Thunderbirds are go!

Oh wow.  They've landed the space shuttle, with its mothership 747, in a corner of JFK airport in New York.  No one knows whether this is a resting space, a permanent fixture, a fair or a funeral.  And I gasped as mad Pepe wove his yellow cab (bald tyres and all) up the slipway towards Terminal 7.  The shuttle is big and clunky, full metal-jacketed and built in an age where rivets still commanded some authority.  Should the day come when our ipaded, soft electronic devices with their squishy compatibility go zap and burn out, I sense the shuttle will be wheeled out sedately to save the world.  It's sort of admirable, not beautfully designed like Concorde, but broad-shouldered.  A sort of Amtrak for the skies.