Tuesday, December 21, 2010

The Winter Solstice

A lunar eclipse on the (Northern hemisphere) winter solstice, according to NASA and the US Naval Observatory, has occurred one time since the A.D. calendar began. That year was 1638. On June 25th of that same year, the first lunar eclipse ever to be recorded in the U.S. occurred. Now, they had occurred before, but if European settlers had not written it down, it never really occurred, of course. The next winter solstice lunar eclipse will occur in 2094, well beyond the scope of average life expectancy at this point. However, fun supernatural circumstance (and some statistics) would predict a decent, if small, chance of a baby somewhere in the world being born today, living to the ripe old age of 84, and passing away on the date of the next solstice lunar eclipse. Fun stuff to think about while procrastinating those last-minute holiday gifts.

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