Yesterday I attended the VIP tour and Director’s Breakfast at the NASA Ames Research Center. This was the special award I’d won at the science fair this year. I brought my dad as a guest. I had also wanted to invite a friend, but since STAR testing was happening I don’t think anyone would have been able to go. [irked]

We arrived at 7:40 AM, twenty minutes earlier than we intended. That was because we had expected there to be a lot of traffic. There was traffic, but the carpool lanes served us well.

We started out with a few introductory speeches and a light continental breakfast with the Director of the Research Center. Then, they wanted us (the science fair winners) to give brief overviews of our projects! This was something for us to get “nice and nervous about.” (laughs) Even though I didn’t prepare for this, my short presentation went well enough. I would say there were about 10 winners there, plus guests.

After discussing our projects, a presenter was invited to talk about Saturn and its many moons. On October 15, 1997, the Cassini probe was launched, using a “Venus-Venus-Earth-Jupiter Gravity Assist” trajectory to slingshot its way across the solar system.

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