How do you like your moon?

Round and dazzling (when you have to worry about werewolves howling all thru the night):




Or thin and crescent (when it's a spectacle only at tea time):

Round and dazzling--it seems more romantic.

11/14/2010

I love it large and when you drive at night it seems
to follow you. I'm waiting for the next one so I can
photograph it..

Cheers..Joe

Harvest Moon.
It's really big and seems to shrink mysteriously as it rises.

"...reminds me of the story about the court jester who catches the moon for the child princess in the branches of a tree..." mentioned the goblin, adding "...satisfied, she at last stops her crying, and then goes back to killing zombies on the PS3 again happy ever after..."

I love it when the moon is full and it brightens up my whole backyard where I can thoroughly enjoy it while relaxing in the hot tub!

I like the moon in any phase, as long as it is with something else to give it some "atmosphere".
Swirling mist on a foggy night when it shines through a maple tree... with falling leaves in the foreground, is how it was the other night. Beautiful!

Turns coppery red during a lunar eclipse... but those are pretty rare. Last one I saw was back in the 90s, though there have been a few more recently in different parts of the world:

Ahad,

How gorgeous! Thank you, I am going to copy that!

Strange as it might seem - this actually happened

One evening around 5 PM my wife Patty and I were driving eastward on a rural Michigan road when all of a sudden the moon appeared before us. It was tangent to the road and went fence line to fence line.

The road right-away was sixty-six feet plus there was at least 20 feet on either side to the fence line. So in total the moon appeared to be one hundred and six feet in diameter.

All traffic stopped - as we sat there in awe. It lasted about 15 minutes - all the while we were able to see the craters and other features. No camera of course! Where is one when you need it?

When this occurred, it was visible to drivers going both east and west! Some day when humanity rids itself of denial perhaps we'll learn how to produce it at will -

Simulation
/

/
James
/

When I lived on the sailboat, far from any lights but God's own creations, the full moon was so bright on the white deck that I could read by the moon. It wasn't perfect; but the novelty of it was worth the eye strain :-)

Last night, the sun was setting as the full moon was rising. That's my favorite time. The moon loomed large on the horizon, tinged golden from the setting sun. I remember the first time I ever observed a setting sun and rising full moon at the same time was in Puerto Rico and I, too, stopped the car to turn my head right and left for the wonderful effect.

Blue. In E-flat.

James wrote:

All traffic stopped - as we sat there in awe. It lasted about 15 minutes - all the while we were able to see the craters and other features. No camera of course! Where is one when you need it?

All those cars and no cell phones? Hmm.

I just received an e-mail bulletin from the BAA about a forthcoming lunar eclipse on the morning of the solstice:

======================================================================
BAA electronic bulletin
======================================================================
BAA e-bulletin, 2010 Dec. 19
GET UP EARLY FOR THIS MONTH'S LUNAR ECLIPSE

Early this Tuesday morning, on 21 December, the day of the winter solstice,
there will be a total eclipse of the Moon. The Moon first enters the outer,
penumbral part of the Earth's shadow at 05:29 UT, and the partial eclipse
begins at 06:32 UT. The eclipse first becomes total at 07:40 UT, reaches
maximum at 08:17 UT, and ends at 08:53 UT.

The entire eclipse will be visible after local midnight from Canada, the
USA, central America and the north-western tip of South America. The eclipse
occurs at the Moon's descending node in eastern Taurus, four days before
perigee. The Moon will be full at 08:13 UT. Further information on this
eclipse may be found at:

http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/OH/OH2010.html#LE2010Dec21T

>From southern parts of the British Isles, the initial umbral phases will be
visible, but the Moon will be dropping down into the western sky as dawn
approaches. From such locations, when totality begins at 07:40 UT, the Moon
will be very low in the west-north-western sky, close to the horizon and in
a rapidly brightening sky. From locations in Scotland and Northern Ireland,
totality will be visible in its entirety, but the Moon will be low down
after the time of greatest eclipse (08:17 UT).

>From London, sunrise is at 08:04 UT with moonset just seven minutes later.
The table below lists the times of moonset for various locations in the
British Isles:

Location Moonset (UT)

Brighton 08:08
London 08:11
Bristol 08:21
Birmingham 08:25
Swansea 08:28
York 08:30
Liverpool 08:35
Newcastle-upon-Tyne 08:39
Dublin 08:48
Belfast 08:55
Glasgow 08:57
Aberdeen 08:58

The umbral phase lasts from 06:32 UT until 10:01 UT. During totality, the
Moon tracks through the northern part of the Earth's umbral shadow, so for
those observers watching it high up in a clear sky, the southern half of the
totally eclipsed Moon will most likely appear considerably darker than the
northern part.

One never quite knows how dark or how bright a lunar eclipse will be.
Everything depends on the conditions in the Earth's upper atmosphere through
which all light falling onto the shadowed Moon has to pass. There have been
eclipses when the Moon has been difficult to find even with a telescope,
while at other eclipses it has remained bright red or vividly coloured.

For observers in the British Isles, the very low elevation of the Moon
during the total phase means that it is not possible to predict the exact
brightness distribution in the umbra, so observers are encouraged to
estimate the brightness using the Danjon scale at different times during
totality. Note that it may also be necessary to assign different Danjon
values to different portions of the Moon (i.e., north vs. south).

For an explanation of the Danjon scale of lunar eclipse brightness visit:
http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/OH/OHres/Danjon.html

The 2010 December 21 total lunar eclipse belongs to Saros 125, a series of
72 eclipses in the following sequence: 17 penumbral, 13 partial, 26 total, 9
partial, and 7 penumbral lunar eclipses.

There will be two total lunar eclipses in 2011, on 15 June and 10 December,
but neither will be visible in its entirety from the British Isles.

The BAA Lunar Section will be pleased to receive observations of the lunar
eclipse. See the Section's webpage at http://www.baalunarsection.org.uk/
for more details.


John Mason
BAA Press and Publicity Officer
email: docjohn@dircon.co.uk

Take many pictures, Ahad.

I look forward to your report.