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Category Archives: Astronomy
Fall ’22 has arrived!
For Austin, it means we’ll only be somewhat, unbearably hot. Nah! I will never trade it in for Midwestern Winters and I say it’s practice for being accustomed to the world being that horrific +3-4° C higher than it used … Continue reading
RIP Dr. Frank Drake
Dr. Frank Drake passed away last Friday and he’s pretty famous to me and to many in Astronomy circles, namely for his equation that postulates the possibility of life on other planets in our galaxy. Translated into English or layman’s … Continue reading
Posted in Astronomy, Science & Technology
Tagged Celebrity Obituary, Seventies, Sixties
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1972: First Leap Second added to UTC system
We must be getting better at this because I haven’t seen warnings at work about this happening in a some years. All our computers, phones, tablets, GPS systems and whatever need to know the exact time down to probably millionths of … Continue reading
My arguments about DST got partial traction!
Well…if you read the article from the most trusted publication these days, The Guardian, it seems the US Senate is oddly in agreement to making DST permanent, which I think it should be. As depressing as it is getting up and … Continue reading
How Daylight Savings Time feels for about two weeks
It’s baaaaaack! The idiocy of us setting our clocks forward to “save” something other than stress, sleep, time, etc. Once again it is my bi-annual diatribe on why this shit needs to end but I did do some poking around … Continue reading
This month’s Astronomy joke
Yes, I know. If a joke requires the recipient to think about it too long, then it’s either not funny or the audience is dumb. I side with the latter camp since everyone should know this regarding the famous constellation. … Continue reading
Earth reaches its 2022 perihelion!
Despite it being Winter in the Northern Hemisphere and colder than Hell lately, Earth passed through its closest point to the Sun. I always thought this coincided with the Winter Solstice back in December but that is when our planet’s … Continue reading
Italian #57: Licia Troisi
For starters, her name is pronounced LEE-cha TRO-easy, not, what I’m predicting from lazy American English, LEE-sia TROY-see. I’m also going to be upfront, I don’t know much about Mrs. Troisi other than I was thrilled to find a person … Continue reading
Made it to the Solstice 2021
Jennifer isn’t a fan of the Sun since she prefers to hit the sack around the same time old people prefer to. It’s mostly due to her job as a nurse; she wakes around 3:30 AM and shows up by … Continue reading
RIP Michael Collins
I’m glad that when the show For All Mankind covered the Apollo XI landing, they kept the names of the real astronauts, including the late Michael Collins who would then be in the alternate universe’s Apollo XV (sic) disaster…spoiler alert, he survived. Rather sucks. … Continue reading
Posted in Astronomy, Science & Technology
Tagged Celebrity Obituary, Cold War, NASA, Sixties, The Moon
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Octavia Butler gets some overdue love!
Although it will require the International Astronomical Union to make it official, the brilliant people at NASA have named/dedicated Perseverance‘s landing site to Sci-Fi author Octavia Butler. It’s a shame she didn’t live to receive this, she passed away in 2006. … Continue reading
Martian sunset or sunrise?
Somebody posted this on Twitter. It’s probably from a probe with functioning cameras. The three bright dots in the Martian sky are Venus, Earth and Jupiter. Given that Mars’ atmosphere is one percent the density of ours, it’s probably easier … Continue reading
If alien civilizations exist, we may not hear each other
Two Scientists (I couldn’t get their specialities) have taken Drake’s Equation further and have concluded that between four to 211 other SETI-capable civilizations may be present in the Milky Way. They did come to 36 as the most likely number. Sounds … Continue reading
Space X must’ve docked
The news has been riddled with more riots over the unnecessary murder of George Floyd and since American Media goes with if it bleeds, it leads…everything went according to plan with Space X docking at ISS. At least one funny thing … Continue reading
Space X was successful, part one
The rocket is on its way to put the two astronauts into orbit, this only takes less than 20 minutes. Now will come the tense 19 hours for the capsule to sync up with the ISS and succeed at docking. … Continue reading