It's clear, by now, that the most interesting thing about NASA's Mars Exploration Program is not Mars itself, which appears to consist chiefly of boring dust mountains and nothing else, but the Curiosity Rover sent there to document it.

I love space travel as much as the next huge dork. I still have my personalized certificate for participating in NASA's 2008 "send your name to the moon" project somewhere in my file cabinet. (Not to mention the certificates for "Space Hitler," and "Poophead McGee," whose names I also sent to the moon. Hey, I was in…