September - December 2009

[Natasha]

Should be a busy New Year's Eve this year.

• September 4 - Full Moon.
• September 17 - Uranus at Opposition.
• September 18 - New Moon.
• September 22 - The Autumnal Equinox occurs in the northern hemisphere at 21:18 UT. There will be equal amounts of day and night. This is also the first day of autumn.
• October 4 - Full Moon.
• October 13 - Conjunction of Venus and Saturn. The planets will appear only a half-degree apart in the early morning sky.
• October 18 - New Moon.
• October 21, 22 - Orionids Meteor Shower.
• November 2 - Full Moon.
• November 16 - New Moon.
• November 17, 18 - Leonids Meteor Shower. The Leonids produce an average of 40 meteors per hour at their peak. The shower itself has a cyclic peak year every 33 years where hundreds of meteors can be seen each hour. The last of these occurred in 2001.
• December 2 - Full Moon.
• December 13, 14 - Geminids Meteor Shower. The Geminids are known for producing up to 60 multi-coloured meteors per hour at their peak.
• December 16 - New Moon.
• December 21 - The Winter Solstice occurs in the northern hemisphere at 17:47 UT. The Sun is at its lowest point in the sky and it will be the shortest day of the year. This is also the first day of winter.
• December 31 - Full Moon and Partial Lunar Eclipse.

[skeptic]

How much is "half-degree"?

And stop talking about my anus.
It's creeping me out.

[Natasha]

A half-degree is slightly less than the width of the Full Moon. The Full Moon is approximately 0.54°.

Humour me while I indulge a little bit.

The Sun subtends approximately 0.52°. It's an amazing coincidence - assuming that you believe in coincidence - that the substention is nearly the same.

That's why solar eclipses are so interesting: the Moon almost perfectly conceals the Sun's disk (of course in addition to being slightly larger than the Moon, there is plenty of stuff coming off the Sun so that we see a sort of halo).

Also, your thumb at arm's length is approximately 0.5°.

The Moon is 380,000km from Earth. The Sun is 150,000,000km from Earth. They substend the same angle. Just try to comprehend how much larger the Sun is than the Moon. Cool stuff.

Are you still on pain meds by the way?