Word: liftoff
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Were you embarrassed during the filming? Yes, a little. There were some professionals there who had done it for a while. I wasn't getting the liftoff as quickly as they did. It was embarrassing. It's funny because now, years later when I am not taking Viagra and the other guy does, I am still slow to the punch. I am the slow man on the totem pole. It was embarrassing because I was not used to being nude and having sex in a room full of people...
...would never admit this, and my dad warned me of this, but the libido does lose a little as you get older. Nature is cruel! As you get older, as you get into your 50s, it is more effort to get into liftoff. I'm 55, and it's a bit of a strain, but it's not to the point where it's a chore because then I just wouldn't do it. I don't have to do porn anymore for economic reasons. However, I like to stay current. I don't want to be an ex-porn...
...anything humorous happen on your mission? -Eve McGivern, Pittsburgh[Laughs] Mike Collins called Neil the "Tsar" and I said a couple of humorous things for levity. When Houston cleared us for liftoff I said, "Roger, we are number one on the runway." When we landed on the moon I said, "Be careful not to lock the hatch on the way out." It wasn't appreciated at the time...
Yesterday's launch included plenty of respectful grace notes. Sixty of the 114 candidates for the Teacher in Space slot in 1985 were at the liftoff, as were a number of relatives of the astronauts lost in the 1986 explosion. NASA was almost defensive in insisting that Endeavour is a sound ship, pointing out that in the nearly five years since it last flew it's undergone improvements so extensive as to leave it almost unrecognizable. "It's like a new space shuttle," shuttle program manager N. Wayne Hale told a news conference...
...astronauts seemed to feel the need to argue for the mission too. "This is serious business we're in here," shuttle commander Scott Kelly radioed shortly before liftoff, as if spacewatchers needed to be reminded of that fact...