Thursday, September 22, 2011

What a Relief!


I've been wondering why, in the last few weeks, I seem to have lost my philosophy of it-is-what-it-is, and what-will-be-will-be. Usually, I'm a fairly patient person and have no problem waiting for something to happen, whether it is waiting for a story idea to come to me, waiting for a reply to a question, waiting for a red light to turn green . . . waiting, waiting, waiting. But lately, my brain is pacing back and forth with impatience, so much so I've found it hard to focus.

So after asking myself what's going on, I decided it must have to do with the fact there's a satellite plunging to Earth. According to statistics, there's a 1-in-3200 chance a chunk of it will hit a human being. A 1-in-3200 chance? I'd say those are pretty good odds! I've entered writing contests with worse odds than that, yet still felt hopeful. And I'd consider a lottery ticket with those odds as pretty good. So, even though it was shoved way down in my subliminal black hole, that must be the reason for my odd behavior. I could be hit by a 200 lb. piece of space debris at any time.

Then, this morning, I read an article on Mashable.com, "Doomed Satellite Approaching Earth, But You Probably Needn't Worry."  It stated:

The 1-in-3,200 probability has been interpreted by some as being ‘per person,’ rather than ‘per 7 billion people.’ That makes the chance of any one person having to worry about it to be less than 1 in 10 trillion,” Kessler told Space.com.

Ah, relief: less than 1 in 10 trillion. That's much better. I can be patient again.

Now, if only I could focus . . .

3 comments:

  1. You have such cute/entertaining/interesting posts! This is great. It brings to mind an episode on the old TV series, Northern Exposure, in which Maggie's boyfriend is hit by a piece of satellite and his body is so melded into it they had to build a special casket, complete with places for antennae, etc. Hilarious.

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  2. @K.D. McCrite, that's a real compliment coming from you! Thank you. :)

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  3. It could also be that this week is the Fall Equinox - notorious for causing children to act up, dogs to pee on the carpet, moods to swing more drastically than usual, and husbands to be discovered as the missing link. Or that could be just my personal life. "This too shall pass."

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