Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata has been elected to stay on board the International space station alone while the other astronauts return in the shuttle.
"It doesn't bother me." He said from his perch in orbit around the earth. "The space is bigger than my apartment in Tokyo and almost as modern. The view is a lot better and the price of maintenance isn't that much more than in Japan."
While alone in the station Mr. Wakata will be carrying on experiments (this is all true) that the space agency will be charging $55,000 an hour for. They include (I am really not making this up) trying to use eye drops and fly a carpet in 0 gravity, to shoot a liquid out of the straw of a drink container to see what it does, do back flips and push ups, attempt to fold clothes and arm wrestle another astronaut. Mr. Wakata has already experimented with using non-smelling underwear in space.
The wonders of science never cease.
