The Pale Blue Dot | Misheard interview question | Breakdown coach | Marmalade gin | Tahini chicken schnitzel
Your report (6 March) suggests that astronauts have seen the Earth “as a pale blue dot”. The Earth will have appeared large to any human spacefarers, as none have travelled beyond the moon. The famous image known as Pale Blue Dot was taken, at the instigation of Carl Sagan, by one of the Voyager probes, looking back through rings of Saturn. No one was on that spacecraft at the time.
Robin Morris
Oxford
• Several years ago my sister’s friend was attending a civil service interview and was asked: “What do you think of President Carter’s new trombone?” Puzzled, she replied: “I didn’t even know he played the trombone.” Back came the straight-faced statement: “I asked you what you thought of President Carter’s neutron bomb” (Letters, 7 March).
Carole Lynn
Durham