Sexy e-mails might have been too much for Nowak

More on Lisa Nowak, everyone's favorite lovelorn astronaut: According to the AP, a series of steamy e-mails another woman sent to her boyfriend might have triggered her bizarre cross-country trip in early February. It seems Nowak had intercepted more that a dozen messages Air Force Capt. Colleen Shipman had sent to astronaut Bill Oefelein, including one sent to him while he was aboard the space shuttle Discovery in December: "First urge will be to rip your clothes off," Shipman wrote Oefelein. "But honestly, love, I want you to totally and thoroughly enjoy your hero's homecoming." It seems that, when Nowak found the e-mails, she decided the best course of action was to pack a knife, rubber tubing, a BB gun, a rubber mallet, gloves, a disguise and some rubber tubing and take a road trip to confront Shipman in Orlando.

That might have been part of it, but information Oefelein gave investigators gives a little more dimension to the story. Though we didn't know it when the story broke in February, Oefelein and Nowak had been romantically involved since 2004 — at least that's what he said; Nowak told police that their relationship fell somewhere between being co-workers and making intergalactic love. According to KTRK, Oefelein said he met Shipman in November and dated her and Nowak simultaneously for a couple of months; eventually, he told Nowak — who had separated from her husband of 19 years in the meantime — that he wanted to date Shipman exclusively. The weekend that Nowak drove to Florida was the first weekend Oefelein and Shipman had planned to spend together as an exclusive couple, which likely also had a lot to do with Nowak heading off to Orlando. According to police, Nowak still had Oefelein's apartment key and had written Shipman's flight information on stationery that came from his apartment; she also had a list of his computer logins and passwords.

Nowak, who is free on bail, is at home in Clear Lake but is being monitored by GPS. It's not all bad news for her, though: Over the weekend, Florida prosecutors rejected an attempted murder charge against Nowak. Of course, she still faces life in prison if she's convicted of the other charges against her, but you have to take your sunshine where you can get it.