<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; ">Thanks for sharing your story Tim. I have shared part of your story in many of my Peace with Justice training workshop that you told me year ago.<div>It was powerful to me then and still is.... </div><div><b><i><span style="font-size: 14px;"><font color="#1a0a53">"When I was working </font></span><span style="color: rgb(26, 10, 83); font-size: 14px; ">programming NASA's first Unix computers, I remember thinking "I wish </span><span style="color: rgb(26, 10, 83); font-size: 14px; ">I had studied Unix in college" - then realizing that Unix didn't </span><span style="color: rgb(26, 10, 83); font-size: 14px; ">exist when I was in college! But the principles and laws of </span><span style="color: rgb(26, 10, 83); font-size: 14px; ">mathematics and physics I learned in the late 60's have stood up very </span><span style="color: rgb(26, 10, 83); font-size: 14px; ">well.</span></i></b></div><div><b><i><span style="color: rgb(26, 10, 83); font-size: 14px; "><br></span></i></b></div><div>Thank you for keeping us always looking "up" for more places to go....</div><div>Best wishes in your new assignment.... and now that Susan is retired too....come visit us in awesome Austin.</div><div>Grace & Peace</div><div>Wanda<br><div apple-content-edited="true">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; font-size: medium; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; font-size: medium; ">Wanda Holcombe<br><a href="mailto:wandah70@gmail.com">wandah70@gmail.com</a></span><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; font-size: medium; ">512-619-3469</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; font-size: medium; ">Email: <a href="mailto:wandah70@gmail.com">wandah70@gmail.com</a><br><br><span></span><span></span><span><img height="197" width="293" id="b1dafb2b-2e1c-4dcf-8c78-44ac1180fc10" apple-width="yes" apple-height="yes" src="cid:89DE84A2-FF0C-4FFA-AAA5-B5A598F12B6C@austin.rr.com"></span>
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</span></div><br><div><div>On Sep 29, 2012, at 11:21 AM, Tim Wegner <<a href="mailto:twegner@swbell.net">twegner@swbell.net</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite">Yesterday I turned in my badges at the United Space Alliance.<br><br>My NASA career started when Susan and I were re-assigned from Egypt <br>to Houston. The only thing I knew about the Space Shuttle was what I <br>had read in Time magazines bought on the streets in Cairo. <br><br>When we arrived at the Houston House, Susan stayed "in house" and I <br>was assigned to work. Larry Henschen helped me arrange an interview <br>with McDonnell Douglas, a NASA contractor. I had never programmed a <br>computer and had no qualification other than a Master's degree in <br>mathematics and an "all-but-thesis" not-quite-a-PhD. In retrospect, <br>those were great credentials, since the state of computer programming <br>when I was in college was using punch cards. When I was working <br>programming NASA's first Unix computers, I remember thinking "I wish <br>I had studied Unix in college" - then realizing that Unix didn't <br>exist when I was in college! But the principles and laws of <br>mathematics and physics I learned in the late 60's have stood up very <br>well. My career has been spent in the abstract world of mathematical <br>models of gravity, drag, solar pressure, and accelerations - space, <br>the final frontier. Hard to beat that.<br><br>I missed the first four shuttle flights but arrived in time for <br>STS-5. My first project was an analysis of the shuttle drag model. My <br>supervisors weren't watching closely, so I learned FORTRAN on a <br>UNISYS mainframe and implemented my results in a program called HOPE. <br>(There was another program called LOVE, but not one called FAITH.) <br>Shortly thereafter I was re-assigned as a programmer, and remained a <br>software developer (and software project manager) for my whole <br>career, which extended more then a year past the last Shuttle flight <br>in July 2011. I ended up working for various NASA contractors for a <br>bit over 30 years.<br><br>Shortly after I started at NASA, Larry Henschen and I were <br>instrumental in helping Lynn Oden, another Houston House order <br>member, in also getting a job. For a few years Lynn and I commutred <br>together. Lynn retired a few years ago, having had a fine career as <br>a Shuttle Navigation Flight Controller.<br><br>Susan and I never "left" the Houston House; it melted away around us <br>as the Order transitioned away from corporate living. Conna Wilkinson <br>was the last one to leave when she moved back to Oklahoma. So Susan <br>and I turned out the lights of the Houston House and got an <br>apartment, and later bought a house. I am grateful today for all the <br>experiences we had assigned to San Franscisco, San Jose, Melbourne, <br>Adelaide, Bayad, and finally Houston. Susan and I arrived in Houston <br>with no assets but no debts in our mid-thirties, and are now both <br>retired. We still have no debts, but now we have a few assets. I <br>amazed that that was possible!<br><br>I am still working with a small group of your colleagues keeping the <br><a href="http://wedgeblade.net">wedgeblade.net</a> glue connecting our far flung community alive.<br><br>Retirement is, of course, just another "assignment" to new <br>challenges.<br><br>Tim Wegner<br><br><br><br>_______________________________________________<br>Dialogue mailing list<br><a href="mailto:Dialogue@lists.wedgeblade.net">Dialogue@lists.wedgeblade.net</a><br>http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net<br></blockquote></div><br></div></body></html>