What do Yuri Gagarin, Buzz Aldrin and I have in common?

Answer: The NYC Yuri's Night Party of 2010.

These parties are celebrated all of the world to commemorate Yuri Gagarin's famous first manned flight into space. If you've never heard of them that's understandable given our current culture. In point of fact I had never heard of them until I was on the set of "Sci Fi Science" a few weeks ago. There I met a very nice woman named Carol. She told me about the party and introduced me to her friends who were setting the whole thing up.
I almost missed it because I had miss remembered the date, but I got word from Carol yesterday that none other than Buzz Aldrin himself might be attending. Needless to say I was all about the chance to meet the famous astronaut. Also the Yuri's night party is a big costume event so I of course broke out the Star Fleet uniform again. (As an aside, to those who go around saying I just look for any excuse to wear that damn thing  . . . you are 100% right.)
This time Gina was feeling better, so off we went into Manhattan's lower east side, to a club named "DROM" for a night of live bands, science talk and a chance to meet one of the first men to walk on the moon.
Well, not only was Mr. Aldrin, and his very nice wife, already there but he seemed to be in a really pleasant and talkative mood.
Once I was introduced to Mr. Aldrin, who according to his wife really does prefer that everyone call him "Buzz", I asked him about what he thought about the recent advances in technology. His response was focused on the recent set backs in manned space exploration, but this was fine with me. I had expected nothing more than a brief polite introduction and then to be overtaken by others perhaps more interested in his recent appearance on "Dancing with the Stars" but this was not the case at all. This crowd was focused on science more than reality television which I must say suited me just fine.
After a while the conversation, which involved a few of us now, drifted into what Buzz thought the future of America's manned space program should look like. I must say he had some really well thought out and wide ranging ideas on the subject, as one might expect. We talked about Mars, Space Elevator technology and low Earth orbit operations as opposed to the Lunar exploration missions he was part of and many other topics.
Eventually I asked him about the work of Dr. Marc Rayman and using some of the technologies developed in "Deep Space One" and to my surprise, he didn't seem to know anything about it. I went on to explain the ion drive and other new technologies that had been developed and that's when he asked me to send him more information at his email address. This, of course, I did last night, before I even went to sleep.
Gina and I had a great time and went to the restaurant upstairs from the club and had sushi for dinner.
All in all it was a great night and we had a wonderful time.