Venus and Mars

If your skies are clear (ha ha) then February is a great month for planet watching.  There's a wondrous app called "Sky Guide." Unbelievably, it is free at the app store.  When you point your phone up, down or sideways, any place on Earth, any time of day, it shows all the constellations, stars, galaxies and planets. Of course the universe stretches to infinity under our feet, not just above our heads. Why is that so easy to forget?

From the deck in Cripple Creek last week, "Sky Guide" showed Jupiter in the dark, cold sky to the east. In Seattle, the close conjunction of Venus and Mars was spectacular this weekend at sunset just as the slender waxing moon rose.

From our front porch, Mars looked like a tiny red moon circling Venus.  Mars (named for the Roman god of war) and Venus (named for the Roman goddess of love) appear close together right now, but they are not. Venus is 134 million miles from Earth and the red planet Mars is 203 million miles away from us. By comparison, the Moon is just a short jaunt from Earth, at 225,000 miles away. If you missed it, the cosmic couple go their separate ways now until October.

Semele Opera set

Speaking of gods and goddesses, we went to see "Semele, the Wrath of Juno" at Seattle Opera yesterday afternoon. It's a long, seldom performed Baroque opera, written in English by Handel, who has been called the "Andrew Lloyd Weber" of his time.  It is a story about pride and vanity. I thought it was kind of interesting we were watching it while the Oscar awards were on TV.

In the story, young and beautiful Semele has everything going for her, including a handsome prince to marry.  However, her narcissism and ambition knows no bounds.  Jupiter falls in love with her and comes to Earth as a handsome human, then sweeps her off for a divine existence of love and pleasure. Even that is not enough for Semele, and she demands to see the god in his real form.  Let's just say she gets what's coming to her, and Jupiter's wife Juno has the last word.