“...all the past is but a beginning of a beginning, and that all that is and has been is but the twilight of dawn.”

— H.G. Wells
1902

Kevin's blog

John Wheeler (1911-2008)

John Wheeler, the great physicist who coined the term "black hole", passed away yesterday: http://cosmicvariance.com/2008/04/13/goodbye/

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=pioneering-physicist-john-wheeler-dies

ISS

Good pass of the space station tonight (Thu Apr. 10) at 9:11pm in the west northweest.

Saturn's Moons

Now is a good time to observe Saturn - next year the planet is headed for a ring-plane crossing so we won't get as good of a view of the rings as we do now. Here's a nifty online doo-dad that can help you observe the brighter satellites of Saturn:http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/objects/planets/3308506.html?page=1&c=y

Sunspots

Note a group of small sunspots have just come onto the disk. They're not visible to the naked eye but might be nice with a white light or H-alpha filter.

ISS & AT

Note there will be a nice pass of the ISS and the Jules Verne spacecraft tomorrow (Wednesday night).See:http://tinyurl.com/3akj65The AT (aka Jules Verne) will precede the station by a couple minutes.

Beer Commercial on the Moon

Rolling Rock is running ads telling people to go outside on March 21 to watch their logo projected on the Moon with lasers. See: www.moonvertising.com
 
Note this is a hoax. The lasers needed to bounce off the bare surface of the Moon would need to be too powerful for safe use. (The Moon's albedo is only 12%).

Test

Test blog, blah blah blah!