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Neil Armstrong - A Tribute From A Bedlington Lad

keith lockey

By keith lockey
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keith lockey

keith lockey

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I know this site is about Bedlington but Neil Armstrong was a part of my past so forgive this detour down memory lane. When I was a kid in the sixties the Apollo missions were a part of my life. I followed them right the way through and stayed up all night to watch the moon landing. I became fascinated by the moon - and still am. To me the sixties and seventies were golden years and I wish I had a time-machine to take me back to those days. It was a marvelous, ground-breaking time and the moon missions added to that time of wonder. It's sad, because this year has had a lot of 'endings' for me on a personal level. And now one of my heroes passes on. I guess memories are all we have left in the long run. So Goodnight, travel well, Neil Armstrong. RIP.

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Brian Cross

Brian Cross

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Well said Keith and from me RIP Neil Armstrong .........he probably had some connections with Northumberland ?

Symptoms

Symptoms

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Keith, I share those sentiments as well about the space missions ... both Ruskie and Yankee. It was a time of REAL heroes ... not like now with those crummy fake heroes who bask in reality TV glory.

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Canny lass

Canny lass

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To me the sixties and seventies were golden years and I wish I had a time-machine to take me back to those days. It was a marvelous, ground-breaking time and the moon missions added to that time of wonder.

You're right there Keith. The 60s and 70s were groundbreaking years. I can't think of any other period in history where so many innovative ideas became reality. I too watched the first moon-landing and remember being amazed at the shere immensity of the whole thing. It must have taken real guts to be strapped into a rocket and shot away into the unknown.

keith lockey

keith lockey

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To me the moon missions rank with the 16th century voyages of discovery. Only the astronauts sailed on the sea of space and truly went where no man had gone before. It must have taken real guts to blast off on the back of a Saturn rocket and leave the Earth's atmosphere and you can only stand in awe of the twelve men who actually set foot on the moon and watched an Earthrise. But on a personal level for me it was a time of innocence or at least the end of innocence. I was 12 years old when they landed on the moon. I was afraid of nothing in those days; life was still a great adventure and the sky was blue and the grass was green. I started listening to music - The Moody Blues, Bread, David Bowie and a host of others. The world was alive then, but looking back I guess I was just seeing things through rose-tinted glasses. The world wasn't perfect, not then and certainly not now; it never will be. But we can never imagine what it is like to stand on the moon and look down on the Earth. Petty squabbles and personal problems must fade into insignificance from up there. It's a pity all the politicians and leaders of the world cannot be transported to the moon and gaze down upon this blue world. Maybe if they did the world would be a better place. But I seriously doubt it! I often get the binoculars out and look up at the moon's surface. It's like Buzz Aldrin said - Magnificent desolation.

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keith lockey

keith lockey

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New avatar for Keith..................

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I learned a valuable lesson regarding garden astronomy. If you stand in your back yard with a telescope people see you and say "Look, Keith must have become an astronomer".

But if you stand in the garden with a pair of binoculars looking at the moon just above rooftop level then the terms "pervert" & "Peeping Tom" become applicable!

"Honest your honour, I was looking for Uranus."

Luckily enough I have understanding neighbours in my cul-de-sac.

keith lockey

keith lockey

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and that's the biggest double entendre in your posting!!! :thumbsup:

OOH Matron!, Stop messing about. Listen what I do with my fifteen-inch refractor in my own garden is nobody's business. HA Ha - I didn't mean any double entendre with cul-de-sac. Honest! But you do have to be careful when you're looking at heavenly bodies with your bins - stop it, you know what I mean. One night there was a beautiful crescent moon with Venus within its horns (I'm off again) but just below this cosmic configuration - in hand measurement ratio - was someones bedroom. The common sense angel floated down onto my shoulder and I put my binoculars away and went inside. I bet Sir Patrick Moore doesn't have this problem. If it's not light pollution that stops me it's decency. Darn and blast! Houston, we have a problem.

keith lockey

keith lockey

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:lol: :lol: :lol: ,

Ok then Keith to be serious………………and seeing as you have an interest in astronomy,

Any thoughts about the impending celestial alignment, roughly on the day of the winter equinox?

Yeah, the 21st december. The real puzzler is how the Mayans knew about this alignment. It's supposed to happen every 26,000 years or something. (I really should know more about this but there are that many theories it's hard to keep up.) I think it is like a rollercoaster ride - the sun is crossing over the equator and will be in a new plane. To be honest Malcolm it's quite scary. Planet Earth has seen many changes throughout its birth, there is evidence of polar reversals - something to do with magnetic field changes if I'm correct. And it could happen again. North and South becomes East and West, that sort of thing. It will be interesting to see what happens. So I'm going to hedge my bets on this one. The truth is out there but we might not find out what it is until it is too late. Look on the bright side, though, this time next year Bedlington could be on the equator.

keith lockey

keith lockey

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:lol: :lol: :lol: ,

Ok then Keith to be serious………………and seeing as you have an interest in astronomy,

Any thoughts about the impending celestial alignment, roughly on the day of the winter equinox?

PLEASE JUST WATCH THE FIRST MINUTE AND TWENTY SECONDS - THE REST IS....WELL JUST DON'T BOTHER!

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mercuryg

mercuryg

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Now Mr Lockey, Sir, as a man whom I know to possess some intellect, and one whom I now know to be interested in astronomy, surely you are aware that the whole 2012 cosmic alignment and Mayan calendar scare is nothing but a fabrication? Let's start with a couple of quotes from above:

"The real puzzler is how the Mayans knew about this alignment."

Well, puzzle solved: they didn't. No serious Mayan history scholar has found any evidence of any knowledge of such, and Mayan texts have been comprehensively deciphered with some accuracy. Nor is there any evidence whatsoever that equinoxes or planetary alignments held any importance in Mayan culture. Furthermore, even NASA has explained that there is no particularly special cosmic alignment in December this year.

"the sun is crossing over the equator and will be in a new plane."

This is hotly disputed in astronomical circles: the sun does move in relation to the so called 'equator' but most astronomers will explain that this is a line that has been invented by us. There is no way of knowing where the true equator is, as we have no idea of the actual dimensions of the universe. Besides, it has been 'crossing' this imaginary plane for many years now. Earth, meanwhile, is not due to cross any 'galactic plane' in 2012.

"there is evidence of polar reversals - something to do with magnetic field changes if I'm correct. And it could happen again. North and South becomes East and West, that sort of thing."

If you refer to scholars on the subject the consensus is that a magnetic change occurs naturally every 400,000 or so years. It isn't a case of north becoming something else, and there is no evidence of harm to life on earth. Astronomers and physicists do not believe this is about to happen imminently.

The whole Mayan calender/cosmic shift/impending apocalypse theory came about only in the 1970's, and then from the pen of a not very well accredited 'astronomer' who surmised that we are going to be blitzed by the return of the 'hidden planet' Nibiru, which in fact made an appearance not in Mayan writing, but in that of the Sumerian race. It doesn't exist. The writer of the book came to the conclusion that as the Mayan calendar 'ends' in December 2012, so they must have had some inkling of the End of the World on that date; in fact, it is simply the end of the current Long Count, and the beginning of a new one, much as we begin and end our years, every year, with the close of December 31st and the dawn of January 1st.

I think you can put away your tin foil hat, Keith!

mercuryg

mercuryg

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Malcolm, you're a prophet! Are you the New Messiah that some loony was telling me the other day is already on earth and waiting for a confrontation with the Devil?

keith lockey

keith lockey

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Now Mr Lockey, Sir, as a man whom I know to possess some intellect, and one whom I now know to be interested in astronomy, surely you are aware that the whole 2012 cosmic alignment and Mayan calendar scare is nothing but a fabrication? Let's start with a couple of quotes from above:

"The real puzzler is how the Mayans knew about this alignment."

Well, puzzle solved: they didn't. No serious Mayan history scholar has found any evidence of any knowledge of such, and Mayan texts have been comprehensively deciphered with some accuracy. Nor is there any evidence whatsoever that equinoxes or planetary alignments held any importance in Mayan culture. Furthermore, even NASA has explained that there is no particularly special cosmic alignment in December this year.

"the sun is crossing over the equator and will be in a new plane."

This is hotly disputed in astronomical circles: the sun does move in relation to the so called 'equator' but most astronomers will explain that this is a line that has been invented by us. There is no way of knowing where the true equator is, as we have no idea of the actual dimensions of the universe. Besides, it has been 'crossing' this imaginary plane for many years now. Earth, meanwhile, is not due to cross any 'galactic plane' in 2012.

"there is evidence of polar reversals - something to do with magnetic field changes if I'm correct. And it could happen again. North and South becomes East and West, that sort of thing."

If you refer to scholars on the subject the consensus is that a magnetic change occurs naturally every 400,000 or so years. It isn't a case of north becoming something else, and there is no evidence of harm to life on earth. Astronomers and physicists do not believe this is about to happen imminently.

The whole Mayan calender/cosmic shift/impending apocalypse theory came about only in the 1970's, and then from the pen of a not very well accredited 'astronomer' who surmised that we are going to be blitzed by the return of the 'hidden planet' Nibiru, which in fact made an appearance not in Mayan writing, but in that of the Sumerian race. It doesn't exist. The writer of the book came to the conclusion that as the Mayan calendar 'ends' in December 2012, so they must have had some inkling of the End of the World on that date; in fact, it is simply the end of the current Long Count, and the beginning of a new one, much as we begin and end our years, every year, with the close of December 31st and the dawn of January 1st.

I think you can put away your tin foil hat, Keith!

Gadzooks sirrah! You put in doubt my scientific renderings? You question my cornucopic data bank of cosmic cognizance and astronomic assertations? I consulted the oracles to bring you these fore-warnings; i cast the runes, shook the bones and even read the tea-leaves. My findings were based on the best scientific minds available - ie wikipedia and Mystic Meg. I went to Stonehenge and danced naked amongst the monoliths in search of wisdom for this site. In my Dervish state I was contacted by a triple-eyed Venusian called Vera who told me emphatically that NASA are part of the 2012 conspiracy theory and that the reptoids of circling Nibiru are preparing their motherships for the main attack on the 21st of december when the Earth passes over the cosmic plane and enters the fifth dimension. She assured me that all the major cities would be targeted first - New York, Moscow, Bedlington. But fear not, for if they land here we'll give them a good yarking, a damned good howking. Geordie belligerence and its best. As to polar shifts thoust should look at the findings in Antarctica. (I will consult the ancient ones of Atlantis for more data on this subject - watch this space. no pun intended!) As for the Mayans they did indeed have innovative astronomical knowledge as well as mathematical wisdom and perchance you are right when you say things have been taken out of context - but then again they may have known things that have been lost in translation.

But harken to this slice of history from the Central American civilizations - The Aztec prophecies said the pale-faced god Quetzalcoatl would return from the east to take his rightful place and that he would return in the year 1-Reed. That year in western timescale was 1519 - the year Hernan Cortes arrived at Vera Cruz - from the east - and destroyed the Aztec nation with 500 conquistadors. COINCIDENCE! or prophetic warning.

So sleep easy, my friends, until the 21st of december when the motherships will arrive and....what's that nurse? Time for my medication?

Malcolm Robinson

Malcolm Robinson

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There is one thing for sure Keef,

the Mayans knew about astrological precession and whilst us Europeans were slaughtering people for not believing the earth was flat and the sun orbited the earth they even worked out the wobble theory.

How………maybe the Nibiruians told them………

keith lockey

keith lockey

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There is one thing for sure Keef,

the Mayans knew about astrological precession and whilst us Europeans were slaughtering people for not believing the earth was flat and the sun orbited the earth they even worked out the wobble theory.

How………maybe the Nibiruians told them………

Think of this as well - just under 500 years ago, Copernicus published his De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium in 1543, stating that the sun was at the centre of our universe - not the Earth - as everyone in the church was thinking at the time. But Copernicus had held back the book for decades for fear of the church. (Bruno got burned at the stake for similar 'preachings'.) Science and the church have been at loggerheads for hundreds of years - maybe thousands if we go back to Egyptian astronomers and the Sumerians. People supressed the truth because it would go against the norm. Also consider this. Orson Welles broadcast the War of the Worlds in 1938 and caused widespread panic. Can you imagine any world leader standing in front of a camera and telling the populace that the world is about to end - or be changed forever!!! We, the teeming masses, the hoi polloi, would be the last to know. they would probably announce it after the cricket results. "England had a good day at Lords at the start of the Ashes...and talking of which the planet is about to be destroyed in a fireball by the planet Nibiru."

Malcolm Robinson

Malcolm Robinson

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I tend to think the ancient religious leaders kept knowledge of astronomy to themselves because they were then able to influence their tribes using that knowledge. If that was true then no good letting everyone in on the secret is it, or you don't have an advantage leading to an exulted place in that society. No wonder history is riddled with secret cults and religions, each keeping their secret knowledge to themselves and no wonder all the strange initiation ceremonies almost all designed to keep an initiate's mouth shut.

(Bruno got smoked off Tyson didn't he?)

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