I know, I know, I promised on Twitter to ask Buzz Aldrin “Were all the moon landings faked, or just the first one?”
And after his talk at Planet2010 - slick, good humoured, fascinating - I did race out the door to follow the astronaut.
So did a couple of others, looking for Buzz to sign biographies.
“I don’t sign books,” he said, tersely.
I started to get nervous.
For 80, Buzz looks very solid, in a Clint Eastwood sort of a way.
Of the two of us, I'm guessing he drinks less beer, and boxes more (see him deck a cheeky questioner in the video below).
To be honest, if it came down to it, I wasn't sure I could take him.
So you’ll have to settle for a snap I took of Buzz with Vodafone NZ boss Russell Stanners (above).
A few of the snippets from Buzz’s speech (he'll be talking again at a public session tomorrow):
- On the way to the moon, the Apollo 11 mission travelled 5 inches to the gallon
- Nasa gave the mission a 60% chance of landing on the moon, and a 95% chance of returning safely
- After it was discovered the initial landing target was too rocky, and Eagle had to land after extra manual manoeuvres, there was only 15 to 20 seconds of fuel left. “We think. Nobody had a dipstick up there”.
- Right up until Eagle landed, scientists weren’t sure if it would become enveloped in layers of moon dust
- Your BlackBerry or iPhone has more relative computing power than that at the disposal of Apollo 11, as you’re probably already aware. Less known: Buzz is thinking about releasing his own iPhone app.