Tonight will feature the biggest and brightest full moon of the year. I'd been noticing the last few nights when I was out that the moon seemed more spectacular than normal. The moon is at its perigee this evening, according to NASA. It will also be the closest lunar perigee since 1993. Granted, at 356,566 kilometres, it's still a good distance away. And, as you can tell, there's a bit of difference in the moon's appearance from its closest point to when its at it furthest point away.
There will also be high tides, but I'm not so much worried about that, what with the bay frozen solid and all.
If I recall, 1993 was a pretty weird year for me as well. I thought there might be any number of factors for that, but I really hadn't counted on the moon in my deliberations. Maybe I should have.
I'm kidding, of course, but only a little bit. Clare can chip in from a law enforcement point of view, but being married to a teacher, I can assure you that Cathy subscribes enthusiastically to the whole "full moon brings out the crazies" theory. Hearing that this is the biggest and brightest full moon in 15 years just has her nodding her head, as if that explains everything of the past few days.
Hopefully as the moon abates, so will the craziness and crankiness.
By the way, one last thing. It occurs to me that I was a touch whiny yesterday and you can always trust The West Wing (at least the first four seasons and most of the 7th) to help put things in perspective. In this case, it was Donna trying to console Josh after he lost a vote on a foreign aid bill. And in consoling she quoted a corrupt New York politician with the wonderful name of 'Fish hooks' McCarthy who went to church every day and offered up the same prayer.
"O Lord, give me health and strength. We'll steal the rest."
I'm not saying their words to live by, but they're not bad ones to get you over a hump.
Last Five
1. Till it happens to you - Corinne Bailey Rae
2. Love reign o'er me - The Who
3. Pale slice of moon - Jenny Gear and the Whiskey Kittens* (honestly)
4. Sugar mountain (live) - Neil Young
5. Wake up call - Maroon 5
2 comments:
There was at least one study on lunacy (there's a reason its named that) and criminal stats, that showed no significant spike in crime during full moons, events like weekends have a much more profound effect.
But... everyone has stories when things got very weird and you'd say "must be a full moon" and sure enough it would be. Stats or not they make for some good stories, full moons.
A lunar perigee in 1993 explains a lot. I graduated high school that year.
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