Word of the day: welkin \WEL-kun\ noun: *1 a : the vault of the sky : firmament b : the celestial abode of God or the gods : heaven. 2 : the upper atmosphere.
This was my Christmas Day dinner. Its not the traditional American Christmas dinner, but since Jeff, my brother has such limited tastes and acceptance of foods, I had to make Lasagna. Holly and I also ate the same thing. As for H.R.M. Queen Halena Slopoflopolopolous, I fixed her a plate on the formal Villeroy & Boch china so that she can celebrate along with us in our meal. We had a lot of fun.
UPDATE: H.R.M. Queen Halena Slopoflopolopolous got too quickly accustomed to eating off "fine china" as now her stainless doggie dishes aren't good enough nor will she eat her special diet doggie chow! She thinks she should be fed like she was on Christmas; all the time.
NEW: Star Gazing Moon & Jupiter: Wow! Another Jovian entry. Moon and Jupiter
Getting up early on the day after Christmas is never much fun. That's especially true this year, when the day after is a Monday, and a lot of people will be heading back to work.
If you do get up early, though, there's one little treat in the pre-dawn sky: the pairing of the crescent Moon and the planet Jupiter. The duo rises several hours before the Sun, and is well up in the south-southeast at first light. Jupiter looks like a brilliant star, a little to the lower left of the Moon.
Jupiter is the biggest planet in the solar system. Yet compared to most of the planets that have been found in other star systems, Jupiter's not such a big deal.
Most of these planets are a good bit heavier than Jupiter -- some of them a dozen times Jupiter's mass or more.
No one has seen any of these planets directly, though, so we don't know exactly how large they are. But it's likely that they're made primarily of gas, like Jupiter is, so they're probably bigger than Jupiter. They may not be that much bigger, though, because as more material is piled on, gravity gets stronger. That squeezes the planet tighter, pulling the top of its atmosphere closer to its center.
Most of these planets are quite close to their stars, too, so they're much hotter than Jupiter is. That could create giant storm systems that are far more turbulent than anything yet seen on Jupiter -- the giant of our solar system.
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