Issue link: https://tmcpulse.uberflip.com/i/807066
t m c ยป p u l s e | a p r i l 2 0 1 7 8 Then on the fourth flight, I got a chance during the flight to actually talk to my kids, to do a video conference and talk to them once or twice on the phone. The 2-year-old didn't really talk much at that point. My older one was almost 4. When I talked to him on the phone, I said, 'What did you think of the launch?' He goes, 'Mommy, I got to ride in a plane.' He flew on a NASA plane with my husband and with the other family members to Florida. Although he had been on a plane before, that was probably the first time he was really old enough to remember it. I go, 'That's really exciting.' Then I said, 'What did you think of the launch?' He goes, 'Mommy, it was a blue and white plane.' He was completely focused on the plane ride to and from the Cape. Q | Now that they're grown, what do your sons think about their mom being an astronaut? A | They're 18 and 16. I think at various points while they were growing up, they thought it was cool. Now they're over that, really. Plus, you have to realize that here in the Clear Lake area where we live, it's not actually unique to have a parent who's an astronaut. When they were in elementary school, for example, it wasn't uncom- mon for them to have some other kid in their class whose mother or father was an astronaut. In fact, my younger son was friends with a girl who was his age and both her parents were astronauts. It wasn't quite the unique experience it might be somewhere else. Q | What was the weirdest thing that ever happened to you in space? A | After I got back to Earth on my first flight, I can remember going to bed the first night and waking up in the middle of the night. I felt like my body was floating off the bed. I could not feel the bed. I was just lying there with my eyes closed. If you'd asked me if I was floating I would have said, 'Absolutely, I'm floating.' I physically had to move my arms and legs to feel the bed to say, 'I'm not floating.' Then the second night I woke up in the middle of the night and it felt like half my body was off the bed and the other half was on the bed. That was very, very weird. I actually had the opposite when I was in space. I woke up in the middle of the night and I could have sworn I was lying against a bed. I remember waking up thinking, 'Wait, I thought I was in space. Why does it feel like I'm on a bed?' Your brain is trying to figure out these new environments. When it doesn't have something that it can correlate with, it makes up these things. It was really interesting. Ellen Ochoa, Ph.D., was interviewed by Pulse reporter Shanley Chien. This interview has been edited for clarity and length. Ochoa floats through the tunnel that connected the STS-96 crew to the International Space Station (ISS) for several days in late May and early June 1999. The crew members eventually transferred several thousand pounds of supplies from Discovery to the ISS. Some of the gear can be seen behind her. Credit: NASA siennaplantation.com/canine This FREE event is big 'bow wow' fun for pooches and their people. Performance Dogs Costume Contest Inflatables Food Trucks Pet Adoptions Canine Carnival Doggone Fun Run Benefitting Fort Bend Cares Sienna's Sawmill Lake Model Home Park Darling . CalAtlantic . Chesmar . David Weekley Gracepoint . Highland . Meritage . MI Homes Newmark . Perry . Shea . Taylor Morrison . Toll Brothers . Trendmaker . Westin Sienna Parkway at Hwy 6 Downtown Greenway Galleria Med Center Fo r t B e n d P k w y New homes from the $280s