Category: The Evening Pause

A nightly pause from the news to give the reader/viewer a bit of classic entertainment.

July 20, 1969: “One small step…”

6:01 pm

An evening pause: In honor of the fiftieth anniversary.

Neil Armstrong takes the first steps on the Moon. Note his focus is almost entirely on describing what he sees and experiences. He is doing this for two reasons, first to provide knowledge of the Moon to the world, and second to provide engineers as much information as possible for future missions.

This focus explains why the first thing he does is to get a contingency rock sample, just in case they need to leave the Moon quickly.

Note also that when Buzz Aldrin joins Armstrong on the surface, he is as professional and calm, proving that the way he has been portrayed by some recent movies as as undisciplined jerk is simply a slander. He would not have been picked for this mission if he really behaved that way.

He wanted to be the first, and lobbied to get that chance. After the decision was made he got down to work to make the mission a success.

For a different view of these same events, watch this video.

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July 20, 1969: “The Eagle has landed”

7:01 pm

An evening pause: In honor of the fiftieth anniversary.

Note the calm tone in all the voices, even when something is not quite right. To do really great things, one must not let one’s emotions run the show. You need to be cool-headed and focused on the task at at hand. If only today’s adult generation, especially in the world of politics, would do the same.

Just before Armstrong brings Eagle down, you will hear a voice say “60 seconds,” then “30 seconds.” That is mission control telling him how much time they estimate he has before he runs out of fuel.

Below the fold is the same last few minutes of the landing, produced by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) science team using its high resolution images to recreate a simulation of what Armstrong saw in his window. Remember, the view in the original 16mm film was out Aldrin’s window.

» Read more

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Eagle undocks, Apollo 11, July 20, 1969

6:01 pm

An evening pause: In honor of the fiftieth anniversary of Apollo 11, today’s evening pause shows the moment when the lunar module Eagle undocked from the command module Columbia. Though this video includes communications with mission control at the start, the actual undocking occurred on the back side of the moon, when the astronauts were out of touch with the Earth.

Near the end of the video, after they have reacquired communications with the ground, you can hear a recitation of a long string of numbers. This is mission control providing the astronauts the numbers that had to be uploaded into their onboard computer so that it could correctly fire the spacecraft engines at the right time and for the right duration.

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Apollo 11 First Stage liftoff

6:01 pm

An evening pause: This was originally posted as an evening pause in 2016. I think that today, the fiftieth anniversary of the launch of Apollo 11, it is appropriate to repost it. As I wrote then,

Though the video is more than 8 minutes long, the actual events recorded lasted only about 30 seconds, beginning 5 seconds before T minus 0.

What struck me most as I watched this was the incredible amount of complex engineering that went into every single small detail of the rocket and the launch tower and launchpad. We tend to take for granted the difficulty of rocket engineering. This video will make you appreciate it again.

It is also mesmerizing. A lot happens in a very short period of time.

Tonight’s evening pause begins eight days of pauses dedicated to celebrating, and reliving, the Apollo 11 mission. To the Moon!

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Aliaksei Zholner – Paper Piano

6:01 pm

An evening pause: Humans can make anything out of anything. From the youtube website:

The model is completely made of paper and cardboard….Strings are made of paper strips, tension mechanism is like one in guitar, using worm-gear (worm is made of paper, gears – from cardboard). Soundboard is combined with stiffness frame and made of 2.5mm cardboard enforced with stiffening ribs. Hammers – from paper and cardboard, dampers – from rolled up paper napkin, keys – from paper. Body is made of cardboard and painted.

Hat tip Martin Kaselis.

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Frank Sinatra – The House I Live In

6:02 pm

An evening pause: Since it is July 4th, and the news is filled with depressing outrages from ignorant social justice warriors who have no knowledge at all about the just and noble roots that founded the United States, I think it necessary to post this magnificent song performed by Frank Sinatra.

Written and produced in 1945, as World War II was ending, the short film tried to encapsulate in one short song the true meaning of the American experiment. This version below includes the lead-in scene to show the context for the song, as sung in the film. Some might find that opening overly preachy, but in the context of World War II and the recent discovery then of the Nazi death camps, it is heartfelt, real, and quite accurate. Please watch it all, and recognize this is what the United States — now being condemned routinely by leftist hate-mongers — is really about.

The song begins by asking, “What is America to me?” It answers it clearly in the final verse:

The town I live in
The street, the house, the room
The pavement of the city
Or a garden all in bloom
The church, the school, the clubhouse
The million lights I see
But especially the people
that’s American to me. [emphasis mine]

And that means all the people, not just those who agree with you.

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1776 – Hatching an Egg

12:01 pm

A mid-day pause: Posted by me on almost every Fourth of July since this site was founded, it is time to do it again. From the 1976 movie version of the 1972 musical, 1776. As I said in those earlier posts, “not only did the musical capture the essence of the men who made independency happen, it is also a rollicking and entertaining work of art.”

And as John Kennedy said of himself, ourselves, and these founding fathers. “We stand for freedom.”

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Edward Elgar – Jerusalem

6:01 pm

An evening pause: The words are by William Blake. Here it is, as traditionally performed, with big audience participation, at the last night of the annual Proms at the Royal Albert Hall, 2012. The video closes with God Save the Queen.

Hat tip John Vernoski.

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