www.space.com/missionlaun...ecycler.html

"CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Tucked away with the new hardware set to launch into space aboard NASA's shuttle Discovery on Wednesday night is a desperately-needed spare part for the International Space Station's urine recycler.

The urine recycling system, which was first delivered to the International Space Station (ISS) last November by the shuttle Endeavour, has been malfunctioning since it was installed. Though the technology may sound icky, it is considered vital for the space station to accommodate crews of six astronauts, double its current occupancy of three."

This must be the ickyest fact about permanent space travel/colonization. You have to drink preprocessed ......LOL.....urine. I'm having a hard time writing this with a straight face.

Fincke's comments:
>"This is exactly why it's good to have the space station to try these things out, rather than trying them for the first time on the moon," Fincke said. "This way, we can figure out all the little tricks and gotchas, and perfect the technology, and then we can go farther away from home."<

Gotchas? Perfect technology? Sounds like something out of Quark!
www.youtube.com/watch