There is gathering evidence that the third moon I mentioned earlier is in fact "the Apollo 12 S-IVB third stage, which was left in a distant Earth orbit after it was launched on November 14, 1969 and passed the Moon four days later." According to this article, that rocket stage escaped Earth orbit via a 'portal' aligned with the L1 Lagrange point in 1971, and has returned by a similar mechanism.
It now appears likely that the object will escape back into solar orbit in June 2003 after its brief six-orbit visit to our planet. In 30 years time the Earth may once again capture J002E3 for another brief tour around its home planet.
Ain't physics grand?
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