Explorations Academy student Zoe Szymczak reviewed All These Wonders. It consists of a collection of 45 short stories from The Moth, a highly successful podcast, celebrating its 20th anniversary. From facing claims of love, to the contemplation of what comes after life, All These Wonders focuses on facing the unknown across many different situations. In these 45 different stories, you will read the experiences of a hip hop “one-hit wonder”, an astronomer seeing Pluto's surface for the first time, a young female spy risking everything as part of Churchill's secret army in WWII, a man who questions his beliefs between God and science, and many, many more. All unique, all different, picked from over twenty thousand live Moth stories performed around the world. From high school students to neuroscientists, these storytellers share their adventures into the unknown, and how their lives were changed and shaped by what they discovered. With humor, wit, passion, and curiosity, these stories encourage us to be open, vulnerable, and to live life to the fullest, even if we don’t know what’s around the corner.
Zoe loves live storytelling and found that these stories were a close approximation of that, easily transformed from page to stage and depicting real-life experiences. She provided some details of stories in the seven sections of the book, dealing with topics such as loss, reflection, fresh starts, and curiosity. Zoe highly recommended this book to all.
Opening Welcome:
President Gary gaveled the 43rd virtual meeting of the RCOB to order at 12:30 PM and welcomed all members and guests, while repeatedly gloating about the beautiful weather at his current location, Tucson, AZ.
Club and Committee Announcements
Rotary Cruise
Marty Haines again reviewed the details of the planned Whale Watching Cruise, scheduled for June 21, and urged all members to reply to the email invite. Family members and friends are encouraged to attend.Ahoy! Special price is $90 a person and the date is Monday, June 21st. You can sign-up by using the email that was sent out or go to the bellinghamrotary.org website under events and register.
Ongoing Announcements:
Blood Drive -
Steve Ban reminds us that when we donate blood, they are still testing for and informing us whether or not you have Covid antibodies. He also reported that our blood drive will be open for the entire Rotary year, until June 30, 2021. We are participating, along with the other clubs in our Area G, in a District 5050 challenge against the other District Areas. He is encouraging friends and relatives to join in. Those who can't donate blood can donate plasma. Currently, the W. Bakerview office is the only donation location open in Whatcom County. Click Here for additional information.The minimum age for donating blood is 16 and those 16 and 17 would need parent’s permission to participate. Rumor has it that you can score a Bloodworks pair of socks for donating! You may schedule your donation appointment on the flyer in the above link or you can make an appointment by phone. In either case, when you are donating, please tell them that you are donating on behalf of RCOB.
YAIL
This year's District YAIL (Youth Adventures In Leadership) program will look different, like so many other activities. It is available for all High School students this year for FREE with a limited number of registrations at 30. It will be over 5 separate sessions. Click Here for information
Meeting Virtually
All Rotary meetings will be held Virtually on Zoom until further notice due to Covid-19 social distancing. You can look for an email from Sandee each week prior to the Monday 12:30 meeting (you can start logging in at 12:00 for short socializing) with the link for that privacy protected meeting. If you have not done so, please download the Zoom app on your computer (you need a camera and microphone on it), iPad or phone. There is no cost to you. If you do not have either, you can also call in. On the invitation, there are US phone numbers you can call and enter the meeting ID number also indicated on the invitation.
RCOB has now set up a Venmo account for ease in payment of Happy Bucks, Minister of Fun, Dues or donations to the club. Our account is @RCOB-Bellingham. If you do not have a Venmo account you can set up an account with your computer then download the app. on your phone (just Google "Venmo" and you will find all the information you need) You then attach it to a debit or credit card (a fee on your end) or attach to your checking account at no cost. Payment will be sent directly to the RCOB checking account. When you use it for the first time it may ask you the last 4 digits of the RCOB phone number which is 0282. Give Sandee a call if you need help. 360-734-5532
Here is a tutorial on how to login for the first time. (Click here) In order to login you need to know your user name and password in your Clubrunner account. The user name is Yourfirstname.Lastname.264 unless you have changed it. Example: Sandra.Lindhout.264 The password is initially set by Clubrunner at 264 unless you have changed it. Sandee can see your Username from my computer but not the password. She can also change your password for you from her computer at your request if you run into problems.
Once you have originally created your User Name and Password you can download the ClubRunner Mobile app on your phone:
Please contact Sandee at 360-734-5532 or rcob@comcast.net if you run into any trouble.
Guests:
Jodi Borelli and Mike Mallory joined us again
Dale Rings joined us again. Love seeing him!
Joe and Karen Morse also joined us from California...
Alice Racer joined us also to thank everyone for their love for Don.
Paul Grey introduced our speaker Dr. Melissa Rice, Associate Professor at WWU
Program: Melissa Rice, Perseverance Rover's First Month on Mars
Program Chair Paul Grey introduced Dr. Melissa Rice, Associate Professor of Planetary Science at WWU, who gave a very interesting presentation, The Perseverance Rover's First Month on Mars. Paul listed Dr. Rice's impressive credentials, including PhD in Astronomy from Cornell University and a Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Sedimentology from Cal Tech. She helped develop the “eyes” of the rover, a pair of the most sophisticated cameras ever made, called Mastcam-Z. Dr. Rice is currently one of the few scientists around the world who is responsible for sending daily instructions to the Rover every morning, which then relays back images and other information in the evening. Unfortunately, Mars' day lasts 40 minutes longer than on Earth. Since Dr. Rice has to follow Mars' day schedule, her awake/sleep periods here change constantly, causing physical and emotional stress, which is why she and the other instruction-sending scientists are limited to 90 days of service at a time.
Dr. Rice began her presentation by reviewing the history of man's perception of Mars from being the brightest star in the night sky to, 100 years ago being planet like Earth to, 60 years ago having geologic features like dust storms and carbon dioxide polar caps. Both Mars and Earth were formed about 4.5 billion years ago and, because Mars looks much like Earth from afar and life on Earth began about 3.5 billion years ago, scientists are searching for evidence of water and, therefore, life on Mars.
Dr. Rice then described the features of Perseverance. On the outside, it looks a lot like Curiosity Rover, from 2012, but has much more sophisticated equipment for imaging and taking samples from Mars' surface. It will be able to pick up rock samples, place them in 43 tubes, hermetically seal the tubes and leave them on Mars for future missions to fetch, and then return them to Earth. Perseverance will also, in the next day or so, deploy a small helicopter which, with its lightweight and large, thin blades (to compensate for Mars' very thin atmosphere) will be able to take off and fly around the area, taking pictures and aiding scientists in allowing the rover to maximize its travel area safely.
Perseverance has 23 cameras on board, including the very powerful two Mastcam-Zs, which were tested here at WWU by Dr. Rice and her graduate students. A unique and useful feature of the Mastcam-Z cameras is their ability to capture colors whose wavelengths are outside the human vision spectrum, allowing a more colorful and detailed view of Mars' surface.
Perseverance launched from Earth last July 30 and traveled the 100 million miles to Mars at a cruising speed of 14,000 MPH, arriving on February 18. Dr. Rice described (and showed photographs of) the nail-biting landing sequence, which required the Rover to slow down from 14,000 MPH to 2 MPH in 7 minutes, using a parachute and retro-rockets, as it landed gently on Jezero Crater
For the first three months of its stay on Mars, Perseverance will conduct a thorough check of its own structure and equipment (making sure that everything is in working order after the long trip) before exploring its surroundings.
Perseverance sends data, including images, back to Earth via several satellites already orbiting Mars. The orbiters then send the signals (which take 5 to 20 minutes to arrive) to the Deep Space Network, a network of satellites orbiting the Earth run by NASA and the European Space Agency. In fact, a number of other countries are involved, such as Britain, Russia, Norway and Mexico.
Dr. Rice closed by mentioning that YouTube has a video depicting Perseverance's launch and landing and Google has daily raw images sent by Perseverance.
Covid Report:
President Gary reported that, locally, we are trending in the right direction, with fewer new cases and more people immunized. This past week, there were a maximum of 5 people hospitalized, with one in the ICU.
Link to info on vaccines and where we stand against the variants(Click Here)
Program Recordings: We are now recording the speaker portion of our meetings:
Missed a meeting? Remember a great speaker but want to revisit the content? You can catch the recording on our Rotary Club of Bellingham YouTube page:
