I have no doubt you’ve gotten the emails from some well-meaning relative or friend.  Given the amount of cool stuff that happens in the night sky, like the Perseid meteor showers and giant solar flares, it seems like something that might be possible.  The orbits of the planets aren’t static, and every two years Mars does move closer to the Earth, but tonight the planet Mars won’t be the same size as the moon.  Not even close.

I got the “two moons” email, and immediately went to check Snopes to verify its authenticity.  As it turns out, the double moon thing isn’t real:  the picture is Photoshopped and in astronomy terms, the fact that Mars is only 195 million miles away is pretty much meaningless.  Yes, Mars will be slightly larger than normal, but that means it’ll only be the size of a pinprick, rather than blending in with the light from all the other heavenly bodies.

Tags: two moons, double moons, moon and mars, astronomy, urban legends, hoaxes, mars closer to earth, mars moves closer to earth, unusual events, snopes, email forwards, two moons on Friday, two moons on August 27, double moon on Friday, double moon on August 27

I’ve never had a problem eating food from a gas station.  Just two weeks ago, I ate a couple of hot dogs purchased from a gas station.  They were delicious.  That’s not the first time I’ve eaten gas station food, and I doubt it will be the last.  There’s nothing like a fun food novelty. […]

Commissioner Roger Goodell gathered 32 NFL owners for one big question.  One of the league’s most wanderlust-stricken franchises is looking to move again.  The Oakland-Los Angeles-Oakland Raiders, tired of gutting it out in a run-down stadium, were once again looking for greener pastures.  Only the Miami Dolphins refused to cooperate.  With a vote of 31-1, […]

In 2006, an injury to Dallas Cowboys starting quarterback Drew Bledsoe opened the door for an undrafted free agent by the name of Tony Romo to take the helm of America’s Team and lead the Dallas Cowboys to an early playoff exit.  Bledsoe went from starter to afterthought in a season.  Now, the circle continues […]

For 89 years, Oscars has never had a major mistake.  The last few Oscars might have had a few flubs, but at least they never got the most important category of the night wrong.  Well, that’s now changed, all thanks to OG Bonnie and Clyde legends Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway.  When Faye Dunaway called […]

Tom Brady has been wildly successful, if controversial.  He’s the first quarterback ever to win five Super Bowls and only the second player to do so after Charles Haley.  Unlike Haley, Brady won all his Super Bowls with the same team, the New England Patriots.  The only thing that seems to be able to stop […]

Ben Affleck, no matter what you might think of him, is a talented actor and director.  He’s got the goods, but he’s smart enough to know when he’s in over his head.  All along, since he took on the mantle of Batman, he’s had his eyes on writing, directing, and starring as the Caped Crusader. […]

In May, students for the for-profit American College of Education were running into some problems.  Their access to email accounts and course information was locked down by Google, who had disabled their accounts.  The reason why?  A fired IT worker for the American College of Education locked the school out of their Google cloud account. […]