In Space, No One Can Hear You Poop
In the next day or so, you’ll hear plenty of jokes about NASA’s $19 million toilet, so I’ll spare you the commentary about “giving new meaning to goverment waste” and providing understanding about why that crazy astronaut lady had diapers.
What interests me most here is the sloppy writing of the Associated Press (used in the MSNBC article linked above), as evidenced in the description here:
The space station toilet physically resembles those used on Earth, except it has leg restraints and thigh bars to keep astronauts and cosmonauts in place. Fans suck waste into the commode.
When considering another common meaning of “fans,” I was left with quite a disturbing image –and wondering just how far space travel enthusiasts were willing to go to express their devotion.
As if drinking recycled pee weren’t icky enough.
The thing I love most about the JKvS blog is that I have access to information I would likely never know about otherwise.
Yours,
a fan (but not the kind that will suck waste into anything!)