FR May 2012

Space travel was, is, and will always be for nunas.

It was necessary, but a necessary evil. Even in the best of circumstances it was a chore to endure, and these were far from the best of circumstances. The quarters were usually too small, the air too cold, too dry, too recycled, too not-quite-right. In space you had no natural day and night cycles. You didn't know what was early and what was late. When you arrived, you had to reset your biological clock to some other planet with a completely different rotational schedule. That usually involved stimulants, alcohol, and/or too much / too little sleep. These were just the major frettings. Forget trying to wrap your mind around dressing for a place with a cold climate or worrying about a breathable atmosphere. Holo-meetings could be done from the comfort of your office, barefoot, in luxurious plush carpet.

Still, Taataani had travelled enough to plan around these unpleasantries like a professional, and she had a series of rules in place:

• Charter your own travel: Mass transit, even first class or whatever they offered for preferential treatment, was for proles and rubes. Too many other people. Not that she wasn't a people person but that environment prevented mingling in a way she was comfortable with. Also you will never get a decent bit of sleep on one of those, no matter how hard you try. Also, private transit tends to be liberal on the eccentricities of the traveler, including and most especially the need to smoke while on board. This shouldn't even be an issue since they've invented air scrubbers, but if you have to suffer the hoi polloi, someone will always complain if you light up.

• Don't fly alone: It's sometimes unavoidable when on business, but if you can afford to charter and have abided by the rules above, you should also have company with you. Unless you need absolute quiet to do busy work on your travels, you're not going to want to read a novel or watch some derivative dopey holo that is playing. The company of others (others that you choose to bring with you, that is) is infinitely more stimulating. Sometimes literally. Even if you have to resort to just chatting up the pilot, make sure you are capable of doing so.

With all of this said, none of it is guaranteed to keep you from being miserable, especially if you travel after getting bad news, like a summons to Coruscant because the Imperial Navy is eager to have your business bid on a contract to supply their cruisers with sublight thrusters. It's not sexy or headline-grabbing, but it both has the potential to be lucrative beyond your wildest dreams, as well as being destructive to your conscience when you supply people you morally oppose. But one thing is for sure. You don't say no. At least not in so few words.