oh and of course we went to Target again. Don't judge, it's a super cool Super Target.
Monday: Ah, finally to Monday. It's has been a day! We were up early since we had to be at Ellington at 7:45 again. After the morning meeting I'm required to attend, it was straight to work on a few last minute things for the box. It was also a really exciting morning because the plane we'll be flying on pulled in and we all got to take a group photo in front of it. Then, at 10:30 it was the big-tail-full-blown-you-better-be-ready Test Readiness Review. This time, instead of 8 engineers, there was 30, a photographer and a videographer. I can honestly say I wasn't nervous until I started talking to all of these people. Again, all my girls were awesome and were so very supportive. They rock and I'm blessed to work with each of them! After the review, there was only one comment and it was resolved quickly. Again, this was VERY unlike many of the teams surrounding us. Since our review went so well, our only tasks for the rest of the day, were lunch and a visit to the Neutral Buoyancy Lab.
The Neutral Buoyancy Lab is a 100'x200'x40' pool with giant replicas of the space station in the bottom. Because of the neutral buoyancy within the pool, they can actually suit up the astronauts and allow them to "practice" for their mission in space. There's also a hyperbaric chamber in the facility so they can determine symptoms of hypoxia (oxygen deprivation) for each person. After leaving the NBL, we ate dinner at TGI Fridays and then it was time to crash. Well, sorta. I went for a super good swim and did some strength training stuff and forgot what a good workout swimming can be. And now, my friends, it is time for B-E-D. Good night and I'll update in a few days!
