May 19 Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

2022 May 19

A Digital Lunar Eclipse

Image Credit & Copyright: Michael Cain

Explanation: Recorded on May 15/16 this sequence of exposures follows the Full Moon during a total lunar eclipse as it arcs above treetops in the clearing skies of central Florida. A frame taken every 5 minutes by a digital camera shows the progression of the eclipse over three hours. The bright lunar disk grows dark and red as it glides through planet Earth’s shadow. In fact, counting the central frames in the sequence measures the roughly 90 minute duration of the total phase of this eclipse. Around 270 BC, the Greek astronomer Aristarchus also measured the duration of total lunar eclipses, but probably without the benefit of digital watches and cameras. Still, using geometry he devised a simple and impressively accurate way to calculate the Moon’s distance in terms of the radius of planet Earth, from the eclipse duration.

May 19 Today in History and the Word of the Day

Today’s Important Historical Events

1536 Anne Boleyn, second wife of English King Henry VIII, is beheaded at the Tower of London on charges of adultery, incest and treason

1643 Massachusetts Bay, Plymouth, Connecticut and New Harbor form the United Colonies of New England

1649 England is declared a Commonwealth by an act of the Rump Parliament making England a republic for the next 11 years

1885 German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck takes possession of Cameroon and Togoland

1898 US Congress passes the Private Mailing Card Act, allowing private publishers and printers to produce postcards, had to be labelled “Private Mailing Cards” until 1901, known as “souvenir cards”

1919 Mustafa Kemal Atatürk lands at Samsun on the Black Sea coast, beginning the Turkish War of Independence

Today’s Historical Events

715 St Gregory II begins his reign as Catholic Pope

1182 The high altar of Paris cathedral Notre Dame is consecrated by Cardinal Henri de Château-Marçay and Maurice de Sully

1506 Christopher Columbus selects his son Diego Columbus as sole heir

1515 George van Saksen-Meissen sells Friesland for 100,000 gold guilders to arch duke Charles

1517 Philip van Bourgondie installed as bishop of Utrecht

1518 Public unveiling of Titian’s masterpiece “Assumption of the Virgin” a painted altarpiece in the Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, Venice

1536 Anne Boleyn, second wife of English King Henry VIII, is beheaded at the Tower of London on charges of adultery, incest and treason

1547 Monarch Johan Frederik surrenders to Karel

Today’s Historical Events in Film and TV

1968 20th Emmy Awards: “Get Smart”, “Mission Impossible” & Barbara Bain win

1972 WMAV TV channel 18 in Oxford, MS (PBS) begins broadcasting

1972 25th Cannes Film Festival: “The Working Class Goes to Heaven” directed by Elio Petri and “The Mattei Affair” directed by Francesco Rosi jointly awarded the Grand Prix du Festival International du Film

1975 27th Emmy Awards: “The Mary Tyler Moore Show”, Robert Blake & Jean Marsh win

1977 Film “Smokey & the Bandit” starring Burt ReynoldsSally Field and Jackie Gleason premieres in NYC

1980 Ringo & Barbara Bach are involved in a car crash

1982 Sophia Loren jailed in Naples, Italy for tax evasion

1983 Weird Al Yankovic gives live performance at Wax Museum in Washington, D.C.

Today’s Historical Events in Music

1886 Camille Saint-Saëns’ 3rd Symphony in C premieres at St. James Hall, London, with the composer conducting

1911 Maurice Ravel‘s opera “L’Heure Espagnole” premieres at the Opéra-Comique, Paris, France

1958 “South Pacific” soundtrack album goes #1 & stays #1 for 31 weeks

1962 “Bravo, Giovanni” opens at Broadhurst Theater NYC for 76 performances

1962 “John Birch Society” by Chad Mitchell Trio hits #99

1973 “Daisy A Day” by Jud Strunk hits #14

1973 “Smith” opens at Eden Theater, NYC: runs for 17 performances

1976 Columbia Records releases “Turnstiles”, singer-songwriter Billy Joel‘s fourth studio album

Today’s Historical Events in Sports

1905 Tom Jenkins beats Frank Gotcha for heavyweight wrestling champ

1909 In his first title defence Jack Johnson fights “Philadelphia” Jack O’Brien to a no decision in 6 rounds in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to retain his world heavyweight crown

1912 AL President Ban Johnson tells Tigers if they continue protest of Ty Cobb‘s suspension, they will be banned from baseball

1923 49th Kentucky Derby: Earl Sande wins aboard Zev for his first Derby success

1928 54th Kentucky Derby: Chick Lang aboard Reigh Count wins in 2:10.4

1929 Cloudburst causes stampede in Yankee Stadium, crushes 2 people to death

1935 NFL adopts an annual college draft to begin in 1936

1941 Germany occupiers in Holland forbid bicycle taxis

Today’s Word is

Merry Andrew

Brought to you by wordoftheday.net

Merry Andrew / noun / mer·ry an·drew

“Merry Andrew” is an archaic definition we use to describe people who behave in a clownish or buffoonish fashion. This early 16th-century noun represents the silly antics or behavior of a person who others consider as being foolish and “jester-like.” Being called a “Merry Andrew” is not a compliment. Someone being called a “Merry Andrew” is being insulted and described as a fool. Merry Andrew is also the name of the 1958 American musical film directed by Michael Kidd and starring famed actor Danny Kaye.

In a Sentence

Look out, here comes that unfunny Merry Andrew from last night’s performance.

A court jester and a Merry Andrew are one and the same.

The king and queen demanded to be entertained by the local Merry Andrew.

Etymology

We saw the first use of Merry Andrew around the late 16th-century in 1670. Etymologists say the term was used to represent people who were kept around because of their entertaining qualities that regularly included them making foolish jokes and public spectacles of themselves.

Synonyms

Comedian, Jester

Antonyms

Wise, Humorless

 

830 million-year-old organisms found locked in ancient crystals could be resurrected

An interesting article that shows some of the wonders that Mother Earth/Gaia has made.

I found this on NewsBreak: 830 million-year-old organisms found locked in ancient crystals could be resurrected https://share.newsbreak.com/13s74s9x

A Laugh for Today

A Thought for Today

A HUGE hug to each of you please pass it on to a person you think needs it most. Science has proven that a 20 second hug releases great, feel-good chemicals in a person’s brain. Remember to hug your fur babies and friends too.

Until we meet again dear sisters, brothers, and honored guests may you blessed be.

May 18 Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

2022 May 18

A Jewel on the Flower Moon

Image Credit & Copyright: Tomas Slovinsky

Explanation: Cloudy skies plagued some sky watchers on Sunday as May’s Full Flower Moon slipped through Earth’s shadow in a total lunar eclipse. In skies above Chile’s Atacama desert this telephoto snapshot still captured an awesome spectacle though. Seen through thin high cirrus clouds just before totality began, a last sliver of sunlit crescent glistens like a hazy jewel atop the mostly shadowed lunar disk. This full moon was near perigee, the closest point in its elliptical orbit. It passed near the center of Earth’s dark umbral shadow during the 90 minute long total eclipse phase. Faintly suffused with sunlight scattered by the atmosphere, the umbral shadow itself gave the eclipsed moon a reddened appearance and the very dramatic popular moniker of a Blood Moon.

A Laugh for Today

It can happen when there is no alcohol too!

19 May 2022 Southern Hemisphere’s Planetary Positions Digest

If you need to calculate the planetary positions for a specific use and time, click on this link

Currentplanetarypositions.com

To figure out GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) to your local time use this link

 For Your Local Time and Date

Southeastern Hemisphere

The time for these Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Sao Paulo, Brazil, South America

19 May 2022
03:00 pm GMT 12:00 PM BRT
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:28 Taurus 37
Moon:16 Capricorn 41
Mercury:01 Gemini 57 Rx
Venus:19 Aries 31
Mars:26 Pisces 00
Jupiter:01 Aries 38
Saturn:25 Aquarius 02
Uranus:15 Taurus 37
Neptune:25 Pisces 01
Pluto:28 Capricorn 30 Rx

True Lunar Node:22 Taurus 30 Rx
Mean Lunar Node:22 Taurus 11 Rx

Lilith (Black Moon):03 Cancer 52

Chiron:14 Aries 56
Ceres:01 Cancer 47
Pallas:08 Taurus 31
Juno:09 Pisces 37
Vesta:28 Aquarius 36

Eris:24 Aries 42

Fire:4
Earth:7
Air:3
Water:5
Cardinal:8
Fixed:7
Mutable:4

Southern Hemisphere

The time for these Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Cape Town, South Africa

19 May 2022
10:00 am GMT 12:00 PM SAST
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:28 Taurus 25
Moon:13 Capricorn 36
Mercury:02 Gemini 04 Rx
Venus:19 Aries 16
Mars:25 Pisces 51
Jupiter:01 Aries 35
Saturn:25 Aquarius 02
Uranus:15 Taurus 36
Neptune:25 Pisces 01
Pluto:28 Capricorn 31 Rx

True Lunar Node:22 Taurus 30 Rx
Mean Lunar Node:22 Taurus 12 Rx

Lilith (Black Moon):03 Cancer 50

Chiron:14 Aries 55
Ceres:01 Cancer 41
Pallas:08 Taurus 25
Juno:09 Pisces 33
Vesta:28 Aquarius 32

Eris:24 Aries 42

Fire:4
Earth:7
Air:3
Water:5
Cardinal:8
Fixed:7
Mutable:4

Southwestern Hemisphere

The time for these Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia 

19 May 2022
02:00 am GMT 12:00 PM AEST
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:28 Taurus 06
Moon:08 Capricorn 40
Mercury:02 Gemini 15 Rx
Venus:18 Aries 53
Mars:25 Pisces 36
Jupiter:01 Aries 32
Saturn:25 Aquarius 01
Uranus:15 Taurus 35
Neptune:25 Pisces 01
Pluto:28 Capricorn 31 Rx

True Lunar Node:22 Taurus 31 Rx
Mean Lunar Node:22 Taurus 13 Rx

Lilith (Black Moon):03 Cancer 48

Chiron:14 Aries 54
Ceres:01 Cancer 33
Pallas:08 Taurus 16
Juno:09 Pisces 27
Vesta:28 Aquarius 26

Eris:24 Aries 42

Fire:4
Earth:7
Air:3
Water:5
Cardinal:8
Fixed:7
Mutable:4

Some of the Witchcraft/Magickal Correspondence Digest for Wednesday

 

Magickal Intentions: Communication, Divination, Writing, Knowledge, Business Transactions, Debt, Fear, Loss, Travel and Money Matters

Incense: Jasmine, Lavender, Sweet Pea

Planet: Mercury and Chiron (though this is a moon of Pluto)

Sign: Virgo

Angel: Raphael

Colors: Orange, Light Blue, Grey, Yellow and Violet

Herbs/Plants: Fern, Lavender, Hazel, Cherry, Periwinkle

Stones: Aventurine, Bloodstone, Hematite, Moss Agate and Sodalite

Oil: (Mercury) Benzoin, Clary Sage, Eucalyptus, Lavender

This day is governed by Mercury. Wednesday’s vibration adds power to rituals involving inspiration, communications, writers, poets, the written and spoken word, and all matters of study, learning, and teaching. This day also provides a good time to begin efforts involving self-improvement or understanding.

Spell for Today

 

An enchantment for your toothpaste and toothbrush to keep a bright smile on your face and ensure good luck throughout the day.

Brush my pearly whites, make them shine
To smile through troubles, to be just fine.
Show off their brilliance, each moment of the day
For I know for certain, things will go my way.

This can be used daily alongside any other incantations or enchantments.

 

–The Power of Positive Witchcraft: Daily Incantations & Enchantments: A Spell a Day for 30 Days
Garden Summerland

A Thought for Today

When doing spells for yourself set your intention that it will work just as you want it to. As you are writing the spell envision the outcome you want to happen.

Until we meet again dear sisters, brothers, and honored guests may you blessed be.

May 17, 2022 Current Moon Phase Digest

You can use this link to go forward or backward in time for Moon phase information. If you are curious, you can even find out what phase the Moon was in when you or anyone else was born.

From Moongiant.com

Today and tonight the Moon will be in a Waning Gibbous Phase. This is the first phase after the Full Moon occurs. It lasts roughly 7 days with the Moon’s illumination growing smaller each day until the Moon becomes a Last Quarter Moon with an illumination of 50%. The average Moon rise for this phase is between 9pm and Midnight depending on the age of the phase. The moon rises later and later each night setting after sunrise in the morning. During this phase the Moon can also be seen in the early morning daylight hours on the western horizon.

Visit the May 2022 Moon Phases Calendar to see all the daily moon phase for this month.

Today’s Waning Gibbous Phase

The Waning Gibbous on May 17 has an illumination of 97%. This is the percentage of the Moon illuminated by the Sun. The illumination is constantly changing and can vary up to 10% a day. On May 17 the Moon is 16.29 days old. This refers to how many days it has been since the last New Moon. It takes 29.53 days for the Moon to orbit the Earth and go through the lunar cycle of all 8 Moon phases.

The 8 Lunar Phases

There are 8 lunar phases the Moon goes through in its 29.53 days lunar cycle. The 4 major Moon phases are Full Moon, New Moon, First Quarter and Last Quarter. Between these major phases, there are 4 minor ones: the Waxing Crescent, Waxing Gibbous, Waning Gibbous and Waning Crescent. For more info on the Moon Cycle and on each phase check out Wikipedia Lunar Phase page.

Phase Details

Phase: Waning Gibbous
Illumination: 97%
Moon Age: 16.29 days
Moon Angle: 0.55
Moon Distance: 364,345.10 km
Sun Angle: 0.53
Sun Distance: 151,312,984.41 km

Useful Moon Resources

Some of the Witchcraft/Magickal Correspondence Digest for Tuesday

 

Tuesday (Tiw’s-day)

Planet: Mars

Colors: Red and Autumn Shades

Crystals: Bloodstone, Ruby, Garnet, Flint, Rhodonite, Iron and Steel

Aroma: Basil, Ginger, Black Pepper, Mars Oil, Dragon’s blood and patchouli

Herb: Basil

The day of Mars. This day could only ever symbolize the sheer power of the god of war! The ideal spells to be cast on this day are that of force, power war and protection.

Dedicated to the powers of the planet Mars, personified as Ares, Tiwaz, Tiw, and Tyr.

Magical aspects: controlled power, energy, and endurance, passion, sex, courage, aggression, and protection.

This is the proper day of the week to perform spells and rituals involving courage, physical strength, revenge, military honors, surgery, the breaking of negative spells, dynamic energy, matrimony, war, enemies, prison, hunting, politics, contests, protection, victory, and athletics.

Spell for Today – Printable

May 17 Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

2022 May 17

NGC 1316: After Galaxies Collide

Image Credit & Copyright: Capture: Greg TurgeonProcessing: Kiko Fairbairn

Explanation: Astronomers turn detectives when trying to figure out the cause of startling sights like NGC 1316. Investigations indicate that NGC 1316 is an enormous elliptical galaxy that started, about 100 million years ago, to devour a smaller spiral galaxy neighbor, NGC 1317, just on the upper right. Supporting evidence includes the dark dust lanes characteristic of a spiral galaxy, and faint swirls and shells of stars and gas visible in this wide and deep image. One thing that >remains unexplained is the unusually small globular star clusters, seen as faint dots on the image. Most elliptical galaxies have more and brighter globular clusters than NGC 1316. Yet the observed globulars are too old to have been created by the recent spiral collision. One hypothesis is that these globulars survive from an even earlier galaxy that was subsumed into NGC 1316. Another surprising attribute of NGC 1316, also known as Fornax A, is its giant lobes of gas that glow brightly in radio waves.

Greek Temples of Sicily

There are at least a thousand reasons to visit Sicily, the great island – indeed the largest in the Mediterranean – that forms the triangular football to the boot that is the Italian peninsula. They are all very good reasons, including amazing landscapes, a uniquely complex and delicious cuisine, a history that is diverse and multifaceted beyond belief, excellent wines, a vast array of archaeological sites, an even vaster one of historical towns and villages. But one key reason to visit the island is missing from the list above: Greek temples!

Greek temples are one of the earliest well-defined expressions of what we now recognise as the Western tradition in architecture, and one of the most influential ones by a vast margin to this day. They go back to the 8th or 7th centuries BCE, and, as the name entails, they are indeed a key achievement of the Archaic Greeks. They originated in what is the south of modern Greece, namely the Peloponnese and Central Greece, where Greek temple architecture appears to have its main roots, probably derived from local wooden predecessors.

The Greek mainland’s architectural style is the Doric one, considered to be the most austere and ‘male’ in character. The eastern Aegean and Asia Minor were famous for their own development, the more elegant and ‘female’ Ionic style, conceived about a century after the Doric one. Its most prominent examples at SamosEphesus, and Didyma (much better preserved than the other two) are also marked by their …

 

Click here to read the rest of this article

A Laugh for Today

Wishing you a fantastic Tuesday!

18 May 2022 Southern Hemisphere’s Planetary Positions Digest

If you need to calculate the planetary positions for a specific use and time, click on this link

Currentplanetarypositions.com

To figure out GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) to your local time use this link

 For Your Local Time and Date

Southeastern Hemisphere

The time for these Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Sao Paulo, Brazil, South America

18 May 2022
03:00 pm GMT 12:00 PM BRT
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:27 Taurus 40
Moon:01 Capricorn 51
Mercury:02 Gemini 29 Rx
Venus:18 Aries 21
Mars:25 Pisces 15
Jupiter:01 Aries 27
Saturn:25 Aquarius 00
Uranus:15 Taurus 34
Neptune:25 Pisces 00
Pluto:28 Capricorn 31 Rx

True Lunar Node:22 Taurus 31 Rx
Mean Lunar Node:22 Taurus 15 Rx

Lilith (Black Moon):03 Cancer 45

Chiron:14 Aries 53
Ceres:01 Cancer 22
Pallas:08 Taurus 04
Juno:09 Pisces 19
Vesta:28 Aquarius 17

Eris:24 Aries 42

Fire:4
Earth:7
Air:3
Water:5
Cardinal:8
Fixed:7
Mutable:4

Southern Hemisphere

The time for these Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Cape Town, South Africa

18 May 2022
10:00 am GMT 12:00 PM SAST
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:27 Taurus 28
Moon:28 Sagittarius 44
Mercury:02 Gemini 35 Rx
Venus:18 Aries 07
Mars:25 Pisces 06
Jupiter:01 Aries 24
Saturn:25 Aquarius 00
Uranus:15 Taurus 33
Neptune:25 Pisces 00
Pluto:28 Capricorn 31 Rx

True Lunar Node:22 Taurus 31 Rx
Mean Lunar Node:22 Taurus 15 Rx

Lilith (Black Moon):03 Cancer 44

Chiron:14 Aries 53
Ceres:01 Cancer 17
Pallas:07 Taurus 58
Juno:09 Pisces 15
Vesta:28 Aquarius 13

Eris:24 Aries 42

Fire:5
Earth:6
Air:3
Water:5
Cardinal:7
Fixed:7
Mutable:5

Southwestern Hemisphere

The time for these Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia 

18 May 2022
02:00 am GMT 12:00 PM AEST
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:27 Taurus 08
Moon:23 Sagittarius 45
Mercury:02 Gemini 45 Rx
Venus:17 Aries 43
Mars:24 Pisces 51
Jupiter:01 Aries 21
Saturn:25 Aquarius 00
Uranus:15 Taurus 32
Neptune:24 Pisces 59
Pluto:28 Capricorn 31 Rx

True Lunar Node:22 Taurus 31 Rx
Mean Lunar Node:22 Taurus 16 Rx

Lilith (Black Moon):03 Cancer 41

Chiron:14 Aries 52
Ceres:01 Cancer 08
Pallas:07 Taurus 49
Juno:09 Pisces 09
Vesta:28 Aquarius 07

Eris:24 Aries 41

Fire:5
Earth:6
Air:3
Water:5
Cardinal:7
Fixed:7
Mutable:5

A Thought for Today

Until we meet again dear sisters, brothers, and honored guests may you blessed be.

May 16, 2022 Current Moon Phase Digest

You can use this link to go forward or backward in time for Moon phase information. If you are curious, you can even find out what phase the Moon was in when you or anyone else was born.

From Moongiant.com

Today and tonight the Moon will be in a Full Moon phase. During a Full Moon the moon is 100% illuminated as seen from Earth and is on the opposite side of the Earth from the Sun. The Moon will be visible throughout the night sky rising at sunset in the east and setting with the sunrise the next morning. The point at which a Full Moon occurs can be measured down to a fraction of a second. The time it takes between full moons is known as a Synodic month and is 29.530587981 days long. Keep track of all the Full Moons throughout the year on the Full Moon Calendar >

Visit the May 2022 Moon Phases Calendar to see all the daily moon phase for this month.

Today’s Full Moon Phase

The Full Moon on May 16 has an illumination of 100%. This is the percentage of the Moon illuminated by the Sun. The illumination is constantly changing and can vary up to 10% a day. On May 16 the Moon is 15.14 days old. This refers to how many days it has been since the last New Moon. It takes 29.53 days for the Moon to orbit the Earth and go through the lunar cycle of all 8 Moon phases.

The 8 Lunar Phases

There are 8 lunar phases the Moon goes through in its 29.53 days lunar cycle. The 4 major Moon phases are Full Moon, New Moon, First Quarter and Last Quarter. Between these major phases, there are 4 minor ones: the Waxing Crescent, Waxing Gibbous, Waning Gibbous and Waning Crescent. For more info on the Moon Cycle and on each phase check out Wikipedia Lunar Phase page.

Phase Details

Phase: Full Moon
Illumination: 100%
Moon Age: 15.14 days
Moon Angle: 0.54
Moon Distance: 366,501.06 km
Sun Angle: 0.53
Sun Distance: 151,281,765.97 km

Useful Moon Resources