Astronaut
Yeah, my heroes growing up were people like Neil Armstrong, John Glenn and Buzz Aldrin. I too wanted to ride on a fuck off pointy rocket and see the many wonders which exist beyond the soggy grey clouds which dominated my mood here on terra firma, to boldy go... Etc, etc.

Then as a teenager I started to read about their character flaws, Aldrin's much publicized breakdown and alcohol abuse and in general their collective inability to articulate their experiences (save Alan Bean, who paints moonscapes. Lots and lots of moonscapes. And then goes to paint some more pictures of the moon). Armstrong himself was not only ginger but also unable to exclaim "woohoo, I'm standing on the fucking moon! Hey Buzz, stop whining about coming second you cunt and break open the crate of Fosters!" which is what I would have probably used in place of the "one small step..." speech.

I doubt whether NASA would be impressed with the excuse "Sorry chaps, I didn't mean to forget to take the 137 pictures of a footprint and make detailed notes about bits of grey rock, but I was too busy sketching pictures of knobs in the dust which will be there for millions of years. Perhaps handbrake turning the moon buggy wasn't the brightest of plans, but it's not as if we were going to be using it again is it?".

You're free to draw your own conclusions as to the sanity of the type of individual who'll strap an 111 metre tube containing liquid oxygen and hydrogen to his arse knowing the following worrying facts:

a) each of the million moving parts was built by the lowest bidder. It'd be akin to Fiat building a nuclear carrier.
b) A 0.01% component failure rate would mean 1000 things would go tits up when you least needed it
c) The total amount of energy expended in getting your arse to the moon and back is equivalent to the Hiroshima A-bomb and if it went "pop" during the launch the end result would be very messy indeed
(Bicycle Repairman "you're also a bit of a wanker", Thu 29 Mar 2007, 14:03, Reply)