Fun With The Sun or The Solar Eclipse of 2012

Yep, that's what it looked like from our front yard last evening when we donned our protective eye wear and gazed at the heavenly phenomenon.  My last glimpse of a solar eclipse was almost 50 years ago when we were living in Cedar Rapids, Iowa with my hubby's folks after just returning from Germany.  I know the one years ago was a total eclipse and this was classified as an "annular" eclipse, but both were spectacular and I am delighted to have been in the part of the world that we could view it for a few minutes.

One of our friends drove all the way to Cedar City, Utah in order to see the 100% view while ours here in Southern California was "only" 86%.  Yet it was freaky to see how the brightness of the sun was dimmed and to watch the shadow of the moon creep across the face of the sun.  I watched a live feed on the internet for a while--it got tiring to keep my head at that angle, and yet it was about an hour before sunset so the angle wasn't as bad as if the sun had been directly overhead.

Just thought I would share my own excitement at being one of the "favored" ones.  I understand the last glimpse of the eclipse was somewhere in Texas before it was all over.  As one commentator put it:  "We have so many manufactured adventures--good books, video games, sci-fi films and paranormal kinds of stuff that everyone enjoys for their thrills.  This is one that nature gave us and it is every bit as good if not better."  Took the words right out of my mouth!