Mon Mar 9, 2026 THE STARS OF THE PHARAOHS
Of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, only the Great Pyramid of Khufu still stands. Its four sides are aligned with the compass directions of North, South, East and West. Near the pyramid there is the statue of the Great Sphinx, a lion’s body with a human face. It also faces toward the east, toward the rising sun. It is said that the sphinx represents the combined constellations of Leo the Lion and Virgo the Maiden. And the Great Pyramid, along with other pyramids nearby, seem to align with the positions of the three stars in the belt of Orion the Hunter, known to the Pharaohs as the mythical god Osiris. In ancient Egypt, the moon was called the left eye of Horus; his right eye was the sun. And three planets were identified with this son of Osiris. Mars was called Horus the Red; Jupiter was named Horus who Limits Two Lands; and Saturn was Horus the bull.
Tue Mar 10, 2026 DIRT ON THE MOON
Dirt on the moon has a fancy name, it’s called regolith. Where’d all this dirt come from? Now, dirt on the earth is made by the action of wind, water, ice, plants, and animals, which break up rocks into smaller chunks. But there’s no air or water flowing on the moon, so how come there’s dirt? The moon is constantly being bombarded by rocks and dust in space. Because there’s no air, there’s nothing to stop this dust, traveling at a hundred thousand miles an hour or faster, to hit the moon and pulverize its surface. It’s like sandblasting – lots of micrometeorite bombardments that earth doesn’t experience, thanks to our atmosphere, which simply makes the dust vaporize high up, lighting up the sky where they become shooting stars.
Wed Mar 11, 2026 WHY DOESN’T POLARIS MOVE?
Earth’s north pole points toward the star Polaris. As the earth rotates, stars rise out of the east and set in the west. But Polaris doesn’t move. It’s like spinning a basketball. There’s only one other place to put a second finger on the ball and not disrupt rotation, and that’s the top of the ball. Now think of standing on the top of the earth. Look straight up. Instead of a giant finger, you’ll see a star. That’s Polaris, and it appears on the zenith, 90 degrees overhead, from the Earth’s north pole, which is at 90 degrees North latitude. If you slide down the Earth, then the North Star Polaris slides downward: at 45 degrees North latitude, Polaris is halfway up the north sky. But if you go to the equator, 0 degrees, then Polaris is on the north horizon, and you can’t see it.
Thu Mar 12, 2026 URANUS AND PLUTO DISCOVERIES
On March 13, 1781, the planet Uranus was discovered by William Herschel. Using a telescope he had built himself, Herschel became the first person in history to discover another planet too faint to be seen with the unaided eye. About a hundred and fifty years after this, Arizona’s Lowell Observatory announced the discovery of another planet. It had been found by a young observatory assistant, Clyde Tombaugh, and was named Pluto. In 2006 an international group of astronomers took a vote, demoting Pluto to dwarf planet status, but the American Astronomical Society opposes the idea and considers it a third class of planet, an ice dwarf or Plutoid. In 2015, the New Horizons space probe flew past Pluto and radioed back some incredible images of this distant world and its moons.
Fri Mar 13, 2026 CAESAR AND THE IDES OF MARCH
Sunday is the Ides of March, that is, March 15th. On this day in 44 BC, Julius Caesar was assassinated, and we think of Shakespeare’s play, in which Caesar is warned to beware the Ides of March. What are the Ides? The Romans divided their calendar month into three parts, with three specific days serving as benchmarks, based on the phases of the moon. The first day of the month, marked by the new moon, was called the Kalends (from which we get the word calendar;) A week later came the first quarter moon and the Nones; and the middle of the month, the 13th day or in some cases, the 15th, when the moon was full - that was the Ides. These terms are not familiar to us today, but they were well-known to the Romans, and also to Europeans in Shakespeare’s time.
