When Sneak was but a boy his careers guidance officer told him he could do anything. If he put his mind to it.

Sneak instantly decided that he would be an astronaut. But then he realised that this would involve rigorous training, not having very much fun in general, and going to the toilet in your trousers on a daily basis – and Sneak gets enough of that at home.

So, he took his mind right off it, and set about researching which supermarket's uniform best suited the colour of his eyes.

Now that he is older, and those lofty dreams of working on the deli counter are but a distant memory – curse those rules about personal hygiene - Sneak is even more annoyed about missing his chance, since it appears that astronauts have more fun than Safeway shelf stackers, and IT journalists (this is not hard).

Just look at some of these spaceman related headlines culled from the BBC news web site: Astronaut on murder plot charge; Space computer 'sabotage' probed; US astronauts 'flew while drunk'; Charged Nasa woman 'had no nappy'.

Boiled down to their most juicy facts these relate to astronauts flying while drunk – spaceships!, astronauts driving around in their cars wearing nappies and looking for their love rivals, space computers being mysteriously bashed with sticks (presumably it was a stick), and murder.

What else is going on at the place where they race to space? And why don't they publicise these things better?

This is definitely Sneak's kinda place to work.

27 Jul 2007