Thanks for the encouragement. The first Astronomy for pre-education majors was great. The group is diverse: a nice mix of men and women, broad range of interests, ages, and backgrounds. I felt comfortable almost immediately; I suspect that it is partially because one of my assistants and I spent a lot of time this summer making sure that all assignments are purposefully placed and contribute to the stated learning goals for the course. Will report more as the semester proceeds.

I could write about all the things I have been doing in the UWM Planetarium; however, I feel more inclined to muse about the holidays. I happen to like Christmas: all of it. The music, the food, the treats, the stockings, the presents, the decorations, the letters and cards, the gatherings… But at least once a day I see people who are so caught up in their frenzy that they are not enjoying themselves anymore. I hope you, gentle reader, are following traditions that you enjoy, setting aside stuff that causes you stress, and finding time to have fun with the people you love. I personally find it fulfilling to try to connect with people I haven’t communicated with since last December.

May you have a marvelous and mindful celebration of the winter solstice and of the light that is to come.

In the next two weeks, I have the following events to worry about:
(1) A joint talk with Dava Sobel, the famous author of Galileo’s daughter and Longitude, on September 25
(2) 100 Telescopes in the Park where we hope to get a lot of people looking through telescopes and have their own stargazing moments just like Galileo did!
(3) First Friday at the University where all faculty and staff get to visit the planetarium
That is on top of teaching, school groups, research etc. Who has time to organize something for my birthday?

I remember being a bit nervous before the first day of school when i was a student. Now I am the professor, and I still feel nervous. Weird… I make sure that I plan as much as possible to exude the confidence of a person who knows where she is going, but I am hoping for some luck too. A small off- the-wall incident can throw things off on the wrong start. Oh well. At this point, I am excited to teach Astronomy to future teachers. I hope we will have fun!

I had a date with my spouse this weekend and we saw the fun movie “Julie and Julia”. It is about Julia Child’s blossoming into an inspirational cook for many people and about Julie, a writer who is cooking every recipe in “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” (over 500 recipes) in a year and blogging about it. She writes for some time and eventually somebody responds. Eventually lots of people send her personal messages (no spam apparently). I confess I was envious. I haven’t heard much from you. Is there anybody out there? Drop me a line if you are reading these blogs. Do you love cooking? I do. Unlike the two J characters in the movies, I have two children, so innovations are not always rewarded. But I have them trained to love romaine lettuce and fruit, so I must be doing something right.

Summers are short in Wisconsin, so we have to make the most of them! On Sunday, I biked on a beautiful path to listen to some live blues guitar in the courtyard of a Tuscan-wannabe villa. I felt so pleased listening to the summer sounds while watching large puffy clouds moving swiftly. Back on my bike to the marvelous Milwaukee Art Museum to see an interesting exhibit on a gifted furniture maker and 8 American modern artists from the early 20th century. What a visual feast!

A new program is starting at the planetarium called “Myths under the stars”. Of course, there are many beautiful stories told about heavenly bodies in countless cultures, but I am familiar with the Greek myths. The summer sky is packed with the deeds of Hercules, the superhero. Not only did he kill the Lion of Nemea with his bare hands, he also freed people of the nasty birds by lake Stymphalia. The people asked Zeus, the king of gods, to put Hercules and three birds in the sky as a reminder of Hercules great feat. The three birds make the summer triangle (Vega, Deneb, and Altair, which belong to different constellations). Although Hercules was brave and strong as an adult, as a baby he was messy: he spilled his milk in the sky and that is why we see the Milky Way. Do yourself a favor: go out and look at some stars! Check out your own galaxy!

As the days are getting warmer, it is getting to be triathlon season: swim 0.5 mi (850 m), bike 12 mi (20 km), and run (see walk fast) for 3 mi (5 km). At this point, I have biked 12 mi 4-5 times, and I am swimming 24 lengths of a pool. That doesn’t sound a lot to an athlete. But two years ago I was falling off my bike and I could swim 8 lengths of a pool without stopping. The walking comes easily: I have walked a lot all my life. I hope I can push myself to run some more. Wish me luck!

For the last two months I have been thinking of Greece on or off. I was even lucky enough to spend almost two weeks in Athens hanging out with friends and family taking in the aroma of the orange blossoms. My spouse and two kids went for Greek Easter and we got the full treatment. The candlelit processions, the fireworks at midnight, the lamb on the spit, the dancing, the excellent agiorgitiko red wine. What a magnificent time! You can imagine that i might think of our trip. I did so even more because I was asked to teach a course about Greek culture and travel. It is always fun to think about what amuses you in your home time and what might amuse someone else. I love octopus, but not everybody does. i love the icons at the Byzantine museum, but not everybody does.

What a rush! I have spent the better part of year thinking about this event and it is over now. We had more people come to the planetarium (250) and fewer people come to the presentations than I expected (51). Since we live in Wisconsin, only 1 night was clear out of the 4. But our eager viewers got to see the Moon, Saturn and two moons, Orion’s nebula, and the Pleiades. I am ready for a break!