Key (To The Mars Rover) Parties

Photo: Patrick T. Fallon / AFP (Getty Images)

NASA is looking for folks willing to stay locked indoors with each other for a year, as practice for an eventual mission to Mars. Their days will be filled with tasks akin to those that real crews will undertake on the Martian surface, collecting rock samples and all, but you have to wonder — what are they going to do with all those nights?

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It’s kind of the Only One Bed trope to rule them all — a group of people of similar ages, with similar interests and education backgrounds, all locked inside with no one but each other for a 365 long, dull days. It’s not unreasonable to imagine that those folks might find some other ways to pass the Martian time. Conveniently, Cayde-6’s Unloaded Dice brought up what we’ve all been thinking:

Before this article was even published, Jalop Slack was bustling with discussion about how the selected test “astronauts” should really just form a polycule while in “space.” Think about it — open and honest communication between all parties, fostering healthy relationships in which all members of the “crew” can participate. It’d certainly be a lot healthier than any other sort of workplace comedy romantic shenanigans that may end up unfolding, with meet-cutes and betrayals and near-misses. Do you want How I Met Your Mother in space? Because forcing monogamy on a group of interesting and interested people locked in confinement together is how you get How I Met Your Mother in (something resembling) space.

Congratulations, Cayde-6’s Unloaded Dice, on your Comment Of The Day win. I imagine an Olympic Village-level supply of condoms would make for a genuine concern on launch, given that condoms have mass and that’s something of an issue to get into space on a Mars-bound rocket. If only someone else could handle delivery.

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