Well, 40 years ago about this time Apollo 8 was swinging around the moon. I was recently going through some old issues of Popular Science that I have from the late 50s and 60s, just soaking up the excitement of a time when everybody was willing to make small or large sacrifices to achieve something beautiful and gloriously human. It was all long before my time, but just reading old articles speculating about what mankind would be able to accomplish within the next half-century, and reading the new interviews with Borman, Lovell, and Anders, one can't help but get charged up and think maybe, just maybe, now that we have put behind us Boomer Myopia as the guiding force in policy making, we might start reaching out to do things worthy of ourselves again.

As a small commemoration, I've put up NASA's site on our links page because, really, even at its worst, NASA is still doing more long-term good for mankind than any cash-strapped government agency could reasonably be expected to pull off.

I also linked to Kate Beaton's site, because it's awesome.

So, if you're of a Jesusy persuasion, have a Merry Christmas, and if not, well, enjoy another day under the sky and stars!

- Count Dolby von Luckner

Some of you might be wondering why the second clock didn't disappear once Frederick convinced himself not to steal it. That might well have been the case had Frederick not first taken the clock to the Voltaire Stasis Year, thereby extending to it the same protection against chrono-spatial disturbance that Delaflotte is currently enjoying! Theoretically, then, once the powers stop maintaining the Stasis Year, this entire Holiday Special will cease to exist.

Sniff.

- Count Dolby von Luckner