Mars Speculation

My first cousin passed away yesterday morning. One wrong nurse at the wrong place at the wrong time really can make a difference in people's lives. I'm still waiting to hear about funeral arrangements.
There's nothing new about the other first cousin with cancer.

Space
An interesting article appeared this week. SpaceX wants to launch people to Mars in 2024. They've already announced an unmanned launch to Mars in 2018. Starting then, they want to launch a rocket there every 26 months. It's also been announced that Elon Musk is going to be sharing SpaceX's Mars colonization plan at the end of September at the International Astronautics Congress.

It may sound ambitious, but they've recovered four rockets already. That's the main cost of a launch. The fuel for a Falcon 9 is about $200,000(€176,312.43) a launch. Prepping a recovered rocket costs single digit millions of dollars last time I saw a quote. Considering their increasing launch rate(increased profitability), sending used rockets into space will be very cheap for them, basically free. Getting to Mars is trickier than launching, of course.

I was texting to someone about this, when I had what may be an epiphany. SpaceX does a lot of testing. Going to Mars is risky. They'll need to do a test run to show it can be done. They can simulate landings on earth. They can test spacecraft under water. What would be a real technology demonstration? Sending a team of astronauts to the moon and back. SpaceX could do that fairly easily and cheaply.

If I'm right, a manned trip or trips to the moon will be one of the announcements in September. They can learn things with boots on the ground they can't with unmanned capsules. If I'm wrong, they must consider the unmanned flights in 2018, 2020 and 2022 to be the only demonstration tests they need.

The really sad part of all this is that, in my opinion, all of 2024 is during the Tribulation.

Book Stuff
The software I needed for the YouTube series I wanted to start after the 21st has been delayed seven week until August 9th. I was wondering how I'd be able to maintain progress on Book 2 if I had to do more prep work for the series. I guess I don't need to worry about that any more.

I've seen less Book 2 progress this week than I wanted. Part of it was the stuff with my cousin. Part of it was an infection I've been fighting. It's really drained my energy, though I'm feeling better.
YouTube videos have been delayed, too. Imagine waking up after a full night's sleep and feeling dead tired.