Quasar

“Hello Equestria, this is Spitfire speaking! Well… who else would be speaking? It is … just me after all.. Heh…

“I won’t lie to you folks… It gets a little lonely up here. So… Thank you for listening. It makes me feel that much closer to you all back at home. I’m nearly halfway through my first year out here. Please, keep sending me your messages! I appreciate each and every one.

“Anywho, I’ve been doing more plant research and have started taking space walks. The view when you’re really out there, instead of inside the spacecraft is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. Unfortunately, my camera wouldn’t work outside the spacecraft. But, just imagine the photos I send down without a pane of glass in front.

“Just the other day when I was space walking to inspect the exterior of the ship, I got to see a comet go by! For those who don’t know, a comet is similar to a meteor, but they usually have brilliant bright tails that come in all sorts of beautiful shades! These colors are due to solar wind and radiation sweeping away gas and dust from the nucleus of the comet, often forming two or more separate tails. How cool is that?

“I have a plant research update for you all, too! The larger they get, the more you have to reposition them to encourage the increased growth rate and size. But… something is odd… I’m not sure what’s causing it exactly, but the plants have started to lean. Even when I reposition them, I find them leaning again later on, and it's affecting their growth in the long term.

“My other research has proven fruitless thus far. I was provided some very interesting methods to attempt to create synthetic oxygen, but there hasn’t been any progress at all. I’ve given it attempt after attempt, magic, science, and even mashups of both. Nothing has led anywhere… I’ll have to get back to you later on that front. I’d expect an update within a couple of months. Research and growth take time, after all!

“Spitfire, Captain of the SS Ursa Major - out!”