James May Love

So some people who know me know me as a huge geek. And that I have the greatest geek crush on James May. Not for being the voice of reason on Top Gear, not for fighting against all the wine ponces of France, and not even for a delicious dress sense; but because he takes an amateur love of aeronautics and physics and engineering, throws in a large dose of a healthy imagination, and creates things.

I have loved James May since discovering Top Gear, whenever that was, its been going since forever. A trait inherent to the BBC I believe (don't get me started on Time Team, its actually ending soon). He's Captain Slow because he's intelligent, assesses risk accurately in a rather dangerous discipline (Hammond's rocket car crash anyone?) and enjoys what he's doing. I quite believe that his love of space and flight translates very well to his love cars, and that he probably enjoys the speed more, despite his sobriquet.

But because of his love of space and flight, and seemingly, education all together, he's also hosted a number of intelligent and emotional documentaries.

Emotional?

He's flown at the edge of space. He has seen the curvature of the Earth and it is gorgeous.

He's also built an entire Lego house. 1 to 1 scale. Out of Legos. (Legoes or Legos? Google says Legos.) With running water, if I remember correctly.

So emotional. I don't cry for romcoms, I don't cry for movies much in general. I'll cry while I'm reading books, and damn, the Fall and the Fountain both make me cry like a baby, but those are, admittedly, very heavy emotional hitters.
But for some reason, James May always makes me tear up when he's successful. He's so joyous and sincere when something works, it brings tears to my eyes that something simple can be so beautiful.

Remember that movie, American Beauty, wherein some creepy guy next door records everything, even a windswept plastic bag and somehow, with hamfisted voice over, the audience is lead to believe its beautiful?
Its a little like that, except way more believable.

So, I've just found another special in the Toy Stories series called Flight Club and again I'm brought to tears. A silver mylar-ed, orange tipped, and tech heavy glidder makes its way across 22 nautical miles, the equivalent distance from the White Cliffs of Dover to France. Tho because of French Air Traffic Control and the weather, the actual flight is made within England's borders.

And its so simple. And its silly. But the people involved in these shows obviously love this bit of fun, these builds they get to toss off just because someone with some popularity and some network clout lets them. And when they succeed, its beautiful.

But that might just be my crush on James May talking.
Either way, learn a little something new and watch James May.