Another Trip

Kathyn—

Sorry I haven't written. You know how crazy it gets right before Christmas break and then I went with Mike on his version of the Grand Tour of the "real moon." It was a different view of the moon than the tour package I took with Fred.

Mike had rented a flyer. It's a special type of leapfrog. Leapfrogs are these vehicles which sort of jump over the lunar landscape. They don't have wheels, but rather have these weird legs. They are hinged in the middle. The vehicle walks on these four legs with a swaying gait like a camel. Then it stops and the legs fold down for you to enter. This one also has onboard jets (powered by compressed air) which enables it to fly short distances. But mostly, the vehicle travels in long leaps. It's not as bad as it sounds. The shock absorbers are perfect so you don't feel the bump of landing and the leaps are several hundred meters so it's more like flying anyway.

The model Mike got didn't have a docking mechanism So,I had to wear a moon suit to walk to the beast. Those things are pretty hot even with the air conditioning in them. Amazingly enough they don't look much different than the primitive Apollo astronauts wore. But inside everything is different. It carries no on board oxygen aside from a small emergency reserve. Scrubbers turn carbon dioxide back into oxygen. Small packs of nutrients and water are placed where a push of a button can serve you lunch if stranded. And the skin of the suit is woven from a superstrong 'thread' made from a special crystal manufactured here on the moon in the high-vac low g manufacturing unit.

It seemed like a lot of stuff, just to walk from the airlock to the leapfrog. When I got in and the cabin repressurized. I was glad to touch the unzip switch and watch it fall off in three pieces.

Our first stop was the arboretum just outside the city. It sat on top of the ground, a huge superhardened concrete dome with anti-meteorite lasers ringing the perimeter. The dome is nearly 300 meters tall and 1000 meters in diameter, making it the largest domed structure made by human hands. We could drive the leapfrog (whom he had named "leaping lena" by this time) directly into a huge airlock. We were met by Hareem Kincaid the director of the arboretum. Apparently, Mike had worked with him in the past. Maybe it was that stuff he couldn't talk about. According to Hareem, the arboretum makes lunar colonization possible. The trees help scrub the air, clean out carbon dioxide and change it into oxygen. "Nature's scrubbers" he called them.

As the doors opened to the arboretum I felt like I was stepping into Muir woods. It was filled with dwarf redwoods, oak, pine, some odd looking trees apparently from the rainforests of the amazon. Such a profusion of different types of trees probably exists no where like this on earth. The air was so humid. I wasn't sure if that was an effect of the trees or if the arboretum was kept that way on purpose. And I was just so amazed at walking through a forest on the moon, that I didn't think to ask. We spent several hours walking through the trails and enjoying the quiet. We saw technicians and researchers. We also saw the odd tourist. We saw an older couple walking hand in hand through the woods. They were so precious. There were a few clearings with picnic tables. Mike arranged for us to have an old time picnic, unfortunately complete with ants and flies. Apparently the insects are an essential part of the ecosystem and the trees need them. I'm just not sure the potato salad did.

Our next stop was an agricultural colony. It looked like the Central Valley, acre after acre of fruit, produce, you name it. The dome had 15 "floors" and 10 sections per floor. Each was devoted to a different type of produce. It was hard to resist the fruit stands, but we wouldn't be back home for a couple of days. I did however, pick up a bottle of honey, and some boysenberry jam.

Oddly, I think the most interesting place on our trip was the dirt mine. You wouldn't think that dirt had any commercial value, but on the moon it does. Lunar soil is rich in certain minerals and all it needs is water to make it good for planting. I stood on the side of a huge pit watching as remote controlled "steam shovels" dug out a ton of dirt and dropped it into a canister. The process was so well controlled that there was hardly even any dust.

The canisters sat on robot carts and once filled drive themselves to the processor. The dirt is dumped on the processor and is shaken. The rocks and gravel are separated from the soil. The rocks are sent to be processed into concrete and the soil is poured into a shipping canister. The canister is sealed and then sent to the mass driver.

The mass driver is the most amazing thing. It's like one of those old fashioned rocket sleds you see in the history books. The canister is placed on this sled and accelerated to ____ KPH which is the escape velocity of the moon. It is precisely aimed at Oneill colony and without any friction to slow it down the canister continues to fly for two weeks until it approaches oneil. Then small water powered jets slow it down and a net like device catches it.

A mass driver like this, but with enhanced security features is used to send Conradium to Oneil for transshipment to earth and mars.

I had mixed feelings when we visited the Skywatch facility. It's a fascinating place, but it was Juan's baby. Since the late 1900's people have worried about an asteroid or huge meteor hitting Earth causing an ELE meaning extinction level event. I've often wondered if Wormwood of the Bible isn't a meteorite. The idea is to scan the heavens with powerful telescopes outside of earth's atmosphere and track asteroids, comets and large meteors. If one is found, then a probe is launched from the moon to survey it and a beacon is set on it to track it. If one is ever found that poses a credible threat to the earth, a mission will be launched from the moon to attach a propulsion unit to the object and nudge it in a different direction. Juan's job was to work out what it would take to nudge an asteroid of a given size into a given orbit over a given period of time. In other words duplicate his work on Oniell station, but not as an experiment.

While there, I saw one of my students. He is an astromechanics major and he took my 20^th century English lit class to kill off a general ed requirement, but he did enjoy reading some of the old science fiction stories and nit-picking the science in them. I encouraged him to write his term paper on "Science and Science Fiction." Hey, anything to get them to read.

We finished our tour by visiting the water mines at the pole. Like our friend at the arboretum, the director of the water mine told us that life would be impossible on the moon if it wasn't for the water mines. I would have to agree. Historically, what prevented the establishment of colonies in space was the absence of water. When the international lunar exploration teams in 2021 found subterranean blocks of ice, the possibility of long term survival on the moon went up. Turned out that there were billions of hectacres of water under the surface.

"You're probably thinking that all the water you need gets recycled," Martin Kwandi said as he paced on a catwalk over the "ice cave" as he called it. "It is true that 9 liters out of every 10 used is reclaimed. But that means you are losing one liter out of ten per day. That needs to be replaced. Additionally, those maneuvering jets on the mass driver canisters, what are they powered by – water. If we didn't have this water, we would be dead. What people don't realize, though is that it is a finite resource. We can't waste it. Personally, I think shooting it off into space is a travesty. They should figure out something else. But they won't concede to that until we are down to our last milliliter of water. Then where do we go Earth? Mars?"

He made a good point, but I was somewhat encouraged when he added that there was enough ice in his mine alone to supply the entire moon for 500 years at the current rate of growth.

On our way home, I did prevail on Mike to stop by the ag colony where I bought grapes, oranges, apples some plums and peaches. He felt it was silly since these are the same fruits we have in the stores, but you and I know that the best fruit is that which was on the vine yesterday and not two days ago.

All in all it was an informative trip. Watching them mine water wasn't as awe inspiring as the view from the mountain top ________ resort, but as Mike would put it, it was more real. I wish we had time to visit the manufacturing facilities over on the farside, but I wanted to be back by Christmas eve.

It was nice meeting the working folk. I grew up working class. My dad sliced through tree trunks with a lasersaw for 30 years. He saved his money to put me through college so I wouldn't have to do that. I called him and those like him, the hidden heros. They go to work every day and do the hard jobs, the dirty jobs, the rough jobs so that the rest of us can have the manufactured goods and nice living conditions.

Well, it's been a long trip and I'm tired, but I wanted to get it all down before I forgot it. Have a good Christmas. I'll holo Christmas eve.

Carolyn

Slang

Kathyrn--

It's great to hear that you are thinking about coming here. Summer will be perfect. I'll be completely settled in by then and know all the cool places to go. Spring break is coming up here next week so I'm going on the grand tour. I'm going to go the the Tranquility Base Museum to see the original LEM. I'll stay overnight at the Hilton Tranquility Hotel and Casino. Gambling isn't allowed in the towns, but "outside" as the locals call it is fair game. I wouldn't be surprised if the hotels don't import other types of entertainment as well. I doubt the oldest profession isn't represented in some manner even hear, although no one seems to want to talk about it.

After that I'll be going to the Mountains. Mt______ is taller than Everest. Near the top is cliff house (That's right another cliff house) It is a restaurant carved out of the face of the cliff itself. We'll be stopping there for lunch. We'll then take the rover down into the Sea of Tears where we will suit up and go for a stroll. I'd pick up a pebble to send back to you, but there are strict rules about disturbing the environment. These areas are the equivalent of national parks.

Finally, I'll take a leapfrog to Farside Settlement to visit the Conradium mines. It should take only three 20 minute leaps. I guess it's an efficient form of travel, but I don't know if I like the idea of a machine just jumping across the landscape.

On my way back I'll visit one of the ag domes. So, I'll be able to be your guide when you bounce in. Of course, by then I hope to be a glider.

I'll tell you I've been learning a lot of the local slang. It's been interesting. Alot of the slang has to do with the history of the moon. To "do an armstrong" for instance means to be a pioneer or to do something courageous. "It's a Collins" means to just miss out on something sort of like the earth expression "Close but no cigar." An avid golfer is called a "Shepherd". And to crash and burn emotionally is to "aldren."

Of course there are cliques and subgroups and the other groups have their own names for them. Lots of people spend a lot of time outside the domes playing low-g games, exploring or just having fun. They are sometimes called "Dust Bunnies" by those who prefer to stay inside and in return the "dust bunnies" call those who don't go out "cave rats."

Tourists often get the wrath of the native. They are called "leadbottoms" and sometimes "alien invaders."

The geography also provides a source for a few slang terms. For instance, To crater means to fail dramatically. It also means to crash into something by accident. To "dust" someone means to try and stir up trouble for them and to disrespect them.

Well, I need to get back to grading papers.

Take Care. I'll look forward to seeing you this summer,but before then don't be a stranger burn a couple of holo credits on us.

Carolyn

Back on the Case

Kathryn--

thanks for the encouraging words. I did feel like a failure. I guess pride still rears his ugly face now and again. I am glad that it worked out well for Erik. I hated to think of him as a murderer. They reduced the charges to aggravated assault 5 years probation and 2000 hours of community service. As Mike predicted, Oneil has declined to extradite him.

Apparently, my capital with Mike hasn't been too badly compromised. He wants me back on the case. I don't know if that's good or bad. I must admit that some of that old adrenaline rush is coming back to me.

Now that we know it was a poisoning we have to go in a different direction. Poisoning is premeditated. However, poisoning with Conradium is odd. It suggests that the killer used what he had on his shelf. I'm thinking that he came by Juan's office and found him sprawled on the floor unconscious. Apparently, Juan had picked up his conradium prescription that day. It was laying on the desk along with a new injector. Since we never found the refills, we can surmise that the killer found him already knocked out laying in a pool of blood, but not yet dead. He was possibly groaning or moving slightly. the killer then saw his opportunity and took it. He simply shot the whole conradium prescription into Juan. Within a few minutes, his heart muscle would thicken and freeze up and stop beating. Everyone would believe he had his head bashed in and the killer probably knew he had an iron clad alibi for the time of the assault. It was improvised, but definitely deliberate.

Now, we just have to figure out who wanted Juan dead. I liked the guy, but I'm afraid we will need an extra memory module in the handheld to list all the suspects.

Well, it's church tomorrow. So, I'd better get my beauty sleep or at my age it's more like my reduce the ugliness sleep.

Carolyn

Embarrased

Kathryn--

I got the vids. Jeremiah is adorable. Sometimes I wish I had children, but God gave me other compensations I suppose. Still, to have a little one dependent on your, learning from you, caring for you (at least until adolescence) must be uniquely satisfying. Still, we follow the paths God lays down for us. I remember one time I was stressing about not being a parent and I ran across an obscure scripture in Isaiah:

For thus saith the LORD unto the eunuchs that keep my sabbaths, and choose the things that please me, and take hold of my covenant; Even unto them will I give in mine house and within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and of daughters: I will give them an everlasting name, that shall not be cut off.
Isa 56:4-5

I know I'm not a eunuch, but the idea is the same. However, I do sometimes wonder hwo my life might have been different if I had taken a more traditional route. I've been thinking about that a lot lately.

I know you are going to say, "I told you so," but I'll risk it. Fred and I have been seeing a lot of each other. I really enjoy being with him. And I know he enjoys being with me. I can't say I'm in love with him, because I haven't a clue what love is, at least that tyep of love. But I do feel comfortable being with him. Still, I have this feeling that he has something he's hiding. In my interpersonal relatinship classes I talk abotu how secrets affect relationships. Your relationship can go no deeper than your most closely held secret. As you talk and your relationship gets deeper you begin to talk about more things eventually one will come close to the secret then you pull up back to the shallower, safer waters.

That's how I feel when i'm with him. We will be talking and enjoying ourselves and tehn suddenly he just pulls back to something safe like talking about the three camera inovation of the I Love Lucy show or comparing protest music of the 60's with gangsta rap of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. I mean, i enjoy talking about those things, but I recognize the tactic. It's a personal favorite of mine when I feel I'm getting too close to someone.

I think it is just as well that I didn't do the whole dating thing in my life. I really dont do it very well.

I guess i should turn to that "other man" in my life. My friend and my bane Mike Hagarity. Well, it really isn't him, it's me, juan, erik and the medical examiner.

I got a call from Mike, he said we should meet at the medical examiners office and tehn hung up. Like I'm supposed to know where the medical examiners office is. I guess he knows because last week he took his forensics students to an autopsy. I do wonder why we have a criminology department. But I'm afraid, EarthCon is just looking ahead to a time when we won't be quite the safe little small town we are today. And inlight of Juans murder, they are probably right.

Following the directions on my handheld, I found my way to a large square white stone building just reeking of governmental efficiency. I wondered if I would have to go into the autopsy room. I didn't know if I could handle that. But instead I found myself with Mike in a rather normal office with the medical examiner, Marta Hassaam.

She had some sort of organ in a glass jar on the table (they use a lot of glass here because the silica in the lunar soil is perfect for glass making).

"This is your victim's heart." She said. I tried not to look at it, but did in fascination.

Let's look at it closer. i was afraid she would take it out of the jar and begin dissecting it in front of me. But instead, she switched on a holo projector with a more stylized image of the heart.

A normal heart has walls ____ mm thick. Juans was three times that thick. In short his heart muscle was so thick it couldn't flex enough to pump the blood. That's your cause of death and not blunt force trauma.

Well, you could have knocked me over with a feather. I had done my Miss Marple thing and solved the case even got a confession, and low and behold, the guy diddn't do it.

If Mike was affected, he didn't show it.

"What could cause that?"

"Well, the tox panel showed that he had an overdose of Conradium."

The ME explained to us that Conradium works by strengthening the muscles of the heart and the vascular system. This is good up to a point, but too much and the tissues become rigid which means the heart stops pumping. The average dose is 2 micrograms. he had over 30 milligrams in his system. Someone had injected him with a lifetime supply of the drug.

That was what killed him and not Erik hitting him over the head with the trophy. The poisoning would have taken several hours to take place. Erik had thought he killed Juan, but he was already dying. He was guilty of anger, assault and bad timing, but not murder.

So, here I am with my big revelation and I'm only sort of right. At least Erik won't be in too much trouble. He will be charged with assault and probably sent back to earth for rehabilitation in a minimum security facility.

What we had thought was an unplanned accidental rage killing, now appears to be premeditated murder. This was deliberate, cold-blooded homicide. Well, after this fiasco, at least I won't be invited back into the investigation.

Oh, I wanted to say congratulations on your sabbatical. You will love Junction City. I spent some time at the University there one summer. The rocky mountains are gorgeous. Since you will be that close, take a side trip into Wyoming and visit the Buffalo Bill Western Museum Complex in Cody. The best museum of Western History in the world. The art collection alone is worth the trip.

Well, this has been your ex-supersleuth friend

Carolyn

An Arrest has been Made

Kathryn--

thank you for your concerns about my safety. I didn't intend to make you think that I've been dropped into a hotbed of radical political activity. I guess I've been feeling less secure the past few days since Juan's death. Mike has been pretty good at not telling people "I told you so" about the vid-eyes. He just grumbled once under his breath, "I could really use a vid chip from last night."

Thankfully, an arrest has been made. It's a relief, but also a sadness. Eric was arrested, and I was probably responsible for the arrest. Basically, it all started with a broken picture frame.

After I got home from helping Mike profile the crime scene, and feeling pretty bad about being unable to help much, I found that my things had arrived from Earth. Isn't it strange how I simply say from Earth. That's how everyone is around here. We talk about earth like it's one big city. We don't say, "I'm going to San Francisco next month, Just I'm going to earth." Anyway back to the story. I began to peel back the foam on one of the crates and I found my favorite painting right on top. You know the Tanya Goldberg neo-cubist work that hung in the entrance hall of my old place.

Well, as I lifted it out of the case, I noticed that the nails holding part of the frame together had come apart. So, I laid it on my worktable and in lieu of a hammer, which is probably packed in one of the other crates, I took off my shoe and tapped the nail, but it didn't seem to want to go down. Finally, I forgot myself and hit the nail with all my might and shot straight up toward the ceiling. Just before I bumped my head, I stopped myself. I looked up and saw my fingers pushing me back away from the ceiling. Then I remembered something. I pulled up the crime scene photos on my handheld. On the ceiling Directly above the blood stain on the carpet was a four or five centimeter smudge.

I called Mike and we went back to the crime scene with one of his crim students. He took a sample of the smudge. It was hair gel. On both sides of the smudge were ten near perfect fingerprints. Within the hour we had Erik in custody.

It was sad to see him sitting there at the security station. He looked so pathetic.

"I didn't mean to do it," he said. "I can't say it was an accident, but I really didn't intend of kill him. But that man stole my life."

He explained that 10 years ago, he and Juan were part of an independence group at Oneil. After 5 years of frustration, they decided on direct action. The group voted and by a narrow margin decided to plant a bomb at EarthCon HQ. They chose the night cycle on a holiday.

"No one should have been in that place. But still it didn't seem right to me," he explained. "So, I went there to stop them. Juan was the ringleader. He was just setting the timer when I tried to stop him. He just pushed me into a closet and locked the door. I thought I was going to die. But the door reduced the concussion and I was able to crawl out of the rubble, but I was seen leaving the scene. The next day I discovered that a woman and her daughter died in the explosion. They had just come by to pick up some papers for her husband."

Apparently that's the darkened sector on Oneil. EarthCon hushed it up and claimed it was a gas leak. They are still trying to decide what to do in the sector.

He fled Oneil and changed his identity. He had fingerprint gloves made. They were skin tight and fooled the fingerprint scanner. Mike grumbled, "If they still rolled a man's prints by hand, that wouldn't have worked." He's probably right. Sometimes thelow-tech road is the best.

He had facial reconstruction and for the past five years has been living life on the run. He figured that the lunar colony was the best place to be because of it's small population. Imagine his distress when he saw Juan Mcalister in the mall one day. The man who had left him to die. The man who had made him a fugitive with a nice job and comfortable life. He decided to confront Juan. He walked up to him and simply gave him the password for the arming code - rosebud - then walked away. Later that day he went by the office later in the evening. Juan was the only one in the buildidng at the time. It was just Juan and the cleaning robots.

"I didn't intend to kill him. I just wanted him to know what he'd done to my life. I wanted... I'm not sure what I wanted, but I didn't want to kill him. I tried to stop the violence and not to start it," he said. It was pitful. She was crying. Apparently the argument got out of hand and he just picked up the award and hit him on the head."

There is one strange part of this story. He says he didn't put the body in the mass driver capsule. Why would he admit the killing, but deny the disposal of the body. Who knows. During my short stint at Quantico, we had a serial killer who freely admitted to 16 murders, but didn't want to admit that he left the scenes a bloody mess because his mother had always said Cleanliness is next to Godliness. So, sometimes a killer's priorities are really skewed.

They don't know much about what to do with him. We don't really have jail facilities here. There's a holding cell. Usually people arrested on minor crimes are fined or put under house arrest, but what do you do with a murderer, albeit an accidental one. They will probably send him back to earth. I really felt sorry for him. I know it sounds wierd, but I think I could understand the feeling if not the act.

Well, Fred is taking me to a new Armenian restaurant tonight. I like him, but every so often he just seems to pull away. Maybe I'm just expecting too much. After all, I don't have any real experience in these things. At least no current experience.

I'm still expecting to see vids of the new grandchild please upload plenty.

Carolyn.

The Movement

Kathyrn--

I've been learning a lot about the Lunar Independence Movement from Juan. He's one of those types who believes that having the office next to you means he can pop in at anytime and talk. It would be annoying if he wasn't so personable. He has two great passions, astromechanics and lunar independence.

Apparently, he moved here with his parents when he was in his teens At first, he was like most teenagers separated from his friends and family. As soon as he was 18 he applied for a scholarship at Oxford in their Astromechanics. He did his doctoral dissertation on a new technique for asteroid deflection using mass driving thrusters to nudge large asteroids into a new orbit rather than trying to destroy them with nuclear explosives.

He spent a few years on Oneil using the space based telescopes there to catalog various types of space debris which could threaten the station. He proved his system when a large house sized meteor approached the colony on a near miss course. He received a grant from EarthCon to affix thrusters to the meteor and push it into a new orbit. After that he became Skywatch's golden haired boy. Later, he thought the moon a better base for his research. Skywatch agreed and now, the moon is the main base of operations in the event of any Earth crossing asteroid incident. So, 15 years after he ran away to earth he returned to the moon.

Seems like a lot of us here are running from or toward something. the problem is that most of us just don't know which it is.

Working closely with EarthCon he came to the conclusion that the Consortium has outlived its usefulness and was now acting as an arrogant corporate dictator. For instance, products made on the moon cannot be sold directly to Mars colony or Oneil. they must be sold to EarthCon who in turn sells them where they wish. This not only hurts the producer's economy having to deal with a monopoly setting prices, but it also affects the consumer, especially off world consumers, who sometimes have to wait twice as long to receive supplies because they must first be logged into EarthCon's inventory and then approved for shipment to the colony.

However, I pointed out that we are allowed a great deal of self-government. Oh, Kathryn, that reminds me I haven't yet told you about the govenment here. Being a fan of Jefferson, you'll love this. The ruling council is chosen at random from the permanent citizen base. To become a permanent citizen you must have lived continuously on the moon (meaning more than 48 weeks adjusted for business or personal trips off-world) for five years. Every five years, 100 people are chosen at random from the three cities to form the world council. Out of that number one person is chosen by lot to be the president of the council. It's like Jury duty, no one really wants the interruption, but it's their civic duty.

Most of the major decisions of the world are made through direct referendum. Each day, every permanent resident (which includes non citizens who have contracted for a five-year residency) checks the comm screen to vote on various resolutions forwarded for approval by the council. Some days there's nothing. Other days it takes an hour or more to get through them all. Each resident is required to vote on at least 70 percent of the resolutions each year. If not, they are fined 100 loaves for each percentage point under 70. Who knew that direct democracy could be so time consuming.

But the LIM's (Lunar Independence Movement adherents) argue that being "allowed" self government by an all powerful consortium is not the same thing as having it. They argue that as soon as any legislation was passed that hurt their profit margin, they would find an excuse to declare martial law. I think that's a bit extreme, but I understand. No one wants to believe that they need permission to govern themselves. It's one of those "natural rights" that were enunciated during the enlightenment which formed the foundation for American Independence.

The Movement has taken hold with many of the young p eople here. They are natives. Born on the moon and see it as their natural home. Seeing a government 240,000 miles away dictating, even if just in trade, policies for the moon irritates them. Protests in front of the EarthCon offices take place almost weekly. A generation gap is developing between children and parents. Those of my generation still have ties - culturally, emotionally, ethnically - to earth. They hesitate to criticize the world of their birth. But the young people with no such ties see earth as a colonial overseer which is inhibting the moon's ability to develop its own economy and culture.

Some have suggested that violence is the only way to attain independence. "Revolutions always involve blood shed" one told me. The near bloodless reunification of Germany and democratization of Russia in the 1980's, the social coups in cuba following Castro's death in 2015, the Tibetan "Mediation" revolution resulting in a free tibet in 2037, seem to be forgotten in the anger.

The lack of credible coverage of by Earth media and the watered down coverage by EarthCon owned Vid channels here and on Oneil have further inflamed the radicals.

The snake is in the garden. The question is whether the temptation will cause the fall of this second eden.

Pray for us, Kathryn. I love the moon. I would hate to see it torn apart by a civil war.

First Day of Class

[Authors note: These are not necessarily in order. This probably reflects events before the murder. But this is my process and I tend to jump around a lot.]

Kathryn--

I'm too old to have a boyfriend. What would I do with one if I had one? Fred is just a friend. We went out to dinner as friends. That's all. I'll tell you one guy who is NOT my boyfriend. Remember, that cop turned criminology professor I met at the reception. Well, he and I got into it at the Academic Senate meeting. He made a proposal that all the hallways and faculty offices be fitted with spycams. Okay he called them minimally visible visual surveillance devices.

The paranoid idiot. This isn't the tenderloin, it's an educational institution on the moon. Everyone of us passed multiple background checks and psychological tests just to get an immigration permit.

Okay, no screening is perfect and we have a new generation of natives, but still let's not get paranoid too early. Let's enjoy a little bit of innocence for now.

Besides there's a privacy issue for our students. You know how students come to us and tell us all sorts of things they wouldn't want some kiddy cop in campus security overhearing. Okay, maybe the hallway makes sense.

I can see that Mike is going to be a major pain in the you-know-what for a very long time to come. I am definitely going to have to pray through about him.

I had my first class today. The kids were fantastic. Well, most of them are the children of geniuses so the IQ level in the room was soaring. It was amazing to see how they just glide in and float into a seat. Meanwhile, I'm bouncing and jerking around. I'm at about 1/3 G now with my weight jacket. At least the students were polite enough not to make fun of it in my presence. Although, they did snicker a bit when I spun around to write something on the touch screen and floated half way to the ceiling. One young man gallantly held out his hand to help steady me as I floated back to the ground. I recognized him as the young customs agent I told you about when we talked. His name is Jonathan Lafarge, but he told me today he's changing his last name to Endymion.

Many of the younger generation are adopting either first or last names of lunar origin. Endymion is a large crater on the moon in the upper right hand corner of the full moon as it might be seen from earth. Others are a bit more whimsical. In my class I have Two "Moonbeams" and a Daniel Bluemoon. Within two generations, I doubt any Earth names will persist.

Something interesting is emerging here. We have people for all ethnic backgrounds moving to the moon. They come from all nations and each have their own customs and languages (although English is the unofficial official language because the first research and commercial bases were set up by the Americans) but those born here on the moon identify more with the Moon than those terrestrial origins. I guess it is something like what happened after the settling of the U.S. and the Great Immigrations of the 19th and early 20th centuries where the children of the immigrants shed their cultural heritage to be seen as "just plain Americans" only to reclaim that in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

But it seems to be something more profound than that. It's like they are saying that they aren't just cutting ties with a cultural heritage, but with earth itself. They are the true ET's. Maybe it's because unlike the decendent of a Mexican American or Italian American imigrant, these kids can never walk the streets of earth without a full body suit supporting bones adapted to gravity 1/6 that of earth. It would be like stepping out of a plane in New New Orleans and suddenly weighing 800 pounds.

There seems to be a strong Lunar Independence Movement emerging here. You know, when you see news reports about Space Colony Independence it's treated as being just a handful of fringe group activists/trouble makers. But the ones I've met have been very articulate and intelligent. They make some good points. I never really considered the question before. Somehow, it seemed unimportant when I was tending my window box on Church Street with hundred year old street cars rattling by. But here, now, I guess I'll have to give it some serious consideration.

Apparently, Juan, you know the professor with the office next to mine, is a leading advocate of Lunar independence. He has been cautioned by the administration a couple of times for bringing it into his classroom and using class time to organize protests. But the students love him. And he is a likeable guy, but I'm afraid his lack of control will get him into trouble. But then maybe he is just passionate. I remember being passionate about things in my youth. But passion must be tempered with good sense. He's young. He'll have time to learn.

So, you say that Leanne Gundersen has been appointed department chair. Well, she has wanted it for years. Personally, even with my arthritis I would run in the opposite direction if they offered it to me. Hmmm... I just noticed. I haven't had so much pain the last few weeks. Low-G must agree with my knee. Now,if I can just keep from spinning off into space periodically.

Well, I've got another class starting in 15 minutes. Earth History: North America 1500-1800. I think that when we get to the Revolutionary War period, there will be some lively discussion.

Take Care and please do consider coming here this summer. I have an extra room and maybe by then I'll be able to loan you my weight suit.

Carolyn