My internal alarm clock went off at 1:15 this morning--time for the Great Astronomer to get up and view an event that had not taken place since the year 1638 and wouldn't happen again until 2094: a lunar eclipse on the winter solstice!
On went the jacket, slippers, eyeglasses, and out I went to the patio, but I had barely eased into a chair before I was joined by Big Bore, trailing behind, also wanting to see this once-in-a-lifetime event.
We were expecting to see this blood red orb in the sky, as pictured in the newspaper, but, to tell you the truth, it wasn't much different than other lunar eclipses we've seen--just maybe a slight tinge of orange, but mostly a black shadow. The conversation soon turned to other astronomical phenomena:
"Isn't there a song about an eclipse?" I asked Big Bore.
"Yeah, I think so," he said, but not offering any suggestions.
"Is it 'Dark Side of the Moon'? Pink Floyd? No, that's not it. The title has the word 'eclipse' in it."
"Oh, you're thinking of 'Total Eclipse of the Sun.' Meatloaf," Dr. Bore said. (After getting the rest of his night's sleep, he told me 'Sun' should be 'Heart.')
"That's it!" And I started humming the tune. "You are a mental giant."
I took some so-so pictures of the moon, went back inside to get our field binoculars for a better view, and we spoke to Orion, who faded out as the eclipse grew. We thought maybe the moon shadow might get redder as it got fuller, but it didn't, so we finally decided we'd seen all we wanted to see. Time to get out of the cold and get back to bed.
"Vini. Vidi. Vici. We came. We saw. We conquered," I lazily proclaimed. "Happy Winter Solstice. Happy Polar Eclipse."
"It's solar, not polar," BB corrected.
"Lunar," I corrected back.
"Whatever."
The brains of great astronomers don't function too well at 2 AM....or at 2 PM, for that matter.
2 comments:
Hi, I'm Patty - Bill's and Janet's friend? I hope you don't mind me commenting on your blog. I read it all the time, and want to comment, but I never do. However, I just had to on this one. I went out at 2:30, and it was still just a shadow - not a large red orb like I had expected, too. So, it's a good thing you went back to bed, as you didn't miss anything. Oh well, at least we can say we 'saw' it! :)
Hi, Patty. Well, at least BB and I know that our eyes aren't as weak as our brains, if someone else saw exactly what we did!
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