Between the Sun and Moon

To all of you out West, hope you enjoy today's annular eclipse--the first solar eclipse seen in the U.S. since 1994, but not here in the Northeast. We're all terribly jealous, or at least I am. But then it won't be a *total* eclipse, since the Moon is one day shy of being at apogee (furthest away from the Earth--it was at perigee, the closest, back a couple of weeks ago when we had the so-called Supermoon). As a result, the lunar disk will only block about 88% of the Sun, but it should still be a great show. If you're venturing out to see it, remember not to look directly at a solar eclipse, as it is a good way to fry your retinas. Mmm...fried retinas....