Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson for September 19, 2018

Well, at least they found a camera.

Fun fact: two Mars rocks were named after Calvin and Hobbes because of this strip.

Dear NASA: WHAZZUP!?

“Sir, you won’t BELIEVE what the camera just picked up…”

Is that “Viking” still operational after 40 years (20 years in the comic’s original publishing)?

Now all they need is a piece of cardboard so they could make a sign Please send tuna sandwiches!

Houston, we’ve got a problem!

There! See there! Proof it’s faked in a studio somewhere!

Where, exactly, is Matt Damon located? He can cook us some potatoes!

Great grimaces!!

I understand that today’s strip was the original inspiration for the movie “The Martian”, and all the other details were added for padding.

Of course, I may be understanding incorrectly. ;)

♥ Wonderful glimpse into Calvin’s little-boy imagination. Thanks, Bill Watterson

LOL! That’s just the sort of thing a kid Calvin’s age would do!

This makes me think of an old “Gilligan’s Island” episode.

Is there any other kind of “Gilligan’ Island” episode?

\\//_

So will he be late for dinner?

Very funny, but its not nice to tease NASA.

Dad is going to blow a gasket when he hears about this on the evening news!

Now they need to find the Rover.

I wonder how many astronauts (especially Apollo members) thought of doing something similar but restrained themselves?

I thought Calvin came here to escape pollution?

There are asteroids named for each of the Beatles and for Eric Clapton, and there are topographics on the moon Charon that are unofficially named for characters out of Star Trek, Star Wars, LOTR, Alien and Doctor Who.

Is that spacecraft actual size?

On a similar vein, when Neil Armstrong was searching for the right words to say when he stepped on the Moon, Michael Collins suggested he say “Oh good God, what the Hell is that? Oh no, AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHUGH!” It didn’t have the same noble sentiment as that was actually said, but it was funny.

I am Nomad must sterilize.

https://www.space.com/20413-phobos-deimos-mars-moons.html

Phobos and Deimos bear more resemblance to asteroids than to Earth’s moon. Both are tiny — the larger, Phobos, is only 14 miles across (22 kilometers), while the smaller, Deimos, is only 8 miles (13 km), making them some of the smallest moons in the solar system.

Both are also made up of material that resembles Type I or II carbonaceous chondrites, the substance that makes up asteroids. With their elongated shapes, they even look more like asteroids than moons.

But the sons won’t be in attendance around Mars forever. Phobos is slowly spiraling inward at a rate of 6 feet (1.8 meters) every century. Within 50 million years, the moon will either collide with Mars or become a ring of rubble around it; stretch marks on its surface are likely early signs that the moon is breaking apart, one 2015 study said, although others have postulated these marks are instead grooves from Mars ejecta.

“We think that Phobos has already started to fail, and the first sign of this failure is the production of these grooves,” Terry Hurford, a research assistant at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, who led a study about stretch marks, said in a statement.

Deimos, on the other hand, is slowly drifting away from the planet.

Hey, Calvin - there’s the camera you were looking for that Hobbes forgot…

Don’t drink the water