Vince Needham

@plugh001.bsky.social

173 Followers 166 Following

Retired physicist and IT specialist with the Physics department of Kansas State University; now busy riding a bicycle. Pronouns are they/them, just to annoy the right.

Vote!
A PDP-11 mini-computer flanked by a teletype and a VT-100 text terminal.
Storm shelter signage with odd iconography posted on a mens room door.
College boys beside the road with a sign "You Honk, We Drink".
Integrity happily afloat off San Diego, with the recovery ship USS Murtha in the background.
Integrity under parachutes/
Integrity command module separates from the service module.
Earth grows ever larger from the perspective of Integrity. The aft end of the service module points upward in this view.
Earth as seen from the Integrity spacecraft shortly before reentry. The aft end of the service module is to left and a beautiful blue Earth to right.
Orion, Moon and Earth all in one frame.
NASA science "backroom" with a profusion of large desktop monitors, bigger wall-mounted screens and a triple-wide projection wall.
"The Oatmeal" comic where an Alien xenomorph egg is tragically mistaken for an Easter egg.
NASA Mission Control, where a white cat Sailor Moon plushie sits behind the CAPCOM wearing a Sailor Moon lanyard.
Virtual control panel of the Orion capsule, including animated orientation renderings and the "8 ball" 3D artificial horizon.
Stage separation, seen from on-board!
Liftoff of Artemis II on an SLS rocket.
Ignition of the RS-25 SSME engines.
Terminal countdown. Access arm retracted.
Final launch poll, showing directors, rocket and launch clock.
Launch clock at the causeway displaying the T-10 minute hold.
Original Apollo Mission Control, with gray steel consoles and monochrome CRTs.
Modern Mission Control seen from the back of the room, with consoles in the foreground and big displays on the front wall.
On left, looking upwards toward the SLS rocket. On left, the white room is swinging away from the rocket, giving a view of the space center.
Orange-clad astronauts relax in the Orion capsule pre-launch. Two are seated in the lower tier while the footwear of another is visible above.
Aerial view of the SLS rocket on the pad.
SLS rocket on the pad.
White suited ground crew preparing to close the spacecraft hatches in the launch tower whiteroom.
Looking over the shoulders of two orange-suited astronauts in front of the Orion control console.
Tiny astronauts in orange spacesuits stand at the base of the giant SLS rocket, pre-boarding.
Meme image depicting various age users next to PC ports appropriate to their age: serial, PS2, USB-A and USB-C.
My "Year in Sport" infographic from Strava for 2025, highlighting better than 4k km of riding and running.
A frame from "The Idolmaster Shiny Colors" where the character just wants to go home.
Poster announcing a retirement party, featuring a bicycle, gears and a "congratulations" banner.
Same gloriously colored tree as featured last week, but now bare of leaves.
A stately, beautifully symmetric oak regally clad in red-gold leaves, stands in a green campus quad.
My sticker and candy prizes for getting vaxxed, plus a take-out coffee and scone. All are posed on a copy of the campus newspaper.
A rainbow arcs across a mostly cloudy Kansas sky above a gravel road.
A take-out coffee cup, a roll of Smarties and an "I got my flu shot" sticker, all posed on a desktop.
Canyon Grail gravel bike in an idyllic park next to a stream.
Promo poster showing Godzilla breathing nuclear fire.
CAPTCHA asking for "objects that can be placed on your head", showing shoes, lab coats and headphones. Any of these can be placed on your head.
The original starship Enterprise, no bloody A, B, C or D.
An oblong hailstone about 1-inch in diameter, posed near a ruler.
US National Weather Service map of probability of more than 12 inches of snowfall centered on Manhattan, KS.
Coffee gear on my countertop, featuring a freshly repaired Baratza Sette grinder fron-and-center.
A PDP-11 mini-computer, with a teletype to one side and a VT-100 terminal to the other.