My NASA flight controller friend Michelle sent me some pictures of herself, since I asked her to, since her hair is totally a different color now than what it was when she and I were close in 1997.

Knowing that she is a flight controller, and that this image was made while she was actually on duty in Houston, I couldn’t escape the irony of the Magic Eight Ball in the frame.

“Will the mission go two extra days?”
“Ask again later!”

Update: Michelle emailed me saying she liked this blog entry…

“The blog is funny! I say keep it.
Do you want to know the “true” story behind the 8 ball?
Its actually kind of our mascott! We are always being asked “do we have good comm now?” or “will we have good comm at blah time. We are in the business of making comm predictions….we’ve even developed a tool to help us no, not the 8 ball, its just the front man. Every once in a while a CATO with that’s feeling some spunk will grab the 8 ball and “predict” the comm, just for grins ;0″