The view of Earth is spectacular.

For whatever reason, I didn't succumb to the stereotype that science wasn't for girls. I got encouragement from my parents. I never ran into a teacher or a counselor who told me that science was for boys. A lot of my friends did.

That's something that is almost part of being human and I'm certain that will continue.

Eventually private enterprise will be able to send people into orbit, but I suspect initially it's going to have to be with NASA's help. Whether it's going to be a consortium or one entity remains to be seen. I could be wrong. I could be one of the old fogies! Rocket science is tough, and rockets have a way of failing. It happens. A company has to be willing to bear the risk of its rocket failing. It's a very large capital investment.

For quite some time, women at NASA only had scientific backgrounds.

Then during the mission itself, I used the space shuttle's robot arm to release a satellite into orbit.

On a standard space shuttle crew, two of the astronauts have a test pilot background - the commander and the pilot.