Astronauts wow adults and children at Georgetown presentation

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Photo by The Georgetown Dish

The six-person crew of the Space Shuttle Atlantis on Monday night at Georgetown

As it turns out, astronauts are not at all as grim-faced and single-minded as Philip Kaufman would have you believe. As the crew of the Space Shuttle Atlantis' final mission showed at a Monday night presentation before a packed Georgetown University auditorium, they're a lot of fun.

The presentation—a slide show led by the six crew members of the Atlantis, followed by a film put together from footage they shot on their mission—was just one stop on a tour that the Atlantis crew has been undertaking since the day they touched down on Earth seven weeks ago. All in all, the mission, which was NASA's most recent shuttle mission and the final voyage of the Atlantis, made a 4.8 million mile journey over twelve days—or 186 orbits around the Earth in total.

The presentation, though, was so much more than a series of stills of astronauts training and shuttles launching. The audience knew it wasn't in for a rote science-and-space slide show when Commander Ken Ham, formerly a captain in the U.S. Navy, showed off Atlantis' "team photo"—which they successfully lobbied to take in the Astros' ballpark—and their crew photo, a snapshot of the six Atlantis crew members in goofy sunglasses and blue velveteen jackets. Mission specialist Garrett Reisman, Ham said, or "Big G" as the short New Jersey native is affectionately known, was nominated as the "team mojo leader," and was tasked throughout the shuttle launch preparation with calling "jacket days," when the crew would wear their '70s-style jackets to work.

Ham said that the crew elected to go on tour because "with the privilege [of going into Space] comes the responsibility to share your experience." The crew's comradery, it was clear, was just as integral to their mission as installing a new antenna on the International Space Station. "Big G" was teased jocularly throughout the night for being "vertically challenged."

"We met the President today ... These guys were making fun of me there, too, and the President told them to cut that out," Reisman protested. "They're violating a direct presidential order!"

Nothing showed their repartee better than the 20-minute video compiled from footage they'd filmed on board the Atlantis and the International Space Station, where they docked. Their zero-gravity shenanigans, which included air-ballet, one-finger pull-ups, synchronized human flights, and a Hungry Hungry Hippo-like, hands-free M&Ms eating contest, cracked up the audience of children and adults alike.

The crew shared intriguing facts about the mission, too—that the sound of the shuttle launch was so fantastically loud that it could shatter the steel launch pad the rocket takes off from; that debris less than a millimeter in size zooming through space constantly endangered the crew; and that regular ice cream is the worst food to eat in space. But most of all—besides the awe-inspiring footage of Earth and the International Space Station that the crew shot from Atlantis, the crowd loved that the crew seemed like best friends.

"I liked the movie," said Jeremy Sutter, a middle school-aged boy who was at the event with his parents. "I also liked how they were all buddies, and they all made fun of 'Big G.'"

"The most interesting thing I found was how you could imagine that they were up there, in Space, working on a hugely important mission, but it was like a day with your pals," said Laura Pneu.

A member of the Atlantis crew attaching a new antenna. Reisman joked that he and his colleague, Steve Bowen, knew they could always get jobs attaching satellites for Direct TV

The packed audience