Re: Happy Winter Solstice! (tonight at 2006-12-22 00:22 UTC)


<david.kynson@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1166776934.080805.166090@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

a l l y wrote:
Why is the solstice at exactly 00.22 UTC by the way? Why not midnight? Or
is
it just that our clocks are out of synch with the movement of the earth,
or
something?

It is the time that the Earth's northern pole is furthest away from the
sun.

That makes sense.


The day (24 hour period) that this falls into is then the Winter
Solstice day. Therefore today is the Winter Solstice, which was
unfortunate for those that turned up at Stonehenge yesterday:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/wiltshire/6199671.stm

<s***> But moveable feats are always difficult. How many of us know how
to work out when Easter will be next year, without looking it up? And at
least we have the benefit of knowing it will always fall on a Sunday.
Wouldn't it be fun if Christmas fell on ... ooh, let's say the day after the
last new moon in December, or something? Heh heh...

ally


.