The Netmums Podcast - S8 Ep4: It's launch week for Tim Peake!

Episode Date: October 11, 2022

Tim Peake joins Wendy and Jen to talk about his first non-fiction book for kids, perfect for those who are hungry to know more about space, the universe and our place in it. The book is released on the 13th October.

This episode is sponsored by Aldi. Life with a newborn is amazing, but why does no one tell you how many nappies they go through? That's why finding nappies that fit, are gentle against your baby's skin, and don't break the bank is so important. Sign up on Netmums and you'll receive a voucher to claim one full-size pack of Aldi Mamiya newborn nappies, totally free. Sounds good to us. Now on with the show. You're listening to the Netmums podcast with me, Wendy Gollich. And me, Jennifer Howes. On this week's show. I felt, you know, that the universe is writing its own diary as to, well, this is the story of my life, but it's actually the story of your life because you are me. But before all of that, hello, hello and

welcome to another episode. It's been quite a week this week. I am looking at secondary schools with my 11 year old and it's making me feel sad and old and worried that she's going to have to get a train on her own and I'm just not ready for 11-year-olds. Jen, help! It's so exciting. I remember that feeling, but you'll be so glad your life will transform. And I think once they get into secondary school, it can be amazing.

I'll take your word for it. Now, I'm super excited about today's guests. Maybe not as excited as my kids who've been begging all morning to say hello to him. Jen, tell us a little bit about today's very special guest. Yes. Well, today's guest, he is the first British astronaut to visit the International Space Station and do a spacewalk. He ran the London Marathon from space. He's father to two boys, Thomas and Oliver, with his wife Rebecca, and he's just written his first non-fiction children's book. It's called The Cosmic Diary of Our Incredible Universe and answers the big

questions our little ones have, like what's inside a black hole and how stars are made. Our guest today is Tim Peake. Welcome, Tim. Hello, Wendy. Hello, Jen. Thank you very much. Great to be here. It's great to have you. Now, Tim, I know you'll have been asked this a million times, but humor me. You're an astronaut. It's an iconic career. It's a career that kids dream about. What are the best and worst moments you've experienced? I know previously you said saying goodbye to your kids was pretty damn tough.

But tell us the highs and the lows, please, sir. Gosh, yeah, there are so many. It's a long, long journey. It's a marathon, not a sprint. And it was six years of training um before I even had my mission so uh lots of ups and lots of downs but um I think one of the greatest moments was when I was actually told that I had been assigned to a long duration mission on the International Space Station because you know even getting selected as an astronaut that's brilliant that's amazing but there's no guarantee of a mission to space. And then you go through all the training and you graduate from training,

but that's no guarantee of a mission to space. And there's lots of politics involved. But when you get that phone call that says you have been assigned, it means there is a seat on a rocket with your name on it. And as long as you're fit and healthy, and you go through the rest of the training process, nothing is going to stop you from launching. So that has to be the best moment when you're like, yes, I have been assigned. And I was kind of expecting it might be a short mission to space, just two weeks. But then I was

told, no, it's six months, you've got a full six months on the space station, which was unbelievable. The lows. Yeah, time away from family. Overall family uh overall I mentioned you know six years of training well at least 50 percent of that time if not more is away it's an international space station so the clue is in the name and we train in Russia we train in Japan in Canada in Germany a huge amount of time in Houston so spending a lot of time away from family was really, really tough. And were your kids just at home at school while that was going on? Well, we had several moves. So when I was first selected as an astronaut, I was just leaving the army and I was about to move down to the southwest.

I had a job with Westlands Helicopters in Yeovil and so we were about to move down there when I was selected and of course that meant a move instead not to Yeovil but to Cologne so we went over to Germany for my training and then when I was assigned to a mission I looked at the training and it's quite clear to see so much of it's in Houston that if you want to see anything of your family, bring them with you to Houston. So we moved over to Houston and settled there for four years. So, yeah, I had two young boys who were pretty much full American into American football. School was just basketball shorts and T-shirts.

And, yeah, so we lived a good life out there. Well, you know, Tim, I'm from Texas. I think Houston, it's an interesting place because it's so international, obviously. But how did you deal with the heat? Yeah, I guess that's the downside. It's pretty brutal in the summer, especially at Houston with the humidity there. But air conditioning is your friend, I guess, if you live in Texas. But what's funny is that I've actually spent four years living in America before when I was in the military.

I did an exchange with the U.S. Army, which happened to be at Fort Hood in Texas. So I've now spent eight years of my life living in Texas. Oh, dear. There are other states in the United States, I know, but I seem to get attracted to Texas every time. How does your wife feel about Texas? If you had asked me that question about two weeks after our wedding, when I just dragged her into the middle of Texas, she was in Fort Hood and I said, cheerio, I'm off on exercise with the US Army. I'll be back in a month's time. I don't think that she would have given you a very good impression of her experience. But in all honesty, the most friendly people you could ever wish to meet. And we had

such a great time. She did not want to leave Texas when we were coming back from our military posting. And again, did not want to leave Texas when we came back from, you know, from the astronaut posting either. It's brilliant. Yes, the weather in the summer is hot, but the weather in the winter is glorious and beautiful and really friendly people and a fun place to live. I think the question that immediately came to mind when we learned that you were going to come on the podcast is about advice that you would give to kids today who want to be astronauts. As Wendy said, iconic career, even just you're describing getting the news there about you will have a place on a

rocket to go up into space. Sounds so exciting. Is it as tough as we imagine it to be? Yes, it is. It's a long slog. I think you just have to be prepared mentally that it might not work out at any stage. And you have to be happy in what you're doing. I remember when I was selected by ESA, I said to Rebecca, look, there's no guarantee of me getting a mission. I'm about to leave, you know, a brilliant job as a senior test pilot, which has been my life's work. And I'm going to gamble it on, you know, the fact that I might get a mission to space. So I have to be happy. And these, you know, I might be leaving the European Space Agency in 10 years time with no mission to space. And I still have to be able to look myself in the mirror and say it was the right choice. I've had a great

time. And that's how I approach life. I think you have to just get the best out of everything you're doing and maximize, maximize what you're doing, be passionate about it, and have no regrets. But it is a long journey, it's very hard. Lots of training, obviously, lots of moving around, lots of uncertainty. But you've just got to enjoy every moment of it. And, you know, it for me, it certainly has been a brilliant time. And I obviously got the mission to space that I wanted. Did your time on the ISS change anything about how you parent? I would imagine being up in space gives you a pretty different perspective on most things. But did like six months of missing your kids, did you come back and were you a complete soft touch and they could get away with murder?

Or had you had time to kind of reflect and were you I don't know I just imagine it would change a person or I imagine this idea of like do you know how small the earth is in relation to the universe that you're upset about this it's not even worth discussing and the whole you're moaning about the baseball and actually you're this big yeah it does give you a different perspective I think my wife would probably say I was a soft touch even before I launched into space I'm probably a bigger soft touch now having come back no it definitely changes your perspective on everything um and I think that will feed into you know changing the way that you parent to a degree.

But I think, you know, we've adapted. I've certainly adapted my parenting style throughout my career. And my boys didn't know me when I was a military test pilot and they've only known me as an astronaut. And in the early days when they were younger and I was away from home an awful lot, the family life was quite up and down because, you know, I would come back from six weeks in Russia and dad's home for two weeks. So we would try and do as much as we could, you know, go to the movies, we'd have meals out, go bowling, we'd go swimming, all of that kind of stuff. And then it was dad's away again for four weeks. And there's this kind of up and down cycle.

And on the one hand, you don't want it to be too much of a roller coaster. But you know, I wanted to obviously enjoy my time with my family as much as possible. And now post mission, of course, thankfully, that we have a much more stable lifestyle, which is great. And you know, I'd still travel around a bit, but not nearly as much as I used to. And I think it's important to try and, you know, impart certain amounts of wisdom on your children. If you can, of course, they will never really listen to you because they do know best. Of course they do, always. How old are they, Tim? How old are they now? Well, now they're 13 and 10. Oh Christ, teenagers. Ah. Yeah. And my eldest

is clearly a teenager, but thankfully he is a 13, 13. He's not kind of an 18 year old, 13. My 10 year old, on the other hand, is an 18 year old, 10 year old. He really doesn't know. It's sometimes very hard to tell him things when he knows everything. And do you know what? Annoyingly, often he's right. Well, along those lines, you know, what have you learned from being a parent who is often away? You've had your wife who's kind of held down the fort and you come in and as you say, you want to make the most of that time together. But also really, you know, keep that strong connection with your children and your family. How does that, how do you make that work? I think you try and make life as normal as possible. I've just described a very abnormal situation, I suppose, but you do try and normalize it. You know, you

try and stick to a routine if you can. And we've certainly done that as a family. And I couldn't have done anything, any of this without, you know, the support of my wife. And she's absolutely incredible person. But she's, she's known me all throughout my military career. And we actually met in the army. She was a captain in the Royal Logistical Corps. When I was in the army air force, we both met in the army. So we're both familiar with operational deployment she she deployed to Kosovo for six months and Bosnia for six months whilst we were courting uh I love that word and so we're you know and she's known me as a test pilot I've gone off and done some um you know

crazy high risk uh test flights uh and so she's very aware of that kind of environment. So we've grown up with this, with the kind of the risks and the separation. And I think it's just a case of trying to make it as normal a family life as possible. It's quite easy to do in Houston, because, you know, my kids would sit in the class, and there were two or three other parents were astronauts in Houston, you know, there was only one fire person firefighter so oh ho hum all the parents are astronauts exactly yeah the dad who was a firefighter was far way cooler way cooler does all the travel make it harder to have a kind of dad support network as well you know we all need those people who we can rant about our kids at, not that aren't necessarily our spouse, because they might be included in the rant. Do you like, I don't know, do you sit up in the space station moaning about your kids

and like discussing how you're going to tackle the teenage years? Or is all your dad mates astronauts? I just don't quite know how I would cope with that. Yeah, I mean, we do, because we're all going through a similar thing. And, you know, whilst we would be training away wherever it was, you know, we'd often in the evenings, we'd all get together, we'd often be living in a common in group accommodation. So we would all take it in turns to cook a meal or just cook a shared meal, eat together and just chat over dinner. And everybody's going through different stages with different children at different years.

And so I think that was really healthy to be able to express that and to talk about it. My NASA crewmate, Tim Kopra, his children were older. They were graduating and looking at, you know, higher education and making big life choices. And, you know, we would chat about that. And of course, with my children, they were younger, which in some respects makes it easier. But actually, you know, for Rebecca, you know, she was having to do an awful lot more work when they're younger, you know, actually physically after them and helping them and getting them dressed and getting

them ready for school and taking them there, and all the rest of it. So, you know, she was struggling with those kind of things. So I think it really helped to talk about the problems. No matter what stage of parenting you're at, from pregnancy through to the toddler years, we all need a little help. And Aldi's on hand with advice and support every step of the way. Head to the Bump, Birth and Beyond Hub under New Parents on netmums.com for a whole host of useful information from tried and tested birth tips to bedtime routines for babies. And while you're there, make sure you sign up for your free pack of Aldi Mammy and Newborn Nappies. It takes less than 30 seconds. We've timed it, by the way, and you'll get a voucher for a free full-size pack. Now, back to the show. I really want to get on to

the book that you've written, partially because when I was young, I became obsessed with black holes and trying to wrap my young mind around this thing that was so dense and so dense, it was kind of nothing inside, but also something. Tell us a little bit, like what was the impetus for writing it? Have you always had a, you've written other children's books and written other books, you know, have you always had

a kind of nonfiction children's book inside you? No, I haven't. It was something that I decided to do having come back from my mission. I guess it touches a little bit on what we were talking about earlier on about perspective and your change in perspective, because one of the things that's, you know, it's very hard to describe to people when you're, when you're looking down at planet earth, and if you're out on a spacewalk and you're floating there, there's this real dichotomy between feeling incredibly small.

And, you know, Wendy, you said that yourself about this. Oh God, you know, we're tiny. We're so insignificant. We could be snuffed out and who would care? But then on the other hand, you think, well, hang on a second. We are the universe. And sometimes I think as humans, we detach ourselves from nature. We detach ourselves from the animal kingdom and we just detach ourselves from the universe, forgetting that this is exactly where we came from and and the universe has assembled us and you know we have gained a consciousness such that we can actually think about these big questions and not only that we can actually build things like the james webb

telescope and go and look out into the universe and find you know answers to questions and this is amazing you know um we you know i don't think we are the only uh living species in the universe but until we find something else you have to accept that that we are the consciousness of the universe and this is incredible so the book came about by you know speaking to children and saying well look don't don't lose this detachment. Think about where you've come from. And this diary, this cosmic diary of our incredible universe is actually a cosmic diary of how you got here. I love the diary. I just love the tone of the diary. It's brilliant. It really made me laugh. Yeah. And I felt, you know, that the universe is writing its own diary

as to, well, this is the story of my life, but it's actually the story of your life because you are me. And I think it's fascinating to reflect on that and to think about, you know, just how we're formed. Think of every element in our body and where did it come from? Some of it came from supernova explosions, but some of it needed a neutron star. Some of it, you know, may have been a black hole in order to forge these heavy elements throughout the universe and the science behind it. And, you know, and then the biology between the evolution of life. So the diary is basically this stepping stone through how you got here. So I've seen a few interviews you've done where kids have asked, how do you poo in space? It seems to be, frankly, the biggest question you get asked.

Was it all of those kids you met who inspired this book? Because you must have been asked some pretty crazy questions in your time. Yes. Yeah, absolutely. It's brilliant to go around and speak to children, speak to students. But with the younger children, it's always so much fun because they don't feel inhibited and they just come out with the best questions. And some of them actually take a lot of explaining. They're brilliant, brilliant questions. And in order to answer them fully, you know, you need to really think about it and think about the answers as to, you know, do aliens exist? And,

you know, is there an edge to the universe? What's inside a black hole, these kind of things. And so it is really a culmination of lots of questions and trying to put that together in the book that helps to answer them. Well, I'm going to throw a six year old's question at you right now, because I will be disowned as a mother if I don't play you this audio that my six-year-old asked me this morning. Are you ready? Okay, let's go for it. How big are stars? Wow, how big are stars? Stars vary in all different sizes. They don't vary so much in shapes, but they vary in sizes. And that's based on the amount of gas that they have sucked in. So the universe there, when it first formed, there was an abundance

of hydrogen, a little bit of helium and lithium, but mostly hydrogen. And the hydrogen started to gather together in a clump. And as it did so, it got bigger and bigger and bigger. And this ball of gas started to kind of collapse in on itself because of gravity. And the amazing thing is, it's a bit like striking a match. There comes a point at which the pressure inside causes the temperature to get so high that it's like striking a match, a spark goes off and suddenly nuclear fusion occurs. And that's when your ball of gas sparks into life and becomes a star and starts burning. And our current sun is about an average size star, but you can get some massive, massive stars. And you can also get some smaller dwarf stars as well in the in the early

universe we had stars that were easily 20 000 times you know bigger than our current sun and in the early universe these massive massive stars actually burnt very quickly through their fuel they were very hot stars um and so they're blue giants and they would literally look blue if anyone was watching them whereas if something's glowing away a much smaller star is just glowing there it would be a red dwarf for example and it would be not the blue end of the spectrum but the red end of the spectrum i'm learning a lot here this is impressive tim thank you very much now i have one more very quick question which is very easy for you to answer. What was the first dog called to go into space? Oh, gosh, it's testing me.

I think it was Laika. I'm hoping it was Laika. My 10-year-old told me the answer because apparently they know these things. So thank you, Tim, for indulging my children. Oh, yeah, it's just a test and you passed, Tim. You passed. You can feel good about that. I have to say, what's so brilliant about the book? I mean, I love how it's broken down and all these different topics really explained, just like you explained there in really easy to understand language, but very complex ideas. And that's something else that's really exciting about the book is that children do have these really big questions, really scientific

questions, and that it doesn't shy away from that or dumb it down. And I think it's something that kids really respond to. It can really spark a lifelong interest in that kind of science. Was that the case for you? Were you just always a child who loved science or who loved to think about outer space or flying? Always. I've always loved asking the big questions and I've always been curious. I've always wanted to know more about the universe. And sometimes it's frustrating when there aren't answers. And I know that sometimes we just have to say, look, we don't know for sure. But this is our best guess.

But I've always tried to break things down. And I think that, you know, gosh, if I can understand it myself, then someone else can understand it. Because I have to make things as simple as possible so that I can understand them. But there's a real, I think there's, you know, that takes a lot of time and effort and skill in terms of, okay, let's get to the nuts and bolts of this. Not simplify it so that it's just, oh, I'll just, I'll simplify it so I can explain this to a six-year-old. And in simplifying it, you're losing the accuracy of the answer. I never want to lose the accuracy of the answer.

So if you need to go into a little more depth, then, you know, don't patronise kids. It's amazing what they can understand. And so let's give them a full answer. Your kids want to be astronauts. Are they, I don't know, are they proud of you? Are they a bit nonplussed by the whole thing? Are they, is't know are they proud of you are they a bit non-plussed by the whole thing are they is my kids are embarrassed by you like I don't know it's funny because

I think they're more aware of it today than they ever were when I was in space or when I was training for space they were so much younger and they were surrounded by the space industry. We were, all of our friends were astronauts at Houston. It was part of the social group, very tight family knit community really. And in order to kind of try and normalize what I was doing, I would take them to work. They would watch me go into the swimming pool, doing spacewalk training, putting on the suit.

They would come into the mock-ups. I'd show them where I'd be sleeping and eating and the science we would be doing and the Sawyer's capsule, the simulator there. So trying to normalize it as much as possible. So I think they felt, you know, as if this was completely normal and everybody was doing it and dad's just popping off to space like other dads and moms do. Now as they're older, I think they kind of appreciate actually, oh, maybe what dad did was a little bit, you know, unique and special. So I think now they come up with more questions than they ever did before. But I think that's just

because they're growing older and more aware of it. So I don't know if either of them ever want to be an astronaut, but I just try, like any parent, I try and, you know, encourage them to find their own way and to try and just offer as many opportunities as possible to help them decide what is it that they're passionate about. Knowing how hard it is to be an astronaut and some of the disappointments it can bring, would you rather they didn't or, you know, do you just want them to follow their own path? No, I think it's a case of following their path. But, you know, I think it's a case of making sure that what they're doing before they would want to become an astronaut is something they're absolutely passionate about. You know, if I had been unsuccessful at any step, I would have been so happy to have just said, well, I gave it my best shot.

Do you know what? I'm going to go back and do what I was doing before, because I was loving it. And I was having a great time. And so I think that helped to soften any potential disappointment. And you've always got to be realistic about your chances. What I've tried not to do through my life, and what I try to, you know, help other people to avoid is going through a tortuous, painful route in order to achieve a goal, knowing that they're not enjoying the route there. I think if you can't achieve what you want to achieve by following your passion, then you really need to look hard about is it worth it? Is the journey worth it? Because life's all about the journey and not necessarily about the end goal. And so you have to be happy about what you're doing at the time. Says the man who got shot up into space to live on a space station

for six months. It's about the journey. It's easy to say. I know. I know. But yeah, I think I was so fortunate, so lucky that for me, it did come to fruition. But as I said, you've got to be happy what you're doing before you become an astronaut. Tim, I've got a question. It relates to private space flights and these private space flight companies, Elon Musk, his desire to create a Mars colony. What do you think this means for the future of space travel? Yes, a really interesting question. It's inevitable that this is the direction that space is going to go. In one way, it's an example of the cost of access to space coming down, which is a good thing. We're using new technologies.

We're using sustainable techniques that means that we can now launch a kilogram into space for, you know, 20, 30 times less than it was when it was the space days of the space shuttle, for example, and that set to come down even further. So this is opening up space to researchers, to schools, to universities and obviously to high net worth individuals who want to go and pop into space and have a look at what it's all about. So I think the important thing is that we do it as responsibly and as sustainably as possible. And on the one hand, I don't think, you know, not all of us have got much appetite to watch wealthy people flying into space to enjoy the journey. I think space should be about science, science and exploration and for the benefits of humanity. But there are definite, there's a progression here as to where this route can take us in terms of a new transportation system.

If you think at the moment that those suborbital flights, they're launching from Texas or from Florida and they're coming back down in the same location. Well, there's no reason why they couldn't launch from Florida and come back down in Paris after 35 minutes. So we're looking at suborbital transportation systems that this could develop into. And, you know, I'm sure when we started flying across the Atlantic in the 1920s and 1930s, people were thinking, well, what's it ever going to mean to my life? That's not going to change the way I live. It's just for very, very rich people in these strange, strange tin cans that can fly across the Atlantic. And now, you know, many, many people could think about affording a holiday to Florida, for example. So who knows, in 100 years time, many, many people might be able to afford a quick trip to that hotel in low Earth orbit, and let's go and spend, you know, two weeks orbiting Earth. That's a reality. And, or,

in the future, we can go from London to Sydney in, you know, 45 minutes, rather than having to spend 20 hours on an aircraft oh that would be nice wouldn't it that would be really nice yeah maybe even easier than catching a flight from Heathrow I think it's easier than getting the tube from Brixton to Walthamstow to be honest so I have to ask Tim we we all get speak. We've been talking about flying to holiday destinations. We all get the post holiday blues from a trip away. What the hell are the post ISS blues like? Because and this isn't a pun, but I can't help feeling that you must have felt like you peaked after that.

And then what do you do afterwards? You know, I think the low came six months after the mission because when you land, you're just suddenly launched into this massive activity. Firstly, there's a whole load of science that needs to be done on your body because your body is changing so rapidly when you come into a gravity environment. So the medical community, you know,

want every piece of you. And so it's three, four weeks of just life science experiments. And then you're debriefing about the mission. You're going on tour back to Russia and Canada, Japan and Germany, America. So you're traveling around a lot. And that all kind of comes to an end about six months after you land. And I think that's the point at which you finally, you know, you're allowed to take a break. And you come back down to earth in the truest sense at that point. So for me, that was Christmas time, you know, I landed in 2016. So it was Christmas 2016.

And I had my first week off over Christmas week. And I just went down with the flu, the worst flu ever. And I think it was because my body just kind of crashed. I'd stopped and I hadn't stopped for so long being on the go. And after that, it was then a case of okay, well, now, you know, you've got some time to catch up and the rest of it. So there was definitely a period of kind of like refocusing, making sure I got my physical fitness back up to strength and refocusing mentally as well on what to go on to. But in the space industry, in the European Space Agency, there's always so much going on. So I went straight into a role which saw me as the head of astronaut operations. So I was now managing the missions for the other astronauts who were flying

and looking after their launch and their landings and supporting them whilst they're on board the space station. So, you know, there's always things to go on and do and keep yourself busy within the space program. They'll find something for you to do around there. So what's still on the list? What's next for Major Tim? Gosh, that's a good question. There's a lot of plates spinning really right now. So I'm really enjoying writing some children's fiction books. And I guess that comes on the back of other questions that kids love to ask about. And that's aliens. So the fiction books focus on aliens. And I'm right then with Steve Cole, who's a brilliant children's author.

So we have a lot of fun writing these books. And I love fiction because you can just kind of enjoy yourself. I still want I still make sure it's all scientifically grounded, but you could just push it a little bit into science fiction and go that step further. So that's been a lot of fun. i've got the live tour on the go starting in september so we're very busy traveling all around the uk and in march as well um doing the live tour again i'm still working with european space agency and uk space agency supporting the human space flight program in the uk we've got launch coming up. So Spaceport Cornwall and Yuki, we're going to see our first rocket launch from UK soil this year and next year from Scotland. So that's really exciting. And so I'm really active in the space industry and also enjoying what I'm doing with the kids books as well. Sounds fabulous. Plenty to keep you occupied. Yeah. And then in my spare time,

I'm a Prince's Trust ambassador, a Scouts ambassador, a STEM ambassador and all the rest of it. It does keep me busy, but I enjoy it. So I've just got one more question, Tim. And this time it's from a 10 year old. She would like to know what does no one ever tell you about space? No one tells you how hard it is not to lose things. And it's amazing how much stuff we lose on the space station until you get used to it. Because, you know, gravity is actually makes it's really easy to live in a gravity environment. Everything just stays under control you know pictures hang on the wall your books stay on the desk your phone stays in your pocket and nothing's going anywhere unless you move it and in weightlessness you have oh god

you imagine everything in your room like right now just floating around and taking a life zone it's like oh my god you just have to pin everything down. Don't go into the pool. Where did I put this? Don't let go of that. So for the first couple of weeks on the space station, you are losing everything all the time

and nobody tells you that. Brilliant. I would never have thought of that. Yeah, me neither. Me neither. Also, it's very much like that parenting situation where people running around going, where is my fill in the blank? And you're, well, where did you leave it? Yes.

But there's no, you can't use that in outer space, I guess. big brother and but they're very useful because you know often we'll just get the call coming up could a crew member go to the US lab please we've got a torch floating past the camera happens all the time they're always there the eyes and ears looking out all this stuff that's just floating around the space station well thank you Tim for coming on our podcast I've learned so much and it's been an absolute pleasure meeting you thank you very much Wendy thank you Jen it's been great being on the podcast thanks for having me take care Tim bye bye