No Need to Travel Light Speed to Glimpse At Our Neighboring Stars

Mars (left), Saturn (upper right) and Spica (bottom right)

Throughout the remainder of this month, the stars Mars, Saturn and Spica will be visible each evening which can be found by dotting a triangle.  This picture was taken two nights ago outside my house. In  the center is Mars (left), Saturn (upper right) and Spica (bottom right).

Now, onto a bit of a short chat on astronomy.

The last star, Spica, is surprisingly 260 light-years away from us (super far!). Personally, I think it's amazing how we're able to see something shine, let alone reach us, that's unimaginably far. But speaking of stars and space, I highly recommend reading the science fiction novel Pushing Ice by Alastair Reynolds. In that novel, Spica is the star whom the star ship mining crew of Rockhopper attempt to reach as they chase after Saturn's moon Janus which, as the novel progresses, is revealed to be alien machinery.

Panoramic View of the Bay Area On A Rainy Night

San Francisco Bay Bridge in upper right

As rain clouds and showers swept the East Bay earlier today, I captured this image looking out from my bedroom window.

Candy from far, far-away: Finland

Mail from Finland is pretty rare in my case. Even more so when its packaged with chocolates.

Goodies..!?

Canseco

Photo by Krudo.

I was just reading that a rock band I have really enjoyed listening to for quite some years now is no longer together anymore.

Canseco, which I picked up somewhere on the internet, was an indie rock band from Mexico. And although I'm just hearing of their breakup, the band broke up some months ago.

Canseco was a four-piece band and they were very good too. I remember when I first heard their album "El Tiempo Y La Ciudad" I was very surprised by its quality and musical textures - it was very modern, fresh and exciting! Their sound was very much like the music being played on alternative rock stations all over California than and now. They were pretty successful too. Canseco even played along side American rock band Nada Surf in Mexico City.

As part of their goodbye, Canseco is giving away free copies of their first album and EP as downloads off their website. I think it's a really nice parting gift!

From 6 To 3 Cookies

Since I live on campus at my university I have to have a meal plan. I use it about two times a day, sometimes more than that.

The dining restaurant where I eat is like a buffet where I only pay once and eat as much as I can stuff. When I've eaten too much, I like to take something home to eat since I might get hungry later. So that's me planning ahead. We're not allowed to take food out, but I do it anyway. Usually it's a fruit or cookies. But the last time I took cookies home, I had taken 6 and ate them way too fast. This gave me a sudden sugar rush and dizzying headache. It soon went away. 6 cookies didn't seem like too much at first, but now it does.

That's why from now on the most cookies I'll be taking with me are 3. Yep, 3.

Sunset Casts the Bay In A Palette of Dark, Neon Hues

Just in the nick of time to catch this sunset slowly fade away behind those hills.

Lights fire-up the San Mateo-Hayward Bridge.

Luna Mix