Welcome to the Ars Mailbag, where we open a tiny porthole into the insanity that is life aboard the Ars Orbiting HQ. We love our readers and pride ourselves on one of the smartest audiences and best comment sections on the Web. That said, we do get the occasional e-mail telling us that Donald Trump is going to Make the Moon Great Again. From Eric Berger's inbox:

Eric, your suggestion that Hillary Clinton might "pivot" NASA back to the Moon is ludicrous! FACT: Only Trump will ensure America returns to the Moon, quickly. I have personal, direct knowledge of this fact. Interview him and ask him yourself, dig a little deeper! Even if Hillary proposed a return to the Moon, she will NEVER get my vote...ever! She has been, and continues to be, part of the problem! Trump is going to win in a landslide! Not speculation, FACT!

Given this writer's obvious prophetic gifts, we've reached out to ask when it will finally be the year of Linux on the desktop.

Paradise Earth

Speaking of space exploration, this e-mail came in to "young man" Annalee Newitz after her recent piece on Martian colonization.

Young man it’s your grand kids and their kids that are going to be figuring out how to undo everything that our generation, our parents and our grandparents generations have created in their so called quest for human progress. I hope you put your brilliant minds toward trying to understand what makes our own planet tic instead of wasting time and treasure trying to figure out how to colonize the desolate rock piles in our solar system. When are we going to realize that the grass is not greener on the other side. We live on a paradise planet and don’t even know it.

A fair point. Going to Mars certainly won't be cheap or easy. And we’re sure that when Elon Musk’s rocket eventually blasts off, this guy will be there to watch, angrily shaking his fist at it.

Spying on the babymama

Not all e-mails are full of FACTS or advice. Sometimes, we get questions. Unusual questions. This one came to me—and after writing about password cracking a couple years back, I receive these with some regularity.

Hi. This is such a desperate move but i need to know my bf's new fb password..i guessed his old password right...the reason i am doing this is because i wanna know what him and his ex/babymama talk about..

We can't hack Facebook accounts (sorry!), but if I had to put on my Ann Landers advice hat, I'd say: ask your boyfriend what he and his ex talk about! If he won't show you the conversations, consider more trustworthy boyfriend options.

“Stupid dumb crab”

Lee Hutchinson recently made fun of astrology—but not everyone was amused.

It's bad enough we have to read that our astrological signs are being changed around and messed with. No one wants to change there sign, especially if you believe in you sign. I'm a Cancer and unfortunately so is Lee H. He jumped from being an arrogant Leo to a “stupid dumb crab” (his words). It's bad enough that we live in such a judgmental world, I also have to be judged and called names when trying to read information and stay updated. I am far from stupid and for an editor to allow him to call every cancer on earth stupid is stupid of him/her. I will continue to write letters until he apologizes. If he's so unhappy being a cancer he can continue being a Leo, no one is forcing him to be a Cancer but he feels he's obligated to disrespect all Cancers on Earth. You don't have to disrespect people to write a good article. I'm a writer as well and choose my words wisely because words are very powerful if you use them correctly. This was the first article I read on this new change and to read that Cancers are dumb and stupid all over the page and pictures is point blank wrong. If your paying Google for your article to be first, at least let it not be offensive. I will forever remain a Cancer and I will be forever seeking knowledge and the truth behind it. There's is no truth to Cancers being stupid. I don't think I need to show you some amazing life changing Cancers we have in this world. Stupid and sensitive are two totally different words.

Thanks for defending the intelligence of Cancers everywhere, e-mailer. We’ve spoken to Lee about this piece and he became morose and apologetic, then he locked himself in his office and started listening to The Cure. Which is exactly what a Cancer would do. Stupid crab.

Live your work

Some of our e-mails are more cryptic, such as this one to writer Megan Geuss, which said in totality:

Hi Megan, I'm your biggest fan

(The subject line was "Live your work," which might either be a typo or a motivational slogan.)

Creepy or inspiring? No one's quite sure...

Uncle Dave

And once in a while, we inspire genealogical connections, as this e-mail to policy editor David Kravets shows:

Greetings David—this is going to sound weird, but every time I see your picture on an Ars post, it always makes me wonder if you we're related somehow. You look almost *exactly* like my uncle.

Sadly, they are not related; Dave asked his mom.

Farming on Mars

The random e-mails are all worth it, however, when an insightful missive lands in our inboxes. This one came as a response to Annalee Newitz's piece on Martian colonization and the need for sound ecological science.

I just wanted to make a few quick comments: [1] I suspect that – in the beginning -- colonizing Mars will be more analogous to the Roanoke Colony in N. Carolina (and a *lot* less like pioneering in Texas). We all know how Roanoke turned out. [2] First, some background: My wife and I have a lot of “hands on” experience working at farming and ranching (going back to when we were children, up to the present day). In addition, my wife has degrees in Geology and Biology, and I have degrees in Geophysics and Space Physics. We have both done extensive field work around the world, often in places so hostile humans cannot survive without a massive support system (such as McMurdo Antarctica, for instance). We have also brought home our share of extremely nasty pathogens and parasites, some that required years to treat. From our perspective, all of the Mars colonization proposals we have looked at seem naive, in that they fail to take into account the many severe risks associated with farming and ranching here on Earth (which will be greatly magnified in the confined environments of any “off earth” colony). Can you say “Hypersensitivity pneumonitis,” for instance ? Since it will be all but impossible to get humans completely clean of parasites, bacteria, molds, various “bugs” [like skin mites] and viruses before transporting them “off world” to various colonies, how will the colonists deal with imported disease pathogens ? [3] I’ve spent decades working in the field of submarine engineering. All the hazards that are associated with confining large numbers of people in the confined spaces of a typical nuclear submarine will apply to any “off earth” colonies. Of course, NASA has acquired an enormous amount of information on environmental issues keeping people alive for long durations in space (and worked out solutions as well). But most of this involves low-orbit platforms like the ISS, where the “solution” to many life threatening problems is to schedule a re-supply rocket or return the station astronauts to earth. That type of “solution” is not going to be available on Mars… [4] Food diversity on off-world colonies is going to be a major problem for the colonists. No one in their right mind is going to try and survive off of just potatoes (and what about the leaves, which are deadly poisonous?). Of course, the colonists could try and ranch chickens and ducks for proper protein – But *that* won’t happen until a significant amount of acreage has been planted and harvested *first*. Out here on the Tughill Wilderness Zone of Upstate New York, we hunt deer, raise “chickens, ducks and geese”, and fish day & night [even in the Winter]. Nature provides us our “backup protein supply” when Walmart is not available. I’d like to see how that works out on Mars…

Thanks! We love our readers and the huge variety of things they do and know.

“Bone of chichimec”

We have to conclude this dive into the mailbag with this guy—or girl, who knows—and his terrifying description of macrofauna and... and other things? We have no idea what’s going on here, but it sounds apocalyptic: