I used to do rocket science. First we'd make the rocket and then we'd make our own solid propellant from melted sugar and KNO3. (Kids! DON'T do this at home! Trust me about this!) and pour it into the rocket and then take the rocket outside and fire it off.

By the way -- we DID do static tests of the propellant and "motor", we fired the thing off tethered, and even followed the flights that worked with inclinometers. Our data books are probably still around somewhere.

And WE didn't have any fancy-schmancy computers, either! We used
slide rules to do the math, or a paper and pencil. Back in those days we were REAL rocket scientists.

And we even managed to grow up without too many puncture wounds from exploding rockets....