250 Words on Knowing the Night Sky

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

I’ve been an amateur astronomer most of my life, peaking in college when I had access to good telescopes and worked as an astronomy lab teaching assistant. I stargazed a few nights a week and really had it down. 

One of the joys of being very familiar with some aspect of the natural world is recognizing something out of place that others might not. I remember being 12 and watching a crescent Moon rising in the east at sunset. The hairs on the back of my neck tingled. “That ain’t right!” Turns out the Moon was (properly) full and I’d caught a lunar eclipse in progress.

A friend who writes mystery novels let me read a draft. One of his characters stepped outside at 9 o’clock and saw a gibbous Moon in the southwest. “That ain’t right!” I told him that the Moon at that time and place would be a crescent, but if he meant to prove the witness was lying, well done! He changed it to a crescent. 

A star where there should be no star is probably a planet, and its location, brightness and color announce which it is. The International Space Station moves briskly from west to east and, unlike an airplane, has no blinking lights. Comets don’t flash across the firmament like meteors, they appear stationary.

When it comes to the night sky, I have a well-honed sense that knows something is off before my conscious mind registers what it is. Then the fun begins.

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The Captain America Minute Podcast

I may be the last person on Earth who's not doing a podcast, but I rectify that oversight today. 

It's "The Captain America Minute Podcast," in which my cohosts and I talk about the movie "Captain America: The First Avenger" at the rate of one minute of screen time per episode, so that a 124-minute movie like "Cap" yields 124 episodes. It sounds like an odd way to analyze a film, and it is, but it allows for some deep dives, interesting digressions, and great guests. 

I've been Internet friends with my cohosts, Jim O'Kane and Hal Bryan, for a long time--in fact, I introduced them to each other--and Jim and Hal have done many "movies by the minute" podcasts for films such as "The Rocketeer" and "October Sky," which both happened to be directed by "Cap" director Joe Johnston. 

I was an occasional guest on those other podcasts, and when they told me they planned to do "Cap" I said, "Hey, I'd be happy to be your guest if you need a Captain America comic book expert!" since I once had a complete run of every "Avengers" issue ever published. They looked at each other slyly; their trap had been sprung. Next thing I knew I was a cohost and, well, I knew the job was dangerous when I took it. 

New episodes drop every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We've already recorded enough to make it into 2026, so I can promise some good conversation and interesting guests, including director Joe Johnston himself, who joined us for this first episode! They'll be available at this link as well as Spotify or wherever podcasts are found.