You’ve probably heard the news about how the European Space Agency recently landed a probe on a comet. But what you may not have known is that some of the essential components for the mission were developed in Ireland. RTE news reports that “Space Technology Ireland Ltd, led by Prof Susan McKenna Lawlor, designed the Electrical Support System (ESS) processor unit” and that another company called CAPTEC “developed the Electronic Support System software for the Philae lander’s interface with the satellite”. You can read more about the mission here.
Category: miscellaneous (Page 4 of 12)
Over the weekend, Seth was invited to a stag party (bachelor party, for Americans) for a friend in Cork. It wasn’t typical. For one, it wasn’t a drinking session. That alone makes it very different than the norm, but it was also unique because we had a big basketball tournament. Basketball is not exactly a common sport here. Most towns would have hoops somewhere, but few people actually play. Seth hadn’t had a chance to play a real game of basketball in years. But as rusty as he is, he didn’t have too much trouble keeping up with Irish guys. It’s not that they were rusty, they never had experience with the game to begin with, so there was nothing to rust. It was pretty fun to watch athletic guys who can perform wonders on a soccer pitch struggle to know what to do when the ball was in their hands! Honestly, it was nice to be able to play a sport and actually be competitive. By the way, Seth’s team won.
We’re back from camp and recovering from all the fun, late nights, and general intensity it brings. Daniel and David discovered a new love for table soccer while we were there, and we also discovered that putting all three kids on the same mattress doesn’t work well for sleeping. We had great opportunities to dig in to God’s word, and the rain certainly didn’t stop the fun, even if it did make a mess of the campers (and our car).
We had beautiful sunshine for soccer camp Monday through Thursday, which was handy since we had a full camp in the morning (about 130 kids) with a waiting list and about 30 teens in the afternoon. Everyone was delighted with how the camp went, and our awards ceremony on Thursday night filled one of the biggest halls in town to standing room only.
Today we were all set to go with our photo booth for Youghal’s Medieval Festival, but the weather changed this morning and it hasn’t stopped raining all day. They decided to postpone the festival until next Sunday, which will hopefully be a bit drier!
We discovered an amazing thing the other day. Click here to see what it was!
Ever since we moved to Youghal, I (Seth) have wanted to go out to Capel Island. You can see the island from Youghal beach, and you can tell there is some kind of tower on it which is just begging to be explored. Recently I was able to borrow a couple of kayaks, and with friends from church finally made it out to the island! The tower was built to be a lighthouse in the early 1800’s, but evidently they changed their minds and it seems it was never used. The island itself is small, but beautiful, and the home of a thousand birds and a handful of goats with very large horns, who thankfully did not decide we were a threat!
In about an hour, the second ever Munster Bible College class will start at a church in Cork. The classes are intensive, one-week courses taught by professors from Southern Seminary in Kentucky, and there will be three of them each year. Seth is in charge of the technical side of making the college work, so is recording the classes, managing the website, etc. He’s delighted to be able to attend as well!
Yesterday we had a farewell service for our teammates, the Scott’s, who are moving this summer to take on the presidency of their mission board. Our usual meeting place wasn’t big enough, so we met in the town hall, which was still filled to more than capacity with people from our church, our community, and other churches in the area. It was a great testimony to the work the Scott’s have done, but even more so to the work God has done through them. Today we also had a special service at church and a church BBQ afterwards – which included a cake for David’s birthday! All morning David kept saying he didn’t feel five – but after he saw the cake, he realised this birthday thing was for real.
David is turning 5 on Sunday, so we threw him a Lego party today with some of his friends. We had a Lego cake (not really Lego..), Lego games (like building and racing cars), and even Lego candy. It was lots of Lego fun!
Last night we had our end of the year BBQ (grilling out, in American English) for the youth club that has been meeting in our front room every Friday. It is a tradition that everyone looks forward to, and this year we had several new folks come, too. Then today we went to the airport to get Jessica’s parents, better known as “Pawpaw & Magram” who will be visiting for a couple of weeks. Exciting times!
