TWEETS - I can't vouch for the accuracy of the following write-up but it
sounds right. Might this not be the perfect chance for us living west of the
Cascades to head east looking for Redpolls by day and catching the moon show
later?



SPECIAL FULL MOON COMING
MARK YOUR CALENDAR....


Everyone should mark their calendars this month. It will
be the Last Lunar Hurrah of the Millennium:

This year will be the first full moon in many years to occur on the winter
solstice,
Dec.22, commonly called the first day of winter. Since a full moon on
the winter solstice occurs in conjunction with a lunar perigee (point
in the moon's orbit that is closest to Earth) the moon will appear about
14 % larger than it does at apogee (the point in its elliptical orbit
that is farthest from the Earth), and since the Earth is also several
million
miles closer to the sun at this time of the year than in the summer,
sunlight striking the moon is about 7% stronger, making it brighter. Also,
this will be the closest perigee of the Moon of the year since the moon's
orbit is constantly deforming. If the weather is clear and there is a
snow
cover where you live, it is believed that even car headlights will be
superfluous. On December 21st. 1866 the Lakota Sioux took advantage of
this
combination of occurences and staged a devastating retaliatory ambush on
soldiers in the Wyoming Territory.

In layman's terms it will be a super
bright full moon, much more than the usual AND it hasn't happened this
way
for 133 years. Our ancestors 133 years ago saw this. Our descendents 100
or so years from now will see this.
Remember this will happen December 22, 1999.....


David Chelimer
Seattle