Posted in Likes, Science!, tagged #365Ways, family, meteor shower, NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day on September 28, 2021| Leave a Comment »
Today’s Astronomy Photo of the Day is a video, two and a half minutes of the Perseid meteor shower as seen from the Indian Astronomical Observatory in Hanle, India.
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Watching this takes me back. We would wake up at three in the morning and head to the back yard to watch meteors burn through the atmosphere. I’d anchor myself on Orion, my first and still favorite constellation, then watch the sky for the next magical streak of green.
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Posted in Likes, Science!, tagged #365Ways, astronomy, creativity, inspiration, NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day, stars on June 24, 2021| Leave a Comment »
How are stars made? You know, those celestial bodies illuminating the sky, happily burning until they get tired of that and become star dust, the components of which we are made.
“The cosmos is also within us. We’re made of star stuff.”
— Carl Sagan
Check out this simulation of a star forge.
How do stars form? Most form in giant molecular clouds located in the central disk of a galaxy. The process is started, influenced, and limited by the stellar winds, jets, high energy starlight, and supernova explosions of previously existing stars. The featured video shows these complex interactions as computed by the STARFORGE simulation of a gas cloud 20,000 times the mass of our Sun.
— APOD: 2021 June 23 – STARFORGE
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I’m also making today, although nothing as dramatic as stars. More like yogurt, a project that required the sewing machine, and a hack for our leaky dishwasher (yes, another appliance is on the road to obsolescence; they really don’t make them like they used to).
I’m also heading into the workshop to make things out of wood. Well, to remember how to make things. And find my tools. And my respirator. And my wood turning clothes. It’s been a while (thanks, Covid)!
My projects won’t be as dynamic or lovely as a star (or Chopin’s music, for that matter).
I’ll still try.
After all, I want to do my ancestors proud.
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Posted in Likes, Science!, tagged #firefall, Horsetail, NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day, Wonder Woman, Yosemite National Park on June 8, 2017| Leave a Comment »
Another busy, busy week, but before that I had out-of-town guests, a full weekend of fun, excellent food, and (of course) Wonder Woman. And today I found this amazing image in my inbox!
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Here’s hoping that you, too, see light in the darkness.
J.R. Johnson 
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