Monday, December 1, 2008

Look up and be surprised.....

Every once in a while, something appears in the night sky that attracts
the attention of even those who normally don't bother looking up.
It was that way on my way home from work tonight.
I had heard the night before the weather man saying
something about an 'upside down frownie' is what to
look for. Well!! There it was ..


A slender crescent moon, about 15 percent illuminated
in very close proximity to the two brightest planets in our sky,
Venus and Jupiter.
Here you can see the full globe of the moon, its darkened portion glowing
with a bluish-gray hue interposed between the sunlit
crescent and not much darker sky. This vision is sometimes called
"the old moon in the young moon's arms." Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519)
was the first to recognize it as what we now call "earthshine"
I was glad I took one picture in Aperture Priority because
it shows just that.

Space.com / Starry Night Software Picture from MSNBC

Sometimes I do look up to see something other than birds.

To God be The Glory ~~ Great Things He Hath Done.

8 comments:

Ruth's Photo Blog said...

The beauty in the heavens is awesome.Our skies were cloudy last night so we didn't get to see this,maybe tonight.

NCmountainwoman said...

This celestial show is always beautiful. Great photos.

Peggy said...

I had heard about the "smiley" in Australia, and thought about looking last night for what I might see here, but forgot...Thanks for showing me what I would have seen! "Frowny" Very cool!

Tina said...

Wow, sooo glad you looked up and after a full day's work you stopped and took those pictures. Thanks, enjoyed your post a lot! :)

Eve said...

Cool Jalynne,
My husband mentioned this...I'll have to take a peak tonight..hope it's not too late.

Shelley said...

I have never seen the moon like that - loved this!

Craig Glenn said...

Jalynne,

can you help with an ID? see my latest hawk post...

Thanks,
Craig

The Birdlady said...

Oh, we saw that too! Wasn't it glorious? I made some photos too, but we couldn't get to a place where we had a clear shot of all three.

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