How to fill time in retirement

 Recently, I posted some camel photographs on Facebook. I have included one here.  A friend commented that I should have posted them on "Hump Day" and I replied that I did. Even though I knew it was Friday, I had just saved off this Pickles comic and included it with my hilarious comment. And then Facebook reminded me that it was 8 years ago that I had announced my retirement from ENSCO. So not only did I start to forget (or not care)  what day of the week it is, but I seem to have lost a few years too. Time is going too fast and the pandemic put a big dent into my travel plans. Most of my enjoyment has been taken photos of local events including launches. So this morning, I was pretty sure it was Monday, I decided I would head to the port to take some photos of the SpaceX launch. I had my cup of coffee and read the paper, knowing there was no hurry because everyone would be at work. Boy was I wrong, damn Monday holiday. Why do they still have these. Us retired people do ...

 As you know, I am a big fan of photographing a variety of things, most of them natural, and some of them man-made. For some reason, maybe living on the Space Coast for over 40 years, I love taking photos of launches. Part of it is the chance to get a great shot, but it is really about watching a launch live. My cousins Harry and Patrick now know the feeling after I took them to see a launch/landing by SpaceX in early January. Well, on January 31 at 6:11 PM, another wonderful launch happened. I should mention that this launch was originally scheduled a few days before, but the cold weather was causing it to be scrubbed. This launch is for an Italian Satellite and it had an instantaneous launch window. That means it had to go at the set time or not go at all. After three delays, the last being caused by a cruise ship, the launch happened just after sunset, a great time for viewing (and photographing) a launch. Now how does a cruise ship cause a rocket delay? Well, Port Canaveral is ...