One evening when I was picking my daughter up from her piano lesson, the instructor gave her some kind of certificate. Across the top it said, “Reach for the moon, even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.”
I’ve seen this phrase before. I’ve never found it particularly inspiring.
When we got in the car my daughter said, “What a dumb certificate.”
I looked over at her. She had it on her lap, and wasn’t wearing any expression on her face.
“You don’t like it?”
“The moon is much closer to us than the stars.”
Oh yeah.
Tags: 2005
December 11, 2009 at 10:35 pm
Reach for the moon, even if you miss, you’ll… um… uh, maybe not die of asphyxiation in cold, empty space.
December 11, 2009 at 10:48 pm
Your chances of being picked up in a spaceship in the 30 seconds you have to live unprotected in outer space is approximately 2267709 to 1 against.
December 11, 2009 at 10:50 pm
2^267709 (2 to the power of 267, 709 to one against) that is. tags didn’t work.
December 11, 2009 at 10:52 pm
HA! Will, that is the funniest thing ever.
December 15, 2009 at 9:51 pm
Landing among the stars is a little too… scalding, for my taste.
December 17, 2009 at 11:30 pm
I do believe the correct odds would be 1 in 2^2079460347, that exponential power being the phone number of the flat where Arthur Dent met Trillian.