I don't know about you, but sometimes I get the urge to do something that no-one else has. I do a lot of mapping, you know the deal if you explore. Hit an unmapped system, scan it, if you find anything worthwhile then scan that.. sell the results and profit. I've made a lot of money doing that. Stars are not actually worth a whole lot. Corporations want to know about planets. Planets they can colonise, or mine, filling their banks and their pockets with ever more credits. Me? Sure the money is nice, but what really gives me a kick is spotting a star, like an unusual star waaay off out of the way, and then finding a way to reach it and scan that, hopefully being the first one there. Like today, I'm out in the black, Achilles Alter area, and I spot a CN type star, a carbon star, one nearing the end of it's long life. It's high up, over 1,200LY above the galactic plane. Not many star systems around it either. Careful calculations, thanking myself for gathering all the materials for FSD Injections and a few long jumps.. I make it to an F class system nearby it. I didn't think I would have the range to make it there, but when I check it, damn if it isn't 118LYs away, easy jump with my Krait Phantom and a premium fsd boost. So I got it, another first discovery and then.. sitting in my ship, staring out the window, I realise I'm looking down on the spiral of the galaxy, from out near the edge. I've seen it before of course, from further out, higher.. but not from this angle, not this .. majestic. But time waits for no man, and I spotted a nice M class red giant on the way up here that's waiting for my name all over it!

I'm watching the updates crawl by, I've been out of space for too long. I decided after much exploring to go planetside in the SOL system for a short visit, at least that was the plan. Some well deserved R&R and maybe a few nice 'encounters' with some dames. Damn if I didn't fall for one of them.. so I stayed far longer than I planned to. Funny thing love, you think you have it all sewn up, meet someone, hit it off, change all your plans, hell, even think settling down on a planet is nice. Then it all goes to hell. At least I have the black. But damn, all my ships systems are so behind with updates. I hadn't even been to the dock in months, and now after my not too careful departure, I'm out where I can forget about people again. I thought I had better check the ship systems, you know the deal.. and yea.. updates.. a LOT of updates. Looks like it's finally done, good thing too before I get too far away.

Well, I guess I got plenty of time to think about what comes next.

Well, I'm back.. from outer space.. yes I made it to the HD systems I wa staring at, careful examination of the galaxy map and a few FSD boosts and I made it up there. Was it worth it? Hell yea.. They have my name on them now! Cash wise though not as profitable as some of the standard systems. There wasn't anywhere else to go upwards at that point I scanned up at least 200LY and saw no more stars so I decided to just drop down to 39 Cancri area and then realised I was only 618LY from home so I headed back. I need to get me some more of those Prismatic shields from the Empire so I guess I'll be hauling magazines and holo-discs for a while. For now though, my cabin on the cutter is calling.. exploring the outer reaches sure is tiring work!

Yea, haven't updated this in a while, kinda forgot to.. anyway, I went out to that sector and as I suspected it was interesting. Scored a few black hole discoveries and some other unusual stuff. But mainly it was peaceful and quite profitable. I made it back to Colonia after just getting sick of scanning, you can have too much of something, believe me..

From Colonia I headed back to Shinrarta.. strange how that leg of the journey seemed to take forever, usually it seems to fly past on the way back. This time it dragged worse than Tina Tasty at the revue bar in Riedquat. Having got back I did a cargo run to a few places I can't even recall the names of now, took the cutter out for some exercise for that. Seems like these reports of Thargoids are real after all. Kinda worrying and I find myself thinking about some big guns. Big guns need a big ship so I'm considering finally using that Fed rank of mine and getting a Corvette. The cost worries me though, so I've taken to the black once again to earn some creds and do some more star charting. I don't want to stray too far from the bubble though so this time I've gone upwards.. way upwards.. my last deep jump took me over 1,800LY above the bubble.. heh Barnard's Loop sure does look odd from up high. I ran outta stars on that leg, so came back down to look for some more HD XXXX stars.. kinda a hobby of mine, tagging HD's and HIP's.. challenging too at times. So right now I'm out in the black again, looking down on you all, so to speak, and wondering how I'm going to reach these HD stars I'm looking at, they're close.. but just not close enough, even for the Mind's jump range..

I'm breaking the mould.. usually when I have been out in the black I like to return to civilisation for a while, remind myself what human company feels like. But my last foray took me out beyond Sag A* and I was struck by the systems out that way in a way I have not been before. My trusty AspX Long View was damaged early on in the mission, my own fault, accidentally disabled the flight computer while exploring a high G world.. even with the hull at 54% though she handled well and carried on for thousands of LY. She's a good ol' gal.. but I decided to heave to at Colonia for repairs rather than head back to the home worlds.

Anyway, while I was out past SagA* a sector of the Galaxy caught my eye, seems very little exploration has been carried out there, can't say I'm surprised, its a back end place and not on the path to Beagle Point. It looks interesting anyhow, and its a long way from people, and heh 'aliens'.. yea right.. too much onion head if you ask me.

Well, I'll update the log again later, got plenty of ground to cover yet.