A photograph I made of our Milky Way and our local Observatory is on the cover of the new newsletter or our local Astronomy group Monterey Institute for Research in Astronomy (MIRA) . That brings me a smile.

http://www.mira.org/newsletr/NL_fall13web.pdf

Even better, it gives me a nice excuse to shine light on this marvelous organization that does world-class Astrophysics research as well as providing a steady drumbeat of high quality astronomy education for our Monterey Bay community.

Recent (all free) leading edge public lectures by the experts in their profession have covered Mars rovers (we learned about some discoveries before the media), Exo-Planets, Comets: NASA Deep Impact Mission and loads more intellectual mind raising topics.

MIRA also provides telescopes for the public so that recently we could all see the last Venus transit of the Sun in our lifetimes.

Next time MIRA announces a lecture or a star party, you should join us.

Click on MIRA.org for more fascinating information