Fun With Stars

I had not intended to write anything today, but sometimes the daily blog reading is just too much fun and I find stuff I want to share.

For starters, it's Johannes Keppler's birthday! "Well, whoopdeedooo," you might say. Well, some of you will be happy to learn that you can blame him for my astronomy habit. He figured out the orbits of the planets, made spiffy telescope eyepieces to increase their field of view, and he designed eyeglasses. See, all his fault. The article to which I've pointed is well-written, short and well worth a read. I like the Universe Today blog in general because it tends to have good astronomy material. And their podcasts are great. I listened to their recent one about Mercury last night and learned a lot.

Another of my favorite astronomy blogs is Bad Astronomy. I've been bummed that the San Jose library system doesn't have one single copy of Phil Plait's book, and finally bought a copy for myself today. Maybe I'll get to donate it to the library when I'm done with it. Dunno. At any rate, he recently pointed to an opportunity to vote for your favorite Cassini pictures. (Cassini is hanging around over dare by Saturn.) Follow the links, there's some cool stuff! Also, if you'd like a nice annotated selection of great astronomy pictures from this year, have a look at his top ten list.

If you haven't already, take a gander at the list of "Astronomers and Atheists" on my sidebar. There is some fun reading to be done!