Hands on Astronomy

I came across a quick little article about how us amateur astronomers can put in our "two cents" in a new web-based project called Galaxy Zoo. The cool thing is that this project wants to enlist the general public's assistance to help the Sloan Digital Sky Survey classify a million galaxies. This endeavor will help scientists better understand how the cosmos evolved by asking participants to distinguish the subtle differences, for example, between spiral and elliptical galaxies. Apparently the human brain is more adept at figuring out these variations than a computer program. After folks do a short online tutorial, Galaxy Zoo will show galaxy images to participants in the hopes that we could spot any minute differences between galaxies, and maybe even to decide which way a particular galaxy is rotating! Exciting stuff to be involved with I say.

So Long Sidle

The original CSI show lost a major character last week as CSI-Sara Sidle left the show. I wonder what Gil Grissom will do now without a love interest? I'm sure he'll figure something out.

Not only did CSI lose a huge component to it's award winning cast, but it lost a major hottie. I've got to admit that she was one of the main reasons why I watched the show. There's something about her, Jorja Fox, that is, that really struck me. I think it was her eyes. She has these amazing soul piercing eyes that just pull you in. And the thing is, as Sara, she really didn't do anything to draw attention to herself such as wearing revealing clothes and etc. To me, everything starts with the eyes-- it could be eyes of blue, or in this case, her dark-colored eyes.

Maybe the television audience will be blessed with her presence in another show before too long. Let's hope.

Climbing the Great Wall of Yao

My brother sent me this link of the San Antonio Spurs' guard Manu Ginobili slam dunk over the Houston Rockets' center Yao Ming last week. Talk about a ferocious facial. Manu's elbows were in the rim!

Here it is, check it out: Manu's dunk.

Healthy Television

I've become a big fan of NBC's reality television show, The Biggest Loser. You gotta say that this show is probably the best in terms of providing a healthy lifestyle. I love to see these folks change from their old, obese selves into the lean, healthy machines most become at the show's end. Even the contestants who get voted off the show during the season continue the exercise regimens learned in front of America and look just as great.

Over the past several months, I've told my friends that I wish I could join the cast just so I can workout all day and eat well. Of course when I tell my friends this, they usually raise an eyebrow and say that I don't need to do that. Well, they have a point. Even though I'm quite overweight, I'm about at that halfway point for those guys who start off near or over 300 pounds. I'm about 255-260, down from near 280 a couple years ago. I just wish I had more time to lose the 30 pounds or so that I think would be a good weight for me. Now if I was on this show, I'd probably be voted off before too long because I'd lose the weight too quickly. A good problem to have I guess.

A Good Week for Astronomy

Here are few quick astronomy hits for this week.

First of all, did anyone see or hear about that amazing spacewalk by a couple of astronauts over the weekend? Wow! I found some wonderful pictures on Space.com that described the dangerous mission to fix one of the space station's solar arrays. The astronaut dangled precariously off the space shuttle's robotic arm in order to untangle some wires. That electrified array carried upwards of 100 volts of electricity. And talk about getting the right guy to do the job-- the guy, Dr. Scott Parazynski, is a former emergency room doctor! It took him 7 hours to get the job done, including a harrowing hour to get back into the shuttle. I bet his parents are very proud of him.

Last Saturday I read that there would be an interesting celestial conjunction in the eastern skies later that night. However, I didn't think that I would have to be up in the wee hours of Sunday morning to see it. No, I wasn't out and about doing who knows what, but I did happen to be out of the house for a few hours between 2 & 5 am because we took our daughter to the emergency room. It was nothing serious thank goodness, but there it was, almost in a straight line up and down from the horizon, a beautiful conjuction-- starting at the bottom, Venus, the Moon, Jupiter and Leo's alpha star, Regulus. Even though we were up because my daughter fell ill in the middle of the night and everything turned out alright, seeing this conjunction made me feel that everything indeed would be alright.

News flash: There's an exploding comet in our skies! Comet Holmes, which is a fuzzy spot in the constellation Perseus, has become a surprise to many astronomers. Comets as they enter the Solar System, usually have a increasingly long tail as it nears the Sun, however in this case, Comet 17P/Holmes is tail less. No one's unsure how long the comet will last at its present state, but experts say it could last weeks, if not months. Check it out before it's gone!

And last, but not least, astronomers have found a star outside our Solar System with at least 5 planets. This is the first time that a star has been found with at least 5 planets. The fifth was found to orbiting relatively distant from its home star, but is much bigger than our planet Earth.

A Tale of Two Stars

In the last week or so, two sports superstars made headlines from opposite ends of the contract negotiation spectrum. Not only was each case different in how the contract was handled, but it also showed how each decision impacted their respective team and sport. The stars I speak of are Tim Duncan and Alex Rodríguez. And if you delve deeper into each instance, you'll notice a stark difference between the apparent selfishness of the two and how that selfishness has taken one to sports championship immortality and the other still waiting for his first shot at a championship.

The Rodríguez story started the night the Boston Red Sox clinched their second World Series championship in three years. During the telecast of the Series' game four, the sportcasters and sports reporters broke the news that Alex Rodríguez would opt out of his contract with the New York Yankees, thus setting him onto the free agent market. What he and his agent, Scott Boras, did was step into the limelight that should have been strictly for yet another historic Red Sox playoff run.

But we all know that this is nothing new with Rodríguez and Boras. They seem to make every contractual agreement about them and how much money Alex (Scott) will garner. Who can blame them really? They're really good at what they do and we're here along for the ride. Some poor sap of a MLB franchise that will pay through the nose to have Rodríguez play on their team. Alex will continue to hit like none before him has, yet will he and his team be around come World Series time? Who knows. Whatever team picks him up may not have enough money to field a decent team anyway because Rodríguez will demand an astronomical amount of cash to fulfill his (Boras') need.

And then there's Tim Duncan. Selfish, Tim Duncan that is. Yes, he is selfish. Even Tim has caught the selfish bug, where it's all about "me, me, me." However, it's not about how much endorsement money he needs to make. Or about how many times he's on the highlight reel each night. Or even about how many shots he needs to take. For Tim Duncan, it's about winning. He took an apparent pay cut when he signed his contract extention this week so that it will pave the way to re-sign Manu Ginobili and even another top free agent down the line. What all this means is that he has set up himself and his teammates for more years of championship runs. This the good kind of selfish that the NBA needs, and the sports world for that matter.