The eclipse
 

Is a really big deal to some people. Or is it just a reason to take a road trip and party?
Our cities are preparing for many folks coming to central Arkansas for this 10 minute event. Gas prices are up, hotel rooms are booked, cities are blocking off some streets, tourism businesses are saying y'all come!
Over in Russellville today there is to be a mass wedding going on with expected to be a couple of hundred couples getting hitched.
Mercy sakes! I've seen a couple eclipses and while it is a rarity, it's no big deal to me.
I can only imagine what is going on in Tx today. Everything is bigger in Tx, right? ;)

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A lot of foofaraw over a shadow, but I guess if a person hasn't yet witnessed one, it could be exciting. I was about 12 for my first total eclipse.

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If you think about it, it really is a big deal like any other rare natural event. But many people sure have a way to blow things way out of proportion. I'll try to see it, supposed to be partly cloudy, we get a 90% eclipse, that's good enough for me. Imagine all these people traveling, spending all this money, planning weddings (Mass weddings? How special :rolleyes:), and causing chaos, when for all they knew it would be a rainy day in April (ya think?). It's a big long path across America, no more visible in Texas than in other places in it's path. What I want to know is where do you get these glasses they tell us to wear?

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They are making it a big deal here in Ohio. I’m really close to the “totality” of the eclipse, and people are flocking from everywhere. Never really understood why, lol.
But someone shared this on FB, so I started putting zip codes in for like Florida and Colorado because family lives there. Seems like most of the country is going to see it as long as it’s clear. It will be partial, but still.

http://univision.com/especiales/noti...pse-solar-2024

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Our schools are closed today and city services are apparently closed today also as our trash pickup hasn't come by, so far. Sheesh!
Big money making opportunity for some.

Bonnie Tyler's "total eclipse of the heart" gets air play a plenty today!

Sunshine and 80* today.
I oughta go fishin..

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Cloudy out here right now and we are getting maybe a 20% version. So just another PNW cloudy day.

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Last partial eclipse we had here, there were crescent-shaped shadows. I wonder if we'll see that again? I asked my wife for the pic. We'll see if she can find it.

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Yes, it's a big deal! Get with the program! My niece is eclipse crazy so is organizing the party. It should be fun. Here is a neat eclipse tracker she sent me the link for: https://www.univision.com/especiales...solar-2024-en/

And she says you can go to sonic and get a blackout slush and it comes with free goggles. You won't like the drink (except maybe Fleetside Paul because the drink goes so well with the chili cheese coney) but you'll like the goggles. We ordered our goggles off of amazon.com for last year's ring of fire eclipse. Next eclipse is in many years. We're having the party rain or shine by golly.

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Schools closed for the eclipse? When I was a kid we made pin hole cameras in class then used them to watch a complete eclipse - I remember this well.

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I've never seen so many predictions, conspiracy theories, end of times prophesy, and every other nonsensical thing attached to this eclipse....
In 2017 the total eclipse passed right over us here in East TN
other than getting midnight dark and the crickets chirping, it was here and gone in a few minutes...pretty uneventful in my opinion....
it's rainy and cloudy here....won't be much to see this time...unless of course all the predictions come true.....:lol:

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Well, if nothing else, it gets people's minds off some of the other ridiculous stuff going on in the world, for a while. ;)

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My kids had an option for an excused absence for it today, because of the traditional Navajo beliefs about being idle and meditating during an eclipse. They believe eclipses are a time of rebirth or renewal for the earth and its inhabitants. My kids are 1/2 Navajo but not traditional so they were pissed when we made them go to school lol.

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I was camping at Lake Greeson during Spring Break a couple of weeks ago. They told us that EVERY site was booked up for this eclipse. I guess people wanna get out on the lake and get a real clear view of it with no obstructions.

I teach high school math at a south Arkansas school. We are not turning school out, but our Science teachers did order a bunch of approved safety glasses and we've all been told to take our students out during 6th period (1:21-2:18) today to let them witness the eclipse.

I remember being in elementary school in the 5th or 6th grade and going outside and looking at an eclipse. That would have been in about 1980 or 1981.

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Aw Daaaad. :lol:

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Well, it came and it went. A whole 7 minutes. For a whole day the country is preoccupied by a 7 minute celestial show that only happens once in many moons. For 7 minutes many people looked up and not down at their phones. Amazing.

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Not great pictures but we were able to watch it to the full 90% then it got cloudy .

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It be more fun watching girls on a pole

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What girls on what pole? I once went to a place like that in Hot Springs, Arkansas, where I would have to agree with you.....the eclipse was more exciting than those ole gals. Bless their hearts, they tried.

Overall though, I would have to disagree. Went off in the Platinum Plus in Memphis a few years back.....definitely much more exciting than the eclipse. The first girl I saw had on part of an Uncle Sam outfit. Never did get all that strawberry scented oily glitter off my clothes and out of my hair. :flagw:

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I took the day off to avoid the predicted traffic that really didn’t happen but my wife, myself, a colleague from the Memphis area and his family took to all in from my driveway.
It was neat but short lived.

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It was a ho-hum here. Did take a couple of look sees through my welding helmet. Moon took about a 1/3 of the sun through the bottom of it. I could tell no difference in the light outside. Visually, never would have known if not for all the hoop-la

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So much "prep" around town. No where near the influx of visitors they expected. Now the next one is to happen 20 years from now.

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left

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^^^:lol:

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Here in central Indiana we got to experience the "full eclipse". Although short lived, it was interesting to witness. Full eclipse lasted about 4 1/2 minutes and it went about 90% dark. If you looked towards the horizon in any direction you could see light, which is why I think we didn't go 100% dark. Looking at the sun thru the cheepo glasses during the full eclipse was interesting. The moon was totally black with an orange/yellow glow around it.

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I saw on my local news website where they were calling it 'The Great Eclipse". C'mon now, please? Just gotta add drama with giving it a name. If this one was great they all are. I didn't have my welding helmet or glasses with me, so I didn't look at it. The dimmed light wasn't as intense as the one in '17 or when I was really young. what I remembered from way back then, and again in '17 was the cool shadows, so I just looked for those. I can look at pictures of the sun taken by others. My favorite thing is the shadows

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This was pretty much me yesterday only with snow. We were visiting the South Dakota Black Hills.

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We have a pic like that here somewhere. Really cool shadows, with that arc shape.

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I first saw these shadows during my first eclipse. I'm not sure what year. I looked at NASA charts and I there was one in 1959 and the other was 1960, meaning I was 4 or 5. I was thinking I was older, like 6 or 7 because I started knowing my cars about then.

Anyway, it was in Maryland and we were on Sligo Creek Parkway, near Washington, DC, and I saw those crescents dancing on the trunk of the mid-50s Buick ahead of us. That vision was deeply planted as I can still see it today

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We used my welding helmet, trust it more than some China glasses.
Greg

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This was my first experience. No heat from our star struck me. Right at the very brink of Totality there's a few second stretch of time where it is as if a dimmer is being turned toward off as the light level reduces into Totality. Looking with my bare eyes at our star's Corona was something!

During our 3 1/2 minutes, I was surprised that it wasn't totally dark. The sky was still a shade of blue and all around was the sight of what appeared to be sunset or sunrise. Frogs started croaking, roosters roostering and crickets making their noise. Strange indeed.

-klb

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I think it is pretty cool only 70% here in CO just got a little darker almost like a brownish hue. It is a primal thing, humans have been looking up at the stars for thousands of years. It is amazing that so many cultures around the world had the whereabouts to track celestial events and made so many dedicated monuments.

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It got dark here in Ohio. My neighbors sitting in their backyard was only about 50-60 ft away. When it got dark I couldn’t even see them anymore. All the street light came on. Along with dusk to dawn lights.

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You may have been closer to the center than we were. I figure the edge of the shadow (when we were 1/2 way through our totality event) was maybe 80 miles away at its closest and as far away as 150 miles at the furthest point. We were not in the center.

-klb

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We had 100%. It was pretty cool when it suddenly got dark. Then when just a sliver of the sun started showing again, it was like a big spot light from the sky came on. The lighting was just weird until more of the sun reappeared.

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Did anyone else notice the so called 'shadow bands' just before and just after total eclipse? We did and they manifested as strange undulating light/dark bands that in our case were perpendicular to the direction of the shadow across the surface of earth. These phenomenon were visible on the patio we were all sitting on which was light in color and had direct exposure to the moon/sun interaction.

https://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/n...lipse/3382949/

-Kevin

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I was outside cutting up trees that blew down this winter. It was a balmy 60F here. Very brief. I enjoyed it myself. I wouldn't have driven across the US. There were people here in Maine from all over the country. I looked with the welding helmet myself.

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We were fortunate to have perfect viewing weather here ... not a cloud in the sky. And I'm glad I didn't have to travel to be in the path of totality ... from what I've heard, traffic (especially on the interstate) was insane.

I remember years ago as a kid in elementary school watching a partial eclipse but seeing a total one was considerably more impressive ... being able to see the sun's corona and what I believe were a couple planets was pretty cool. Seemed pretty strange going from a clear sunny day to twilight-like darkness and then right back to sun within such a short time though.

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Me too!
When it was 100%, we could look at it with the naked eye- pretty cool

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My buddy took his wife and little girl to the shore of Lake Erie from down here. Basically, across PA south to north. I'd say it would have been worth it. We were in the 90% area and it wasn't all that much to experience.

I mentioned those crescent shadows. But another shadow phenomenon is shadows going two different angles at the same time. While people were looking up, I was looking down