Tuesday, December 12, 2006

God's Fireworks

If you can get away from city lights this Wednesday night, and into Thursday morning, "the best meteor shower of the year" will be lighting up the sky:

"It's the Geminid meteor shower," says Bill Cooke of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office in Huntsville, Alabama. "Start watching on Wednesday evening, Dec. 13th, around 9 p.m. local time," he advises. "The display will start small but grow in intensity as the night wears on. By Thursday morning, Dec. 14th, people in dark, rural areas could see one or two meteors every minute."
If my Kedley's feeling better (he's home with the flu), we just might head out to Crown Point, in the Columbia Gorge, and watch the show. Maybe you can find a dark corner of the world, too, and we can all watch it together. Wouldn't that be fun?

Update: Rats!! I just remembered to check the weather report for tomorrow night (via the fun little link to Weather Underground in the sidebar), and after remarkably clear and beautiful, albeit cold, weather last week, we have settled into a determinedly soggy spell. It's going to rain, rain, rain, thus rendering our chances to see the pretties in the sky almost nil. Hopefully you will have better viewing conditions. Let me know if you get to catch the fun. Living vicariously is now my only option.