Sorry dude, they got no slots this year, Collegeguy got the last one, reapply next year, good luck.
For interest's sake, to get Pilot/commander you need jet rating, science/engineering degree and 2 years of practice, and be able to touch your toes. For mission specialist (I think they are changing this title) you just need science/engineering degree and 2 years of practice. (to actually get a slot you have to max everything, most have PHD almost all have masters) Technically the "board" meets every 2 years, but they often cancel that meeting, and they might meet every 4 years based on who is retiring. Most astronauts do their time 'ground billet' supporting human space flight program, and even fewer of those astronauts fly. For pilot after selection you have to fly 2000 practice shuttle landings in a modified business jet trainer (the shuttle has no go around capability as it is a glider on landing, so you got to get it right the first time)
More interesting is the X Prize, which I'm sure most of you know about, which is a 10M prize for the first private team to have the capability of putting 3 people up 65 some odd miles (high atmosphere, low space) and repeat the feat in 2 weeks. The guy that built the Voyager (Burt Rutan sp?) now in the Air and Space museum, has a lil company called Scaled Composites, and have built a little space program of their own to compete for the X Prize, check out scaled it's very cool.
Also, the Hazy center,(Air and Space museum) is opening up in January I believe, Enterprise will be there (the atmospheric test shuttle) as well as allot of aerospace history. (I will be there) It's where they are going to put the aerospace history that can't fit on the mall.