Honoring The Leaders of the AoA Collective

Shocking isn't it? AoI wants to honor the leaders of the collective? How could this be possible?

The idea came to me out of the blue. Well, out of the early morning sky. I have been a skywatcher since childhood. I recall watching for the ECHO passive communications satellite pass over head every two hours. For those who do not recall, or never heard of the ECHO satellite, it was a large aluminized mylar balloon which radio and television signals were bounced off. Being that large and reflective, it was clearly visible from the ground.

A few mornings ago, on one of our clear days in these parts, the ISS few overhead. A beautiful sight.

I read Phil Plait's BadAstronomy every day. He is a good writer and has a wonderful sense of wonderment about our universe. I could spend long nights with him watching the sky. In fact, when I went to his blog to get the URL, I found a great article which I read before coming back to continue to write this article.

Phil had several articles about the recent attempt at Space Piracy by the fans of Stephen Colbert. They attempted to hijack the vote for the name of a new node on the ISS, but NASA rejected their ploy, and, instead, named the node Tranquility, after the site of the first moon landing, which I watched live in black and white on TV at my cousin's house in Boston.

My original response, was how dare they do this? Then, I got to thinking and concluded that they deserved an appropriate response. I posted to BadAstronomy that the latrine aboard the ISS should be named after Colbert. It did not catch on, unfortunately.

Then, I read a few articles at AoA. This always gets me thinking. The brain wheels turned. The throught processes churned. It then struck me!

Anything aboard the ISS should be named after someone who has affected science. Now, how could the pure science of the ISS and the anti-science non-science of AoA merge into one? Galaxies merge. Companies merge. How could I blend the two just right? More thinking.

During one of humankind's morning necessities it came to me. I would say "out of the blue" but, I am not talking blue this time. The ISS was recently upgraded to allow for a larger crew.

Therefore, I hereby propose that the new liquid recycling system be named after the founder and GR Collective Leader, J. B. Handley. It should henceforth be referred to as the H.A.N.D.L.E.Y. or Human Automatic Node Detoxifying Liquids Even Yellow ones.

Of course, the HANDLEY needs input, so the newly upgraded latrine should also be named after one of AoA's most prolific lemmings. Therefore, the latrine should be named after Kim Stagliano, and henceforth be referred to as the S.T.A.G.L.I.A.N.O. or Simplified Toilet Accommodating Gravitational Levels In AbNormal Outlets.

There you have it. Honoring the most anti-science of the Anti-vaccination Collective in the most appropriate manner.

Next job: Petition NASA.