[imagesource: Joe Raedle/Getty Images]

Jeff Bezos must have known that blasting into space in a phallic-shaped rocket would inspire thousands of jokes and memes.

Yet he still went ahead and wore a cowboy hat?

I just Googled his age, and he’s 57, which is too late for a midlife crisis, but he’s giving it a good shot.

Anyway, we have covered the memes and jokes here, but one or two did slip through the net.

The comparisons with Dr, Evil are obvious, but once he let out this laugh it was game over:

It’s official, Bezos is indeed Dr Evil 🤣 pic.twitter.com/PjULe4EAnF

— ⚡️Tesla Owners Online (@Model3Owners) July 21, 2021

One that we already covered yesterday, just to drive home the point:

Quite the liftoff. pic.twitter.com/6JzR1Rfu9Z

— Matt Mullin (@matt_mullin) July 20, 2021

By the way, if you’ve ever bought anything from Amazon, or worked for the company, Bezos wants to thank you:

“I also want to thank every Amazon employee and every Amazon customer because you guys paid for all of this.” pic.twitter.com/uM99zMaWYt

— Eoin Higgins (@EoinHiggins_) July 20, 2021

I’m sure those employees paid minimum wage to work for Amazon, who pee into bottles in order to hit their targets, are happy to have made the sacrifice.

They may take solace in the fact that the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has now tightened its rules for how it awards astronaut wings to those riding on private space flights.

This via New Scientist:

For the FAA to award wings, an astronaut must be employed by the company performing the launch – so tourists that have bought tickets are out. They must also go through training to be certified by the FAA as an astronaut and fly higher than 80 kilometres.

And they must have “demonstrated activities during flight that were essential to public safety, or contributed to human space flight safety,” according to the new order providing the guidelines.

…the [Blue Origin] spacecraft was entirely controlled from the ground, not by Jeff Bezos or any of the other three passengers, so all they had to do was enjoy the ride. That means that they would not qualify for astronaut wings under the FAA’s new rules.

Sadly, that would also mean that Wally Funk, a person more deserving of the title ‘astronaut’ than almost any other, wouldn’t qualify, either.

Except…

The agency is allowed to give honorary wings to “individuals who demonstrated extraordinary contribution or beneficial service to the commercial human space flight industry” but who did not satisfy the other eligibility requirements.

So Wally Funk, a passenger aboard the flight who trained to be an astronaut in the 1960s but did not get to go to space back then, may still get her astronaut wings.

Yes, please.

Give Wally her wings.

[source:newscientist]