(He’s a good boy, just getting older and having some kidney issues.)

A grey and white cat sleeps curled up on a black and red flower-patterned blanket. One front paw shows pink toe beans and the other covers his nose. He appears to be smiling.

Badminton peed on the couch last night but is Unrepentant

Trade you for a flicker who drums on the downspout? 😆

Looks beautiful and sounds so relaxing! I also always get homesick for Wisconsin when I hear cardinal songs. 😍

Please read this urgent paper. I am then going to repost a bunch of comments I made last night (sorry).

Please read this excellent essay by @chanda.blacksky.app for more on why Artemis is complicated and why it's important to acknowledge this fact.

bsky.app/profile/chan...

Yeah, so this is why many astronomers are less than completely excited about the Artemis missions.

(Which is not to detract from the courage and hard work of everyone who made Artemis II so successful! But we have to understand there are other motives involved than science and inspiration.)

The FY 2027 NASA budget request hides its science cuts by omitting mission names instead of explicitly zeroing them out.

We did the work and found 54 missions cancelled in this proposal.

This is another extinction-level event for NASA science.

Full list: planetary.org/save-nasa-science

[alt text by NASA] The Moon, seen here backlit by the Sun during a solar eclipse on April 6, 2026, is photographed by one of the cameras on the Orion spacecraft’s solar array wings. Orion is visible in the foreground on the left. Earth is reflecting sunlight at the left edge of the Moon, which is slightly brighter than the rest of the disk. The bright spot visible just below the Moon’s bottom right edge is Saturn. Beyond that, the bright spot at the right edge of the image is Mars. Credit: NASA

Whoa 🤯

The Moon, in full eclipse, with the #Artemis II Orion spacecraft. Part of the Moon and spacecraft are lit by Earthshine, and both Saturn and Mars are visible to the lower right. Incredible. Details: images.nasa.gov/details/art0...

The NASA #Artemis II tracking website: www.nasa.gov/missions/art...

It includes a nice moveable visualization of the Moon, the spacecraft, the Sun, and the Earth, so you can get a feel for the relative positions of them all.

A full disc image of Earth, as seen from the Orion Crew Module. The planet is a pale blue, swirling with white clouds and glowing slightly lighter blue in place from reflected light. At lower left, a large brown landmass is Africa, with Spain and Portugal with twinkling lights where the planet curves. At top right, auroras glow in a thin green glow, just barely separated from the planet's surface. Earth is set against the black of space (pic: NASA/R.Wiseman)

More context on this #Artemis II image:

* This is the night side, lit by moonlight. You can see city lights in Spain & Portugal, & a sliver of day at lower right

* The Sun is entirely behind Earth, which makes it a kind of solar eclipse, but w/ Earth doing the eclipsing instead of the Moon:
☀️🌍🚀🌕

That's home. That's us.

This image of home just came down from the Artemis II crew.

Taken after their translunar injection burn, there are aurorae at top right and lower left, and zodiacal light at lower right.

Credit: NASA/Reid Wiseman

If all goes according to plan, in a few hours, a crew of astronauts will begin a journey that will take them on a loop around the moon. Here's a video that NASA put together to help people visualize the journey through space, first orbiting the earth before looping around the moon and flying home 🔭

The New Moon by Sara Teasdale Day, you have bruised and beaten me, As rain beats down the bright, proud sea, Beaten my body, bruised my soul, Left me nothing lovely or whole, Yet I have wrested a gift from you, Day that dies in dusky blue: For suddenly over the factories I saw a moon in the cloudy seas, A wisp of beauty all alone In a world as hard and gray as stone, Oh who could be bitter and want to die When a maiden moon wakes up in the sky?

I love this poem by Sara Teasdale. My choir sang a lovely setting of it a few years back.

Look, @jrlomax.bsky.social, your internet fame lives on!

This is such a great prompt. I may use it in my class tonight!

Yes! And they’re so easily portable. I always have a pair on hand at outreach events. Love showing people the Moon through binoculars while the Sun is still up.

It’s a perfect day to appreciate the Moon! 🌕 Join the love-fest here:

While leading “moon walks” on the south rim of the Grand Canyon, it struck me how very many people have *never* seen the Moon through a telescope. It’s so fun to hear them go “whoooaaaa” when they get that first glimpse!

Thia is also one of my favorites because the astronomer with the spider in her office was my former grad student!

One time when my niece was little, she looked up at a first-quarter Moon and said, “Ball!” I was stunned and delighted at her 3D perception.

Amazing! What's up with the guy near the end who has to have the flight attendant bring him a FACE?! 😱

It’s not aliens.

Wikipedia now has higher standards than all universities

A grey and white cat sleeps on his side with his front paws curled up, showing off his white feet and pink toe beans. He is lying on a black blanket patterned with red berries and green leaves. He appears to be smiling in his sleep.

Badminton has purrfected his napping technique

Hard agree, ugh. Vote for actual human intelligence, please.

Exciting, congrats!!! At the end do you finally get to make an apple pie from scratch? 🥧

Denver Water implements mandatory watering restrictions Denver Water declares a Stage 1 drought, announcing mandatory watering restrictions to manage supply as snowpack levels hit historic lows.

NEW: Denver is now under Stage 1 Drought restrictions for the first time since 2013. Denver's seeking a 20% drop in water usage. That means:

-You can only water your lawn twice a week this summer
-Wait until mid-to-late May to turn on sprinklers

More:

Um no thank you for that mental image

look I don't want to count my chickens or downplay the extent to which the right has fascist aspirations. but if the GOP had an unassailable, undetectable election rigging strategy - or the juice to openly do the detectable kind - you do kind of suspect they would've started here