Even with a year of adjustment, the twenty-two hour days are still grueling. Sure, we get a lot done, and we all sleep like rocks at "night," but it's tough. The orbit doesn't help; we get eclipsed for fifteen minutes or so every half hour.
Enough complaining about that. The inspection today went well.
External:
The EDV's rockets are clean, smooth, and ready to burn. Hull looks just fine, though I found Michael-Aleksander polishing it, the nut. The heatshield is above the wear lines, despite the aerocapture yesterday. The parachute covers open smoothly, the chutes themselves are intact, and their charges report nominal. The brakes brake, the motors… mote? and the suspension suspends.
Internal:
The cabins smell a little stale, but literally nothing has lived in there since we broke orbit over Kerbin—we made sure—so that's expected. The acceleration couches seem plush enough. Pantry is stocked with snacks, water tanks are full, and the—wait, lemme look this up—supercritical water oxidizer says it's ready to unleash hell upon anything you can fit in it. Which is, to be fair, not a whole lot. The science rover's cab is immaculate. Not a single coffee stain to be found. We'll see about that at the end of the mission.
Oh yeah, coffee. How did I forget that? The EDV has a coffee-pot. What's the big deal, you ask? Well, let me tell you.
Coffee is hard to make in orbit. Well, maybe not coffee, but good coffee certainly is. You have to do all sorts of contrived things, like pressure-fed contraptions with pistons and stuff. Plus, the water boils cold, because the hab isn't kept at a full atmosphere. But a good, gravity-fed coffee-pot is simple, reliable, and makes real, proper coffee.
Anyways, tomorrow is systems-check. More on that then.
Had some weak coffee. I can't wait for the victory coffee once we land.
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