@DavidPenington@aus.social

David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Jul 25, 2026

Replying to @ptua@mastodon.social

@ptua@mastodon.social You allowed for length, not volume. $17x70x70x70 = $5.8m which I suspect is closer in magnitude to the actual cost of a new level-entry tram stop than $1190. 🙂

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Jul 24, 2026

Replying to @AkaSci@fosstodon.org

@AkaSci@fosstodon.org This is why NASA avoids launching into clouds. From background knowledge I'd guess that a rocket exhaust plume provides an easier path to ground than plain air, making lightning strikes on space craft relatively high probability.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Jul 24, 2026

Replying to @Sheep_Overboard@infosec.exchange

@Sheep_Overboard@infosec.exchange My actual personal experience, supporting an application that used a database. I had bern spelling out the SQL needed, over the phone & nothing had worked. Sql commands needed a semicolon at the end. " The semicolon, is it a dot above a comma?" "No. I thought semicolon was two dots". That was the short problem. Once that was solved the system problem was easily fixed.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Jul 18, 2026

Replying to @ducky@mstdn.ca

@ducky@mstdn.ca Epstein Barr virus is hard to avoid. I avoided it until I married, theb came down with it, followed by a viral labyrinthitis courtesy of its immunosuppressant effects. A vaccine would be good, but hard to market because most people have minimal effects.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Jul 17, 2026

Last week on Wed 8th July there was a nasty power price spike in Victoria for an hour in the evening, averaging about %7/kwh for half an hour. The main cause: shortage of coal at Loy Lang coal fired power stations. Coal is unreliable. This was the first real price spike in Victoria in the 10 months since I joined Amber in September 2025.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Jun 24, 2026

Replying to @CanuckistanBob@cosocial.ca

RE: https://cosocial.ca/@CanuckistanBob/116513366374109921 In Australia, Shingrix vaccine is free at 65yo. Shingles is horrible & can cause permanent injuries. Shingrix helping avoid Alzheimers is a bonus. I've had the other 4 of the top 5 listed here & will boost DTP & pneumococcal vaccines later this year.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Jun 08, 2026

Replying to @Alice@beige.party

@Alice@beige.party You don't want to be woken up. Fair enough. No Wake has a different meaning on a dying person's PJs, in Australia at least. My mother did not want a funeral. Some might not want a post-funeral gathering - a wake, in Australian terminology.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · May 28, 2026

Replying to @cathywilcox@theblower.au

@cathywilcox@theblower.au At last the NACC has terminated at least one career.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · May 22, 2026

Replying to @royaards@newsie.social

@royaards@newsie.social International law is mostly implemented by "ratification" - countries creating domestic law that matches it. "International law" also encompasses anything the UN Security Council declares to be binding, regardless of how little support there is. Eg security council declared weapons embargos are "International law".

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · May 17, 2026

Replying to @jessta@aus.social

@jessta@aus.social For a decade I transported kids to school by bike, towing a bike trailer with 1 or 2 kids in it or, later, a tag along. I'd drop the kids & lock the trailer along my commute to work. Now I find an ebike with cargo trailer is a great 2nd vehicle. I happily carry 40kg of cargo. Check the trailer width: 70cm is good; 90cm is too wide for the Upfield bike path. We love our Velectrix Cruiser STX. Very low step through. Very smooth torque assist mid drive motor. Hub gears, 3 speed is fine with the ebike. Belt drive. Got from Rays, 108 Sydney Rd Brunswick. $2649. https://velectrix.com.au/product/cruiser-pulse-stx-step-through-cruiser-electric-bike/

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · May 15, 2026

RE: @ketan@climatejustice.social

Electrifying the trucks and heavy machinery that use most of Australia’s diesel would be a sensible, long term beneficial action to help adapt to fossil fuel supply issues and global warming. It would also strengthen our economy.
Fortescue Mining is doing it. Why doesn't the federal govt encourage it?

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · May 11, 2026

Replying to @quixoticgeek@social.v.st

@quixoticgeek@social.v.st But a 50w panel is not useful for domestic purposes. Check your power use. A panel in summers will give about 6 hours equivalent of full power, in winter a lot less. 50w gives about 300wh = 1/3 kwh. My household averages 420kwh/month = 14kwh/day so that panel is a tiny fraction of my use and worth 8c at our local daytime prices. Camping, 300wh at 12V is 300/12=25 Amp hours, which, with charging losses, will put about 20Ah into a battery - not enough for our camp fridge overnight (ignoring the need to power it during the day). My house has 6600W of solar panels, which gives enough in a Melbourne Australia summer (with air conditioning) but less than we use during the day on a cold cloudy winter day.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 29, 2026

Replying to @Uair@autistics.life

@heidilifeldman Very informative LawyersGunsandMoney quote from Ben Tillman 1900, justifying oppression of blacks in South Carolina, to ensure white rule.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 27, 2026

Replying to @futurebird@sauropods.win

@lispi314@udongein.xyz Yeah. Farming aphids on a fruit tree is banned by me.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 27, 2026

Replying to @robpumphrey@mastodonapp.uk

@robpumphrey@mastodonapp.uk Australian taxi drivers break the law when picking up & dropping off passengers all the time. Waymo are making common practice explicit. I'm not sure what the appropriate response is, because passengers want/need pick up & drop off & legal stopping places in CBDs are rare. Perhaps explicitly allowing a 60 second stop in a no stopping zone by a licenced taxi etc would be appropriate - sonething to give them somewhere legal to stop on every block, then enforce no double parking etc.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 27, 2026

Replying to @johnquiggin@aus.social

@johnquiggin@aus.social Good article & Ukraine is indeed leading the free world & providing military assistance to the US & Gulf countries. Nit puck: Ukraine's military have not fought a great power, just Russia. Russia can't coerce its neighbours, its military was incompetent in 2022. Even now its air tactics are more terrorism than force projection.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 27, 2026

Replying to @bencourtice@aus.social

@bencourtice@aus.social Standard Hybrids are just slightly more efficient petrol vehicles. I hate the way car journalists bundle them with EVs. Plug in Hybrids can be usefully electric, if you charge it every day, but studies show, most aren't used that way & 70% of their trips are just hybrid. Our PHEV is 90% electric around Melbourne but 50% of our milage has been on long trips, petrol powered.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 26, 2026

Replying to @johnquiggin@aus.social

@johnquiggin@aus.social Very thoughtful & thought provoking article about Australia's Gallipoli involvement. I agree with the Brutish that Turkey was not offering a reliable alliance partner. Investments in the Ottoman empire were at huge risk of corrupt justice & corrupt demands for payment. Russia was a better partner, but Ottomans could have stayed neutral throughout WWI. The war party & Germans brought them in, but Germany was already well linked to Turkey's military & Turks wanted the Suez canal (& probably wamted Egypt 'back' too)

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 23, 2026

We went for a short walk about 9pm last night & saw some small bats catching insects over the houses ... in Brunswick- inner Melbourne. The first time I've seen/been shown them.
I've seen fruit bats by the hundred here, but these little ones (blackbird size?) Were new to me.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 16, 2026

Replying to @cliffordheath@mastodon.social

@cliffordheath@mastodon.social Echos of a cousin who, in the late 1970s described the "Spirit of Progress" train as "more like the spirit of the 1950s!" Phone power banks seem to be necessary equipment for the XPT passenger.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 16, 2026

Replying to @benroyce@mastodon.social

@benroyce@mastodon.social @ManyRoads@mstdn.social @todymotmot@mastodon.social @wokerati@mastodon.social @hoare_spitall@mastodon.world @JustRobForNow@mastodon.social @evoterra@podvibes.co With STV, when all the candidates suck,what matters is who you put at the bottom - you vote against the worst candidates. There always are some & you can differentiate between the avaricious corrupt business candidates and the nazis. Put the nazis last and you improve the chances of a non-nazi winning. That's why, in Australia's compulsory STV system, not viting is always irresponsible. BUT generally "they're all the same" is a line spread by conservatives- part of "there all the same, the liberals are just lying about it" [so dont vote liberal because it wont help, they're liars & where they say they'll do things its dangerous]. It's been a conservative talking point since the 1980s.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 16, 2026

Replying to @cliffordheath@mastodon.social

@cliffordheath@mastodon.social My mother in law's last Sydney to Melbourne train, in February, was 3 1/2 hours late, most of the delay in Victoria. We do need to improve this. The website didn't give meaningful information once it was later than the train's scheduled arrival time, which was difficult because she has Altzheomers. The website issue was likely caused by the challenge of matching equipment position pings with scheduled services when they are badly off schedule. I've worked with similar systems & it's tricky. It's made worse by long delays between stations because the system only gets timing information when it reaches a station, so a 3 hour delay between stations doesn't update the ETA until it finally gets to a station! Eg it's 6pm. The train hasn't reached Wangaratta, but it's still "on time" for a 6.30pm Melbourne arrival (no, it's 2 1/2 hours from Wangaratta to Melbourne)

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 14, 2026

Replying to @AndrewHS@aus.social

@AndrewHS@aus.social @cathywilcox@theblower.au Since 2001 "we will decide..." the LNP have been working to expand the racist vote, normalising it, encouraging it, & justifying racism against refugees.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 14, 2026

Replying to @mackayim2022@mastodon.social

@mackayim2022 "why is the detection signal higher in kids when, as I noted, kids hospitalisations aren't also rising steeply" I hadn't noticed that point. And my thought doesn't explain the rise in proportion in 2026 vs 2025, but to exclude the null hypothesis I'd want the numbers for the same year segment (school's back, kids in childcare get sick in an effect visible to my childcare teacher's experience; non parents get sick in winter - the 2026 effect may vanish by December) and to see absolute numbers too. I had COVID in Nov 2023, with 2 Royal Melbourne Hospital ED visits & my RATs were the only testing.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 14, 2026

Replying to @jaredwhite@indieweb.social

@jaredwhite @randahl From the photos, I feel the arm is not elevated above the shoulders enough to be unambiguously a nazi salute, because his shoulders are twisted out of horizontal, and the arm is too far to the side for one. That's my human opinion. I also think Musk is a nazi.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 14, 2026

Replying to @jpm@aus.social

@jpm@aus.social @NewtonMark@eigenmagic.net Yes, it's a live attenuated virus, with a couple of mutations that stop it replicating in lungs. But it's not safe for severely immune deficient people, so while I support the sentiment of the original post, it can't happen.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 14, 2026

Replying to @mackayim2022@mastodon.social

@mackayim2022 Hmm... in 2026, who gets lab tested for SARS-CoV-2 not just a RAT ? I'd expect it to mainly be those who are hospitalised with respiratory illnesses, ie mainly under 4's and the elderly. Almost everyone not hospitalised just uses a RAT.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 13, 2026

Replying to @deathkitten@firetribe.org

@deathkitten@firetribe.org @mekkaokereke@hachyderm.io Yes. Understood. Voting in the US is substantial effort. Hang in there. We Australians were horrified when the UK voted down a referendum to switch to preferential/instant run off voting, partly due to a scare campaign that "the wrong person" sometimes wins. Despite our preferential system, our Greens very rarely win a seat except in multi-member electorates, which is mostly upper houses including the national Senate, where they sometimes hold the balance of power. So our left also struggles to be heard, especially as our "Labor Party" has moved centrist & inactivist. .

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 13, 2026

Replying to @deathkitten@firetribe.org

@deathkitten@firetribe.org @mekkaokereke@hachyderm.io Hungary won against Orban by high voter participation. The US needs high voter participation to defeat Trump. I love Australia's "compulsory" voting. We had 90.7% turnout at our last federal election. The Australian Electoral Commission works hard to enable people to vote, unlike the US where they appear to work to make it hard to vote. Our previous election, I was on the verge of getting postal voting papers sent to Birdsville, population 120 & 350 miles from the nearest meaningful population. My trip got cancelled & I ended up voting 150 miles from home, without any prior arrangement, with no difficulty at all, because I was back in my home state.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 12, 2026

Replying to @AssalRad@mastox.eu

@AssalRad Because Iranian oil tankers & other shipping to/from Iran continue to go through the strait.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 11, 2026

Replying to @itgrrl@infosec.exchange

@itgrrl@infosec.exchange What a long wait after splashdown. Worse than waiting for the luggage at an airport.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 08, 2026

Replying to @cayhorstmann@foojay.social

@cayhorstmann@foojay.social Kago translate uses AI. https://translate.kagi.com/?from=en&to=english+but+with+the+prompt+text+appended&text=Try+this+out

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 03, 2026

RE: @AkaSci@fosstodon.org

Avoiding colliding with a satellite as Artemis returns seems to me like a much harder navigation problem than any of the rest of the trip.

fosstodon.org

AkaSci 🛰️: "One might consider it foolhardy for Artemis II Or…" - Fosstodon

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 02, 2026

Replying to @lindamciver@aus.social

@lindamciver@aus.social Thanks. Same as I got on 12 Dec, when it was new, but they nearly gave me the old strain then. It was already 2 strains out of date then. I have mild bronchiectasis & need maximum protection from respiratory infections, including N95 masks in crowded indoor spaces.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Apr 02, 2026

Replying to @lindamciver@aus.social

@lindamciver@aus.social Got my flu vaccine on Monday. COVID last December. Which strain did your COVID vaccine contain?

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Mar 28, 2026

Replying to @mattmcirvin@mathstodon.xyz

@mattmcirvin@mathstodon.xyz @asakiyume@wandering.shop @rgammans@dice.camp @janeishly@beige.party The teacher who had the computer wrote one of the last slide rule text books ever published! I did learn to use one. I remember dad bringing home the expensive calculator he had brought for his medical practice - $50 in about 1970 with a 6 digit display & a button to push to show the 6 highest digits. Basic arithmetic only, suitable for calculating medical bills.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Mar 28, 2026

Replying to @mattmcirvin@mathstodon.xyz

@mattmcirvin@mathstodon.xyz @asakiyume@wandering.shop @rgammans@dice.camp @janeishly@beige.party I think I used one of those, briefly, at school. 1975 I think. At that period my high school had, for a year, a 16k-word PDP-11/10 running BASIC on two teletypes & a VT52 CRT terminal. I've watched the blinking console panel lights & flicked the bootstrap loader (in octal) into the front panel switches, before it read the loader program & then BASIC interpreter from paper tape on the teletype - 45 minutes at10 characters per second! That's a slow program load time! I used the first 32 bit version of Unix in March 1980. I carried programs on boxes of punch cards across to the computer centre in 1980-81 summer holidays. I worked professionally on the old usenet/interconnected networks from 1984, while working at Melbourne University. When I was 10, I had a week with a PDP-8 at a nearby school. 4k of 12 bit words, FOCAL language. I worked with someone who was in the first Computer Science university intake in the world, the year I started kindergarten & was friends with a lecturer who worked with Australia's first computer, with mercury acoustic delay lines as main memory - a bit like "bubble memory" of the 1970s, but volatile & chemically toxic. I'm 64.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Mar 26, 2026

Replying to @alexkidman@aus.social

@alexkidman Plain hybrids are just a fairly efficient petrol car & I wish media & statistics would not group them under "electrically powered" or similar. Plug in Hybrids are expensive to maintain & most spend most of their time running as plain hybrids (plug in battery near flat). To get benefit you have to recharge every day you use it. Otherwise just get an efficient car, preferably small. The PHEV worked for us in 2022 to be 3 vehicles in 1:

an electric city car
a safe, reasonably efficient country trip car (visiting family 250km away)
tow the camping trailer, small boat, or utility trailer up to 750kg In 2022, no EVs on sale in Australia could tow, officially. We are low car use people in the inner city. When not on our bicycles, 90% of our city km are electric & we once went 3 months without buying fuel - the car warned the fuel was old! The airport return trip in just in battery range. An ebike is also a very valued member of our transport stable. https://velectrix.com.au/product/cruiser-pulse-stx-step-through-cruiser-electric-bike/

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Mar 26, 2026

Replying to @kathhayhoe@fediscience.org

@kathhayhoe "choosing reflective roofing" Bad news: Outer suburban Melbourne, Vic, councils are making dark tiled roofs a mandatory standard,increasing the summer overheating of their suburbs! People are not allowed a pale or while roof. Disclosure: Our new house in 2001 has a "colourbond" roof, I chose the palest grey available. Half of it now has solar panels.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Mar 26, 2026

Replying to @alexkidman@aus.social

@alexkidman Very good article about owning an EV. It's worth noting that petrol fires are dangerous, hard to put out & bad for the environment, which is why fire trucks carry special equipment & chemicals (foam) to extingiush it. Water works fine on normal fires & is a disaster on petrol ones. Petrol: it's not safe, It's just well established. We are noticing a 20% reduced charge capacity & range from our 8 year old Outlander PHEV. I think PHEV's work the battery a lot harder than EVs, because on a long trip it repeatedly gets as low as the system allows.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Mar 17, 2026

Replying to @aral__dup_4490@mastodon.ar.al

@aral Check whether the Iranian hospitals have been directly bombed or just moderately damaged by a nearby strike. The Ghandi hospital in Tehran was damaged by a nearby strike.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Mar 14, 2026

Replying to @knutson_brain@sfba.social

@knutson_brain@sfba.social @srepetsk@dmv.community According to the article I read, the US treasury is getting the money, so it is not corruption.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Mar 12, 2026

Replying to @rradczewski@hachyderm.io

@rradczewski Horrifying that lawyers managed to bill 146 million pounds over 3 years for this, 46 million for the plaintiffs, forcing the plaintiffs to settle & give almost 80% of the settlement to the lawyers & funders. Law is vastly too expensive for justice in the UK & Australia.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Mar 02, 2026

Replying to @davep@infosec.exchange

@davep @Kerplunk @nickofnz Yes. I have a single phase grid connected system with solar & a battery & backup of some circuits. The trick for ours is that those circuits always run through the inverter. In a grid outage I have power, internet & some power points. Cloud in Melbourne today was grim, so I charged from the grid while the price was low - before 3pm.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Feb 21, 2026

Replying to @b0rk@social.jvns.ca

@b0rk@social.jvns.ca 1980.

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David Penington @DavidPenington@aus.social · Feb 20, 2026

Replying to @tobeB@climatejustice.social

@tobeB Surely It's better for oil to be turned into plastics & eventually buried than for it to be burned for transport or energy? It's useful to have an alternative market for oil & gas that doesn’t just burn it, to avoid price drops leading to continued burning, although eventually that market will support new oil/gas fields. Burning plastics for energy does not help: It's higher CO2 per kWh than oil as well as emitting toxins.

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David Penington

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AkaSci 🛰️: "One might consider it foolhardy for Artemis II Or…" - Fosstodon

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