[When asked what he looked forward to about spending 6 months aboard the International Space Station] I look forward to getting to spend more than just a few weeks and getting comfortable enough to feel like I'm actually a resident of the cosmos, I guess you'd say, rather than just a visitor.

I...got my Naval aviator's wings on July 7th, 1989, and then went on to fly in a fighter squadron-VF-143, the world famous Pukin' Dogs is what they're called...

We have many goals on board the space station, both programmatic and personal. As far as my personal goals are concerned, my priority is that no one gets hurt, we don't break any of the space station hardware, and we meet all of the program objectives.

I chose the Navy over the Air Force because I thought landing on the ship would be harder and more challenging than landing on a runway, and I was right, and then I was a fighter pilot. I flew the F-14 Tomcat and then decided that being a test pilot was the next level of flying challenge. And then I decided, I guess a lot of guys that are test pilots put in an application to be an astronaut and thinking then of the next level would be being a pilot or commander of the space shuttle some day, and timing and preparation and luck aligned for me to get an interview and then get selected.