Thursday night we made the trek as we did a couple months ago to watch NASA’s space shuttle launch.  We’ve were fortunate to be in Florida for two launches in such a short time.  And we couldn’t miss the fire display that would be the first nighttime launch in 4 years, so there we were.  Except, it was cloudy and with T-minus 9:00 minutes, the launch was aborted and we drove 50 minutes back home to try another day.

Today was the day, however, I am beat from pushing hard on work this week and we couldn’t be sure that Olivia would enjoy the travel more than the other day in which she cried and fussed a lot.

Plus, Troy Smith, the quarterback for the #1 Ohio State Buckeyes was going to win the coveted Heisman Trophy tonight just a few minutes past launch.   I like science and new frontiers a lot, but football more…;)

So, we rolled the big screen to face the door and watched a simultaneous close-up lift-off and an amazing outdoor display of a nighttime sunrise.  It was unbelievable how much the scattered clouds lit up in what was otherwise a beautifully clear sky.  Ten minutes later, Troy Smith’s NFL draft-status launched into the stratosphere as the first-ever Buckeye and Big Ten QB to win the Heisman Trophy.  A good night!