Comments

Wow, what a day. Lol. Nice pictures, keep it up. Your photos do tell the story very well. Thanks for posting them. I heard comets are dirty snowballs. Is that true? If so, I see comets. Or is it like that thing where they say all comets are dirty snowballs but not all dirty snowballs are comets? What do they say about it up there? If you look closely at the second picture you can definitely see an image of King Tut in the ice, headdress, beard and all. Or maybe it's his Father's image. LOL, close enough, though. Emily... you need to move. But I do love your pictures... :) Jim,

Comets are indeed "dirty snowballs", but you wouldn't want to pick one up (even to throw at me) because, aside from the size, the "ices" that make up the "snow" in them are very cold ices of Ammonia (freezes at -107.9°) and (I believe) methane (freezes at -297 F), as well as water ice. Comets in general are lightly packed, and not dense like for example an asteroid. The "dirty" part comes from admixtures of silicates and other stuff you'd call dirt if you saw it here.

Howard, are you saying comets are like stars, except that they don't have planets inside them? Howard, it may be cold here, but at least it's not Washington DC... ;)

(Actually, if I lived in DC I would probably hide out in the Smithsonian and see how long I could live there before someone caught me. I've always wanted to do that, ever since I read From the Mixed up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, back in fourth grade.)

Ray, I'm trying hard to see him, but I can't. Is the shape in the glossy area, or the negative space?

Jim, they say Alaska is just one big comet whose orbit remotely associates it with the US. If you're lucky, you get to see it once every 76 years.

Alaskans are actually aliens. We don't body snatch or anything, and though many of us are armed, we come in peace.

One time I was wondering what the Sun would sound like if you could hear it on Earth. I started to do the calculation, but then realized this is the 21st century. Let's Google. Turns out it's 125 dB, roughly equivalent to putting your ear up to a jackhammer. So loud it that doesn't need to be any louder, in other words. I meant if there was air between here and it, not if it was here. If it was here it would be so loud it ...well just save your earplugs. Oh. I was wondering about that. Hypotheticals are funny though, because if the sun was here, then we wouldn't be.

I'm that much more thankful for space, now that I know I won't be awakened by a jackhammer sun in the morning because of it.

You do know the museum in Mixed Up Files was MOMA in NYC, right? I decided to try out the Smithsonian instead. Emily, keep in mind that there's Federal DC, and then there are the rest of us. I live in the Capitol Hill district, which despite what you might imagine, is actually kind of sleepy. DC is very interesting because of this tension between people who actually live here and the more transient government people.

I've also thought about living in the museums, but they might hear me when I practice on the strads at the nat'l history museum! I do go on a regular basis to feel the moon rock at the Air and Space museum though...