Space Weather

Our sun is waking up. That's what all the scientists are saying. That explains the two recent sunspots that caused a disturbance in our atmosphere, resulting in really cool displays of the aurora borealis and australis. Sadly, living in south Georgia I didn't get to experience any of that firsthand but the net has been littered with pictures. So, this piqued my interest and I started digging around for more information and found some cool stuff. First of all, all those goings-on in space is actually called space weather, which makes sense but sounded kind of strange at first. The National Weather Service even has a Space Weather Prediction Center, where you can sign up for alerts and warnings, just like you can get messages about severe weather in your area like tornadoes and thunderstorms, now you can get alerts to sun spots and solar storms, weird but I dig it. Needless to say I registered for the alerts. I've always been a little bit interested in astronomy. When I was really little and living in Tampa I can remember my Dad and Uncle grabbing up me and brother and running outside at night to see the shuttle launches. And later, when we moved to Georgia if there was a cool moon or a meteor shower we'd go lay outside and watch it. At one time, probably for Christmas we had a pretty nifty telescope. I think we used it once and then who knows what happened to it. We're bad about doing stuff like that. So last semester I was excited when I signed up for the intro astronomy class, but holy crap it was pretty intense. That made me realize I'm really better off just doing my own research and laying out in my yard at night and stuff. There's actually some cool apps you can get if you have a Android or iPhone, using your phone's technology you just point your phone at the sky and you basically have a virtual planetarium. Which is pretty freaking cool, in my opinion. Too bad my ding dang FAILberry hates cool apps. *le sigh. Guess I'll have to convert over at some point.  BUT! Regardless of what phone you have you can still experience some neat space stuff. Right now, Venus, Saturn, and Mars are all visible in the night sky. Here's a graphic:

Even cooler still is that the best time to see the three is the 7th and 8th when they'll be in a very tight cluster. This is a good article by Joe Rao you should check out for more information. Peace Out!

Halloween Costume Ideas

I know its early to start planning, but Halloween is my favorite holiday and I take it seriously. Last year I was Flo, the Progressive Insurance spokeslady. The year before that I was a sexy-ish, Heidi-esque, German beer-wentch. And the year before that I was (or attempted to be) Amy Winehouse. This year I will be.............LADY GAGA! Well, at least a fabulous plus-size version of her. Gagita for the big girls, if you will. I thought about being Gaga last year, but I wasn't comfortable with my weight and settled for Flo. I've been losing some weight though, and inhibitions be damned. Yesterday, costumecraze.com announced they will carry the official licensed Lady Gaga costumes, and they're pretty good. Here's two of my personal favorites:

Not bad, huh? Well, being more of a DIY gal I've been brainstorming about which look I'd like to copy. Here's two of my vision boards I've been working on:

Nothing fancy, just a collection of ideas. When I narrow it down some more I'll post updates. 


Have you thought about a costume yet? Who or what will you be this year?

I'm a Blogger!

So I've wanted to do this for awhile now. I'm not sure whether or not I'm going to be any good at this, but from what I can tell there doesn't seem to be any real pre-reqs to having your own blog. I felt motivated to start a blog because Facebook status updates just aren't cutting it. I come across a lot of stuff in daily life that I find interesting and I think my small circle of FB friends are getting tired of all my show-and-tell sessions. I really should have started this back during the beginning of the summer, but eh...better late than never. Peace out.