Buzz Aldrin all smiles after medical evacuation from South Pole

Damn, Buzz, you're like 500 years old, maybe you should take it easy for a while and play shuffleboard.

I guess the problem with being an astronaut is that afterward nothing you do will ever be exciting or adventurous. Me, I get excited trying out a new beef stew recipe, but if you're a spaceman you have to like go to the South Pole to get your fix.

This might be more fictional than fact but I think there's this common myth or something like all of the astronauts who landed on the moon eventually divorced their wives or something? Anyway insert stories about astronaut groupies -- Canaveral Cookies in NASA parlance. ("Canaveral Cookies" is the NASA term in the 60s for groupie ladies who wanted contact with the astronauts dudes).

Anyway, a friend and I was once debated (after a few beers) why astronauts got restless with their wives and found new ones after they got done with their Apollo missions or whatever.

My buddy argued it was something something space and the moon changed everything in these guys, therefore they came back changed men and sought new adventures including wives. Basically what you're arguing. Coming back to life on Earth after a decade of intense training and drama and space adventuring, they got bored and needed new drama.

I argued something of the opposite: these dudes were just normal guys who now had far better pick up lines and used their new found celebrity status to upgrade, which is the most stereotypical thing guys with new-found later-in-life fame can do. Their space adventures were exceptional; using their new status to dump their wives for presumably upgraded women was the most pedestrian thing about them.

Also the Economics forum as Trolly's blog is something I can get behind.

I agree with your theory.

They're just trying their luck with all the astronophiles

As I said, this is a real thing, apparently

http://nypost.com/2013/06/09/i-never...-you-the-moon/

Must be the sexy space suits

We sort of have this modern image of astronauts as science dorks like Sandra Bullock from Gravity, but you have to remember that at least the early astronauts were all hyper-macho test pilots or fighter pilot action junkies. That's not to say they weren't really smart guys with a lot of technical knowledge, but fundamentally they're all YOLO dudebros with a lot of gung-ho Right Stuff driving them. Even Valentina Tereshkova was an amateur skydiver in her spare time. You have to be a little nuts if you're going to volunteer to be the first guy to be strapped to a rocket and blasted to the ****ing moon.

So yeah, it's not hard to imagine spacedudes being the rockstar type of guys who have trouble with stable, long-term marriages and trade in for a string of younger spouses and I don't think it's because space changed them. These are adrenaline junkies who mainlined pure Mountain Dew XXXtreme X-Games action in their younger days and now have to deal with grocery shopping and taking kids to band practice and stuff.

I was going to say that you could write a novel about an aging astronaut always trying to chase that dragon and knowing he can never push the envelope harder than he's already pushed it, but according to Wikipedia there's already a book about Buzz Aldrin's struggles with depression and alcohol. I guess if you're Buzz Aldrin you spend your retirement exploring the remotest regions of the Earth you can find or skydiving and trying to relive some of that magic.

Also might have something to do with alien chicks with three boobs.

Update: Buzz is doing okay.

Buzz Aldrin's Twitter feed is the only thing that makes me feel joy these days:

John Glen has died. 2016 can go **** itself.

RIP Gene Cerman, last man to walk on the moon.

Would Buzz support http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/21...sayer-1649231/ or not?

Happy 87th, Buzz!