"It was my goof."

Mick made a mistake recently. While we were talking on his way to Lunar Gateway 5, he was fooling around doing somersaults in zero G and bumped a switch.  The switch reset his communications system to an alternate, slow speed network.

This is the result on my end.

We fixed it, but Mick was embarrassed.  But he's in good company.

During the historic Apollo 8 mission in 1968, astronaut Jim Lovell made a pretty big mistake.

106:27:28 Lovell: "Roger. For some reason, we suddenly got a Program 01 and no attitude light on our computer."

Lovell was an experienced pilot and veteran of two previous Gemini missions. Even he made a goof.

He accidentally entered a computer code that reset the command module's guidance computer to make it think it was back on the launch pad in Florida!

Jim Lovell using a telescope to set his navigation computer. Credit: NASA

Lovell quickly understood what had happened, though.

107:00:58 Lovell: "Roger. It was my goof; I must have put in 3701 instead of 3723 and 501."

Lovell didn't freak out or panic.  He worked with Mission Control to resolve the problem.

Mistakes are gonna happen in life, and astronauts are trained to recognize that and overcome them. You'll make some mistakes too. Don't feel bad. Just learn from it and move on.

Maybe it will help to remember this wise saying from Albert Einstein: "A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new."