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Please enjoy this inelegantly named moon

Worm moon. Also known as the Crow Moon, Crust Moon, Sap Moon, Sugar Moon or Lenten Moon. But the article says Worm Moon is the most popular in Britain.

Most people assume it’s due to earthworms in Spring, but the article says some bullshit about native Americans. The Brits love them some red Indians. They also still use the expression “red Indians” which makes me wince a little. I feel sure that would get you screamed at by a bluehair in the States.

It’s technically not full until tomorrow night, but more visible here tonight.

I can attest. I came in and looked up the moon because I went out to put the chickens away, and there it was in all its wormy glory.

Comments


Comment from Mitch
Time: March 17, 2022, 7:04 pm

When the worm-moon hits your eye
Like a decaying pizza pie
That’s…disgusting!

When I was a kid I never thought Amerinds* looked particularly “red”. Still don’t for that matter. Also, I never thought David Carradine looked particularly “yellow”. It was a confusing time.

*Alternate term that was proposed in the 70’s I think. Never caught on but I always liked it.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 17, 2022, 7:57 pm

Yes, I never thought Indians looked red nor Chinese yellow. It’s all just different amounts of melanin, innit?

Though I’m not sure how many pure-blooded Indians I’ve ever seen.


Comment from Deborah HH
Time: March 17, 2022, 8:05 pm

We are overcast today, and I don’t think it will improve by nightfall so I can see the moon. Windy, too: 32 mph straight out of the North.

There’s a flyover of the International Space Station late tonight and I don’t think I’ll get to see it either. I always make the effort to view it, if the sky is clear. Sometimes early in the morning, and today—late in the evening. Here’s the link if any of you want to sign up and watch when it passes over your locale. NASA sends a notice when the ISS passes over your location.
https://spotthestation.nasa.gov/sightings/index.cfm

I drag my granddaughters out to see it (when they are here), since it’s a short lesson in reading the compass and explaining degrees of altitude above the horizon. Lovely in summer, but I am committed even in winter. The G’Daughters think I’m weird, but they understand why the ISS lights up while the sun is still below our horizon.

This is what the NASA message looks like (for example):
Time: Thu Mar 17 8:51 PM, Visible: 7 min, Max Height: 79°, Appears: 10° above SW, Disappears: 11° above NE

Stoaty—you may be too far north to see the ISS pass over.


Comment from Uncle Al
Time: March 17, 2022, 8:05 pm

Columbus et al. sure screwed things up when they mistook America for India, and not just names for people but also for islands. East Indies? West Indies? Huh?

We had some mildly amusing ways to distinguish American and Asian Indians some years back before the aggrieved language Stasi started holding struggle sessions and sending people to re-education camps.

Bedsheet or Blanket?
Dot or Feather?

It seems to me there were one or two more but they’re not bubbling up to my memory’s top layer.


Comment from OldFert
Time: March 17, 2022, 8:37 pm

When I found out that light-skinned black folks were (archaicly) described as “yellow” or “high yellow” I kinda figured that Asians being described as “yellow” followed in that vein.


Comment from bds
Time: March 17, 2022, 10:42 pm

A bit off the topic, but I think you probably mean purple hair or some such. A blue-hair is a little old lady (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/blue-hair). I’m sure there are some that are particularly sensitive in regard to how one refers to the aboriginal people of North America, but you’re more likely to get yelled at for making her late to bingo.


Comment from HTL
Time: March 17, 2022, 10:54 pm

Anytime I think of American Indians (well, the Plains Indians, anyway) I cannot help but fondly remember the guy who looks the most like the guy on the Indian head nickel. I mean, of course, Mel Brooks in Blazing Saddles.


Comment from BJM
Time: March 18, 2022, 1:54 am

@Deborah…you’re not weird… I wave as the IIS passes overhead. More Starlink satellite trains chugging their way across the night sky…and C-5M’s too.

This video is kinda cool…the 1st officer’s laconic pilot voice makes me laugh.

Back in the day at an AFB far, far away, we’d sip beer and lay on the grassy berms under the approach lights as the Buff’s landed….it was awesome…so was watching the Habu takeoff…cuz it didn’t even exist.

But I digress…So what do youse guys see on the moon? A face or the profile of a rabbit?


Comment from Deborah HH
Time: March 18, 2022, 3:04 am

@BJM—very cool indeed. All those flaps!

I see a face, but I didn’t for the longest time. Not until I saw a drawing on top of the photo.


Comment from Durnedyankee
Time: March 18, 2022, 3:10 am

In the picture above I see rabbit, but more of a view from above and slightly to (the rabbit’s) right rather than profile.

I tried getting a picture of it in East Texas this morning just before moonset. The 1865 house (no plumbing, no electric, no indoor restroom) had light coming through the bedroom window at 5ish and it took me a second to realize it was moonlight. Damn these older eyes, I used to love walking under a full moon but I feel now like it’s not a clear as it was (I know, you old farts are saying “because IT ISN’T numbnuts!”)


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 18, 2022, 6:49 pm

Deborah, we have for sure seen satellites go over, but I don’t know if it’s the ISS.


Comment from Drew458
Time: March 18, 2022, 7:36 pm

Durned – IIRC the Japanese also see a rabbit in the moon. Possibly using a flail to beat rice. Read that ages ago, along with how they always color the sun orange instead of yellow.

So the Brits say “red indians”. What do they call people from India? Brown indians (or more likely, “Mr. Vandashalaya who is my boss”)?

Being an east coast person, I’ve met few Indigenous Peoples, Most of them were just slightly tan at best. Don’t know where the red thing came from. Sunburn, at a time they average colonist was covered in clothes from head to toe?


Comment from Durnedyankee
Time: March 19, 2022, 2:46 am

@Drew – my favorite East coast tribe is the Passamaquoddy Tribe up in northeastern Maine.

Made available to the world by the Disney movie, Pete’s Dragon.
(passamadaddy! Padamaquassy!)

There’s a Fauxcahontas class family legend we’ve got native American blood in us from the tribe on our maternal side which hails from DownEast but if so I think I used it up one time when I nicked myself, shaving. Ironically I sometimes blame that on my inability to grow a decent beard.

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