today was so sweet for space exploration! Spirit lands in the best possible configuration - right side up. It survived the descent, where just outside the heatshield the temperature is hotter than the surface of the sun while inside its not much warmer than room temperature. how do they do that?

spirit sends signals to earth while the earth is in view from the landing site of the moon. earthset happens but is spirit cut off? no! it can use odyssey, which is very close to the moon for its landing later this month, as a bounce-point to continue transmitting data back to earth. Soon we should have the first high-res images from the surface of mars. Then a rover will come out and roll around and collect all sorts of data about the surface of the planet. Nasa TV just reported that the first images have arrived.

All the while the International Space Station keeps on keepin on.