tbh they never actually defined how long "much longer" would be. Maybe they were basing the two words off of the course of a light year. Then that definitely wouldn't be much longer. If they were saying the deadline was 3 days into May and they were almost to the end of the second, "much longer" would seem like quite a long time. Who knows. Maybe the staff are actually aliens travelling light years through space while writing the newsletter trying to reach earth. -thinks deeply in curiosity-