Wacko Wednesday

As far as I'm aware, we are entering our second day of a government shutdown. Wacko Wednesday indeed.

Along the lines of that theme: Did you see the recent story about a company's plans for space travel?

The Dutch-based Mars One venture says more than 165,000 people around the world have voiced interest in a one-way trip to the Red Planet .

"The response to the first round of the astronaut selection program has been tremendous," Norbert Kraft, Mars One's chief medical officer, said in a news release updating the tally. "We now have a large group of applicants from where we can start our search."

After the Aug. 31 deadline passes, Mars One will review the applications to decide who goes on to the next round of the selection process.

"We'll select the good ones for Round 2 — this will be the job interview round," Bas Lansdorp, the venture's co-founder and CEO, told NBC News in an email. "There is no fixed upper limit. ... We expect to announce who passes to Round 2 within two or three months, depending on how many people apply in these last 10 days."

Now, did you notice in that story a rather key item? ONE-WAY TRIP was the little item that struck my attention. And they have a large group of applicants. And there will be job interviews.

"So, have you been drinking a lot of Drano lately?" I imagine some of the questions must be like. More than 150,000 folks have thought it a real good idea to strap themselves into a rocket of some sort that will take off from Earth and land (run into) Mars. Might even run into that little feller that used to pester Bugs Bunny on occasion. Heck, might even run into Bugs Bunny, taking into account that anyone purposefully taking a one-way trip to another planet is somewhat buggy in the first place.

Some folks have noted that there are not more than, oh, 500 or so congressmen, Senators, and a president that Mars One might want to take along as well. But not me. No, not me.