Alright, let's cut the crap. Another SpaceX launch, or two SpaceX launches, happening within spitting distance of each other on November 14th. Yawn. I mean, seriously, are we still supposed to be impressed by this?
So, the "news" is that SpaceX is planning a double Falcon 9 launch from Florida. Starlink 6-85 off pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 1:44 a.m. EST, give or take some delays. The weather's supposed to be great, which, offcourse, means it'll probably be cloudy just to spite everyone. And they're downplaying the solar activity risk. Right. Because that's never been a problem before.
They're launching 29 more Starlink satellites. More space junk. More bandwidth for cat videos. Great.
And this Falcon 9 booster B1078, it's flying for the 24th time. Twenty-freaking-fourth! It's like these boosters are the Energizer Bunny of space travel. Which, I guess, is kinda cool... or terrifying, depending on how you look at it. I mean, how much wear and tear can these things actually take? Are they just slapping some duct tape on it and sending it back up? I need to see the maintenance reports.
Oh, and it's landing on the drone ship 'Just Read the Instructions.' How original.
Blue Origin launched twin Mars probes for NASA. ULA launched ViaSat-3 after a valve replacement. NASA scrubbed a launch because of solar activity. Rocket Lab delayed Neutron. It’s all happening, everywhere. Except, does any of it really matter?
Here's what gets me: this whole space thing has become so…routine. It's like watching a factory churn out widgets, except the widgets are rockets and the factory is the entire freaking planet. We're supposed to be awestruck by this, right? We're supposed to be like, "Oh, wow, humanity is reaching for the stars!"
Give me a break.
Kindery commented "This is brilliant" on November 15th. Brilliant? Brilliant? What's brilliant about it? Is it brilliant because we're polluting low Earth orbit with thousands of satellites? Is it brilliant because we're turning space into a giant billboard? I don't get it. What am I missing here?
And don't even get me started on the "annual launch record" being broken with a late-night Starlink flight. Who cares? Seriously, who actually sits around counting launches like they're baseball scores? Is there some kind of launch leaderboard I don't know about?
This whole thing reminds me of that time I tried to assemble IKEA furniture. It starts off exciting, you think you're building something amazing, but then you're three hours in, covered in sawdust, missing half the screws, and wondering why you didn't just pay someone else to do it. Except in this case, the furniture is a rocket, the sawdust is rocket fuel, and the missing screws are probably floating around in the Van Allen belts somewhere.
Look, I'm not saying space exploration is bad. I'm just saying, let's be real about what's happening here. This isn't about grand visions and pushing the boundaries of human knowledge. This is about capitalism, about Elon Musk's ego, and about selling internet access to people who already have it. Maybe I'm being too cynical. Maybe I'm just tired. But honestly...
