Send in the Russians

I'd only been loosely following our recent troubles with NASA's Discovery mission, but I started to take interest when I noticed the headlines were getting worse daily. Delayed, then goes up, but has damage eerily similar to the damage that caused the Columbia disaster. Then NASA says "Oh, it's not a big deal, we've got this under control." (NOT a direct quote!!) Well someone must have felt it was a big enough deal to call the Russian space program. They said "If we've got to go get them, we can get it done in January 2006" (again, not the direct quote!!) Ok, we've now got a back up plan. Still, NASA says we can safely bring the ship home next week. Now there are pieces of ceramic fiber cloth hanging off the bottom, they are supposed to be between the thermal tiles, and there is much debate over the extent of the danger. The spacewalk guys say "Have them fix it" (do you see that I'm paraphrasing all this? My English teacher would die), but it's not that simple. They would have to go under the ship in orbit. Never been done. So... let's recap... things going wrong left and right. Russians prepared to come get our astronauts if need be. NASA not sure what to do. If YOU were one of those astronauts, what would you be thinking? They'd tell me to prepare to come home, and I'd be like "Oh, HELL NO! I'm staying RIGHT HERE. Call me when the cosmonauts are on their way!" I'd be sitting my ass in the ISS. "Honey? Yeah, I'm gonna be a little late coming home from work. Maybe you should go ahead and put my plate in the microwave." I mean, no offense to our space program, but holy shit! We've only been doing this for how many years? I know these ship are old and all, but haven't they ever heard of routine maintenence? So, my thoughts are with the astronauts and their families, may they make it home safely.