You Are Here

Click to enlarge.

This is the current map of the Milky Way, as best we can make it out from our viewpoint inside. Our home galaxy has about 200 billion to perhaps 500 billion other stars beside our own. Orbiting them are billions to trillions of planets and moons. And that’s just one of billions of galaxies in the universe.

We cannot take pictures of our galaxy, so this image is a model. It is based primarily on results from the Galactic Legacy Infrared Mid-Plane Survey Extraordinaire (GLIMPSE) and the Multiband Imaging Photometer for Spitzer Galactic Plane Survey (MIPSGAL). Both are key projects for the infrared Spitzer Space Telescope. This particular image was released on June 3, 2008 at the 212th meeting of the American Astronomical Society.

I hope your head is spinning. (It should be).

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Never Will I Falter

America’s entire East Coast is under assault from “Frankenstorm” Sandy tonight.

All of New York is shut down, partially flooded, and half the city has lost power. Nine state governors have declared emergencies and millions of residents are without electricity and under evacuation orders.

In the middle of all this, a sleeper story of human resilience and determination has taken the social media by storm.

Since midnight of July 2, 1937, the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery has been guarded around the clock, without any interruptions. In 1948, guard duty was assigned to the U.S. Army’s 3rd Infantry Regiment, also known as “The Old Guard“. Since then, they have been true to their credo to “never falter”. Never have the remains of the soldiers buried at the tomb been left alone.

On their Twitter feed and Facebook page, the Old Guard has made it clear that come Sandy, they have no intention of abandoning their post. Their Facebook statement from Monday reads:

“The Sentinels at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier maintain their vigil even as Hurricane Sandy bears down on the Eastern Seaboard. The Old Guard has guarded the tomb every minute of every day since April 6, 1948. Today will be no exception.”

The message widely resonated in a nation full of doubt, uncertainty and crisis. And now, as the outpouring of encouraging social media postings indicates, the Old Guard clearly have a cross section of America high-fiving and rooting for them.

Here is a photo taken during a storm last month. (I could not determine who the photographer was. Internet users have mistakenly connected the picture with Sandy).

Inspiring indeed!

The Old Guard on Twitter
The Old Guard on Facebook

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Akina

She was the best Christmas gift ever,
every day for 12 years and 191 days,
the most wonderful companion.

She was the best cat in the world.

Words cannot describe the sadness
she left behind.

A photo album in rememberance.

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Walter Cronkite Biography

Harper Collins just came out with a new, substantial biography of Walter Cronkite.

From the publisher’s release: “Douglas Brinkley presents the definitive, revealing biography of an American legend: renowned news anchor Walter Cronkite. An acclaimed author and historian, Brinkley has drawn upon recently disclosed letters, diaries, and other artifacts at the recently opened Cronkite Archive to bring detail and depth to this deeply personal portrait. He also interviewed nearly two hundred of Cronkite’s closest friends and colleagues, including Andy Rooney, Leslie Stahl, Barbara Walters, Dan Rather, Brian Williams, Les Moonves, Christiane Amanpour, Katie Couric, Bob Schieffer, Ted Turner, Jimmy Buffett, and Morley Safer, using their voices to instill dignity and humanity in this study of one of America’s most beloved and trusted public figures.

For decades, Walter Cronkite was known as “the most trusted man in America.” Millions across the nation welcomed him into their homes, first as a print reporter for the United Press on the front lines of World War II, and later, in the emerging medium of television, as a host of numerous documentary programs and as anchor of the CBS Evening News, from 1962 until his retirement in 1981. Yet this very public figure, undoubtedly the twentieth century’s most revered journalist, was a remarkably private man; few know the full story of his life. Drawing on unprecedented access to Cronkite’s private papers as well as interviews with his family and friends, Douglas Brinkley now brings this American icon into focus as never before.

Brinkley traces Cronkite’s story from his roots in Missouri and Texas through the Great Depression, during which he began his career, to World War II, when he gained notice reporting with Allied troops from North Africa, D-day, and the Battle of the Bulge. In 1950, Edward R. Murrow recruited him to work for CBS, where he covered presidential elections, the space program, Vietnam, and the first televised broadcasts of the Olympic Games, as both a reporter and later as an anchor for the evening news. Cronkite was also witness to—and the nation’s voice for—many of the most profound moments in modern American history, including the Kennedy assassination, Apollos 11 and 13, Watergate, the Vietnam War, and the Iran hostage crisis.”

Here is Patt Morrison’s radio interview with Douglas Brinkley.

ISBN: 9780061374265; ISBN10: 0061374261; Imprint: Harper ; On Sale: 5/29/2012; Format: Hardcover; Pages: 832; $34.99.

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Transit Of Venus

Like thousands of other people, I watched the Venus transit on my computer, via webcast from the Keck Observatory on the summit of Mauna Kea on Hawaii. (It was amusing to see a bunch of excited scientists trying to keep a TV audience entertained for  6 hours).

There are plenty of great transit photographs taken by amateurs. (The L.A. Times has a nice collection of images from Southern California). But the best view was from space. My favorite image is this one, taken by the Japanese Hinode spacecraft.

(Click to enlarge).

Hinode is a collaboration between the Japanese space agency JAXA and various institutions in the US and the UK. Then known as “Solar-B”, the satellite was launched on a Japanese M-5 rocket in 2006. Earlier this year, Hinode returned  stunning images and data from the Lunar eclipse. Well done, Japan!

 

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