First Light

We'll begin this project in the air, the ultimate in media res.

The northern end of the Chicago shoreline, extending roughly from the Loop to Evanston, as seen on ascent out of O'Hare. 2004:09:17 12:27:59

Now, it was no secret that the remnants of a hurricane were on the way. In fact, I'm surprised it didn't disturb the flight more than it did. As things stood, we had a fairly smooth ride, and don't seem to have been diverted much at all. This compares favorably to a certain line of thunderstorms that resulted in my flight from Boston to Minneapolis last spring being rerouted through Denver by way of Ontario.

Flying through the outer fringes of Tropical Depression Ivan produced surprisingly few bumps. Somewhere over Ohio, I'd reckon. 2004:09:17 13:36:27

P.S. "First Light" is an astronomy reference. That's what we call the event when a new telescope has been assembled and is first opened, hopefully demonstrating that light passes clear through the thing as it should. If successful, the observatory will still be months away from being able to do real work, but bubbly is uncorked anyway, on the theory that the "hard part" is done.