Tha Final Frontier

You wouldn't believe how BIG space is. You think it's a long way down to the chemists, but that's nothing compared to space.

Today, our mission was to boldly go, boldly, where no-one else has boldly gone before, again.

You see, this morning Dan watched a programme called "Only in America" that included a visit to NASA. He signed "Me, Me, Me!", and so, instead of sorting out the garage (an annual event) we went to the National Space Centre in Leicester (for non-Brits, pronounced Lester).

For grown-ups it's a very confusing place. In fact, its confusing just getting there as Leicester is a sprawling mess and the by-pass consists of an infinite number of traffic lights and round-abouts. However, the tourism people have put up lots of brown signs with rockets on, so you more or less end up at the Space Centre, even if you were really going to Loughborough. It's a different matter getting away as the signs still point to the Space Centre, as though it was at the centre of a black-hole. No matter can escape, not even light.

Kids don't find it at all confusing. You just run around randomly pushing every button in sight. Something will happen, and, if not, you just push the next button or wind the next handle.

Grown-ups want the toilets and a cup of tea; kids just go berserk. Space is infinite and we only have three hours to see the universe. And it's not just the universe we see today, we want to go from the Big Bang to the Infinite Silence and back again by five 0'clock (17.00 space time).

You think re-cycling is new? We saw stars go super-nova and explode all over us, then the dust and energy clumped up to form; guess what: Stars.

We saw spacemen, satellites, planets, stars, moon rocks, rockets; you name it, and it still, wasn't enough. We had to drag Dan away after 2 1/2 hours and he hadn't had a pee or a drink. We tried to coax him into the cafe, but he didn't care. He wants to be an astronaut.

In the car we ate our space food (freeze dried strawberries) and experienced weightlessness as I drove over roundabouts at 80 mph to get back for our child-minders, an hour late. But, hey, time is relative, isn't it? After our experience with the black hole, its just amazing we are still in the same galaxy! Perhaps we are in some parallel universe where I am younger, and even more handsome.

Isn't space travel wonderful?