Great news for the amateur star-gazer or anyone interested in anything outside the local planetary system. A planet has been discovered orbiting our closest stellar neighbor. Designated Alpha Centauri Bb (so named because it is orbiting the start Alpha Centauri B, and planets are designated with lower case letters beginning with "b"), the planet is roughly 1.13 times the size of Terra. 

Unfortunately, the planet is very close to the star (only 4 million miles, compared to our 93 million) so cannot support life as we know it. Oh, and its year is about 3 days. Dizzying, as it revolves!

Anyway, there is more information here. If you were planning a visit, despite it being only 4.3 light years away, our fastest probe ever would take approximately 75,000 years to get there. Kind of gives the size of the neighborhood some perspective, doesn't it?

Is Reno truly the answer to life, the universe and everything?

As anyone who has read Douglas Adams' 5-part trilogy (wait, what?) that begins with "A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" and ends with "So Long, and Thanks For All The Fish," the answer to that question is 42. Well, according to Bloomberg, Reno is also the answer. At least in a ranking of the 50 best cities in the United States, sandwiched between Dallas (41), and Scottsdale, AZ (43). Who ranked first, you ask? Well it is none other than our Over-The-Hill-And-On-The-Coast neighbor, San Francisco.

In other, and, IMHO, more interesting news on a Universe theme, we can expect a new comet to visit our neck of the galactical neighborhood at this time next year. It is currently saddled with the decidedly NOT catchy name of ISON. Predictions concerning just how bright it might turn out to be are all over the place, but there is the potential for it to be at least as bright in the sky as Venus. That would be impressive. I remember seeing Kohoutek (1973), Halley (1986) and Hyakutake (1996), but this will be the first time my kids will be able to see a comet. Let's hope it doesn't fade (pun intended) in the face of the likely hype over its potential luminosity over the next 12 months.

Keeping with the Science Friday theme I seem to have picked up on, if you are interested in Mars, take a look at some of the photos Curiosity is snapping while carrying out its mission on our red neighbor's surface. If you're a member of the Twitterati, following Curiosity on Twitter is an easy way to get up to date photos. 

It came, we saw, nobody conquered. But that's OK, we all had a good time at Western Nevada College's Jack C. Davis Observatory watching the annular solar eclipse.

We got there about an hour before the maximum, and there were a lot of other people already there, queueing up to peer through the at least six telescopes, and other assorted paraphenalia available to watch the sun and moon play PacMan with each other.

It turned out to be quite the social event with (by my estimation) a couple hundred people milling about and talking. I'm not sure how much the kids that were running around got out of it, but I certainly enjoyed it, as did Mikaela. I think Spencer was more concerned about chatting with his buds than the astronomical spectacle. But what do you truly expect from a soon to be teenager?

I'm planning to be back at the observatory in a couple of weeks for the Transit of Venus. For some reason, I am not expecting similar crowds for that event as appeared this evening, though the transit is something that won't happen again in our lifetimes. See ya there?

This was another overly busy weekend. I guess I should just accept the fact that they are all going to be over the top until either the kids' sports seasons are done and gone, the weather turns south, holidays stop occurring, or, more likely, all three at once. 

The weekend started on Friday night with a Mikaela soccer game. They ended in a draw, which is unfortunate, since they went into the last minute with a 2-1 advantage. Mikaela scored one of the two goals, so on a personal level, it was a good game. From the sidelines, I am seeing such an improvement in her skill level over last fall. She and her teammates are all getting this whole "team" thing going. Now if they can just get a formidable stopper in the goal!

Saturday morning was a double header. I went for a run and Mikaela played with the younger girls (she usually plays up an age division, only playing her "real" division when they need a guest player), and she scored another goal on the team's way to a 3-0 win. She was happy with both the result and her play. I was a proud papa, though I didn't get to see the game, I deferred to Risa to let her watch. :-)

I went running on Saturday morning and wasn't sure if anyone else was going to show for the scheduled run. I am firmly convinced most of the runners show for the scheduled runs because of who schedules. Abbey? Full trail. Me? Not so much. :-p At the scheduled time, it was me alone. Joe showed at his usual 7 minutes late with Gino, and as we were about to leave, Melissa and Lindy appeared. They had called Abbey and she guided them. I guess she pitied me the poor turnout. 

The run was warm in the absolute and HOT in the relative with temps in the upper 70s at the start. It's finally starting to get wa We did the V&T Lasso to start off and swung back by the vehicles after 4 miles, then headed up Ash Canyon for 9 more. Melissa had better things to do and split where her run would total 8-9, and Joe, Gino and Lindy powered their way with me snacking on the copious dust their feet kicked up. DFL! DFL! It didn't matter, it was a finish.

Sunday was Mom's day. I did yard work, and prepped the bikes for a short family ride. Since my bike is in the shop, I did a short run while Risa and the kids did a ride. It's good that everyone is getting comfortable on the bikes. We are going to be doing some rides this summer and the more comfy Mikaela gets, the more fun the rides will be. 

We closed out the weekend with a visit to the all-you-can-stuff buffet (early) then watching Ghostbusters on Netflix. A nice weekend all around.

Don't forget the eclipse next weekend!