Doug's Darkworld

On December 11, 1972, 47 years ago today, humans landed on the Moon for the last time. Two men of course, women were still pretty much at the back of the bus then, Eugene Cernan and  Harrison Schmitt. Command Module Pilot Ronald Evans remained in orbit, as well as five mice. Upon return to Earth they were all dissected, their consolation prize being they got to go down in history. The mice were dissected, not the men.

Of the three men, only one is still alive. Evans died young of a heart attack in 1990. RIP. The other two got to live lives as minor celebrities, morphing into their later years spent punching Moon landing deniers. Cernan passed in 2017, but at 84 Schmitt is still with us, faithfully carrying water for the anti-global warming crowd. Sigh. The gentle reader can be forgiven for any thoughts this may inspire. Schmidt claims global warming is all a hoax to increase the government’s size and control over Americans. Louder sigh. Dude, they don’t need a hoax to do that, our ruling parties have been doing both in spades for decades, no excuse asked for or given.

Moving right along, mission highlights are about as exciting as one could expect on a lifeless airless rock. Longest time out of the lander, furthest distance travelled on the surface, the greatest distance away from the lander. They utilized the LRV (Lunar Roving Vehicle) for these. They collected a lot of rocks and gravel. They also partially solved the light flash phenomena reported by previous lunar explorers, astronauts reported seeing flashes or streaks of light averaging 2 per minute while inbound, outbound, and in lunar orbit. Most noticeable when they were lights out and falling asleep. One of the astronauts on this mission always wore a cosmic ray detector, and thus as suspected, turns out the flashes were caused by cosmic rays. How, exactly, these cause visual phenomena is still unknown.

As for the Moon landing hoax people, they’re still going strong. I’m sure them and the flat Earthers have joint conventions now. I’ve pointed out the absurdity of both “theories” before, nothing new to add. Social beliefs, and pretty sure these fall into that category, are strongly resistant to logical argument. I’ll just relist this link for those that want to delve deeper into this silliness. The moon landing hoax no doubt inspired by this movie, notable for co-starring O.J. Simpson. In the movie he’s a murderee, not a murderer.

Well, that’s about all I can extract from this topic. What else happened on this day? In 1282 the Battle of Orewin Bridge where England crushed the last formal resistance to English rule in Wales. The Welsh leader, Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, wasn’t at the battle. One of the reasons it was lost. Worse, he arrived back at the battle scene just in time to be killed. He was the first and last Welsh Prince of Wales. No doubt he is spinning in his grave about Prince Cha Cha holding his office now.

In 1602 according to legend a cook in Geneva noticed armed men scaling the city’s walls. Thinking quickly, she dumped a pot of boiling vegetable soup on them, causing a commotion and helping to rouse the town. The falling pot itself killed one man. So this was the only known battle in history where the first salvo was boiling soup. Legends aside, the Catholic Duke of Savoy had sent a force to launch a surprise attack on the Protestant city. Roused by the soup commotion, the citizens of Geneva sallied forth and fighting side by side with the town militia, defeated the attackers. A number of prisoners were taken, several of them high born. To their dismay, since the Duke of savoy had repeatedly pledged peace with Geneva, they were summarily hung as bandits the next day. And until this day the city celebrates the festival of L’Escalade on this date. (Escalade is the scaling of defensive walls.)

And finally, on this day in 1962, Arthur Lucas became the last person to be executed in Canada. And with the abolition of the death penalty, major crimes spiralled out of control in Canada. Because we all know that fear of harsh punishment is the only thing keeping us in line. Snort. That was sarcasm. The death penalty is to satisfy blood lust, it’s deterrent effect is minimal to non-existent. Hell, a well publicized execution breifly raises the murder and suicide rate. Go figure. When informed that he would be the last person to be executed in Canada, Lucas said “Some consolation.”

As ever, comments, suggestions, and shares are appreciated.

(Copyright © 2019 Doug Stych. All rights reserved.

(Image: Eugene Cernan driving the LRV. Credit: NASA, as such it’s free to use as long as it doesn’t imply sponsorship by NASA. No such sponsorship is meant or implied. Photo details here.)