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  SpaceX has incredibly impressive engineering! ...That they are putting towards destroying the upper atmosphere with pollution from launches and reentries, dropping potentially lethal garbage on everyone from orbit, stopping the entire field of observational astronomy, and soon ending our ability to use Low Earth Orbit for anything, while making shitloads of money for the richest dude in the world. Time to go pat goats.

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  I am digging deep in @planet4589.bsky.social's catalogues for making some plots on satellite usage over time, and so grateful for his meticulous record keeping that he shares with everyone! His excellent websites are here https://planet4589.org/index.html, and he's still in the process of rebuilding his full library after moving out of the US. If you happen to be looking for (yet another) good cause to donate to, here's a link: https://www.gofundme.com/f/fund-jonathans-space-repo...

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  Morning sky report: It's finally not foggy! But I did not set an alarm this morning and we've gotten to the time of year where I don't wake up naturally until much later than I'd prefer (oops). So, the only "star" I saw this morning was Venus. Very nice though!

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  I ran into a neighbour at the library, and really the only thing I know about this family (besides our kids being on the bus together) is that they have a floofy white livestock guardian dog named Pluto. I happen to have a floofy white livestock guardian dog named Sedna, and I think this is the funniest thing in the world. But... even though I put my Kuiper Belt scicomm hat on as best I could, I think I was laughing too hard to properly explain why this is so incredibly funny. I tried.

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  I don't have the emotional energy to read this right now, but months ago I got interviewed for this article in Astronomy Magazine that just got published! https://www.astronomy.com/science/our-increasingly-cluttered-skies/ Astronomy Magazine was one I would read as often as I could in high school, excitedly learning about the brand-new field of exoplanets. It's very cool that I'm in it now! Too bad it's for talking about the destruction of the sky rather than cool astronomy d...

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  Those of us who have Microsoft-based work emails, will tomorrow have:

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  It used to be so nice when I used to get excited about rocket launches instead of yelling "FUCK" and dreading to learn what terrible shit they're launching THIS time. (This time it's ~30 two-ton Starlink satellites that will burn up in the atmosphere in <5 years and/or drop giant pieces of potentially lethal garbage somewhere in the world. Or maybe the rocket will explode in a ball of awful pollution. Who even knows.) https://spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&day=12&...

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  Oh my goodness radio astronomy meetings are depressing. Satellites are royally fucking things up for radio telescopes everywhere.

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  This is absolutely me with satellite landfalls. "Don't worry about getting hit by a satellite piece or the airplane you're riding on getting hit by a satellite piece. You should be WAY more worried about Kessler Syndrome ending our ability to use satellites for centuries, and about aluminum in the upper atmosphere causing ozone depletion!" https://mastodon.com.br/@xkcd/117599582203247109

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  https://www.skyatnightmagazine.com/news/reflect-orbital-giant-mirror-in-space Overall good article about all the terrible things that are going to happen if Reflect Orbital actually launches mirrors into orbit. Among other things, "people should not have to be afraid to look at the stars through a telescope because of the actions of a single private enterprise." But boy I'm really tired of journalists giving Reflect Orbital the last word. I hate this company with ever fibre of...

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  New hay bale means very very happy goats. Wouldn't it be cool if it was socially acceptable to stuff your whole face into your lunch? If you look carefully in the last couple of pictures here's a little black goat (underneath the black and white goat who's precariously dangling through the hay rack) who's almost completely buried in hay. (Yes, I did check on her. Yes, she was annoyed at me for interrupting her glorious full-body meal experience.)

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  Sending peace

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  I'm going to listen in to a talk by Prof. James Lowenthal from Smith College called "Darkness at Night: Essential for Health", for the IAU-CPS community education hub. I'll share some highlights (there aren't very many people here listening, which is crappy because James is such an excellent teacher!)

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  This is very nice, but it really makes typing difficult...

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  I LOVE hour long meetings that turn out to be 15 minute meetings! Wooo

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  Morning sky report: despite the high clouds, I saw loads of satellites. One was just a flash that repeated every few seconds (tumbling space debris), one was a very bright (brighter than Jupiter) flare that had a wiggly lightcurve before and after flaring - must be a weird shape? Venus is so bright it's almost funny. And I saw one decently bright, very fast shooting star.

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  I should really stop reviewing stressful documents about the future of astronomy right before I go to bed...

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  Starting the morning stewing about how incredibly fucking terrible Reflect Orbital is. I chatted with a relative over the weekend who has connections in the area where they did that stupid floodlight test https://www.backpacker.com/news-and-events/news/space-mirrors-search-rescue-test/, and apparently several people saw the light, thought it was a cry for help, drove up to provide help, and were told to stay away from the beam because it could burn them (?!) They put up a spotlight so hot it...

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  Goat morning.

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  Well, I guess I'm ready for another round of interviews where I get to say, yet again, Planet-9-isn't-real-but-there's-lots-of-other-cool-stuff-out-there-to-find-if-techbros-would-stop-launching-so-damn-many-bright-satellites https://mastodon.social/@badastro/117571163569692462

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  RE: https://infosec.exchange/@catsalad/117565835460469779 Orbital dynamics for cats

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  There's a competition to name a satellite that will remove debris from orbit. Good for making orbit safer, BUT it just chucks it into the atmosphere, making metal-vapour pollution or hitting the ground. Fediverse, you are so creatively sarcastic, I think many of you could have some very good submissions here! (I'm not saying this is a bad idea, it's just that with better regulation and better engineering of satellites, we wouldn't have this problem in the first place) https:/...

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  Crazy busy morning... good discussions with a student about postdocs, satellite streaks and nuclear explosions in orbit (eeek let's please not do that), course planning, an invite to a satellite workshop in France in 2 weeks (that'll be remote and only in the afternoon France time...), and a report of a possible (maybe-probably-not) meteorite fall in Sask. Oh, and cat snuggles while milking this morning.

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  Sound on for sandhill cranes!

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  For my birthday tomorrow, I'd love fewer satellites in orbit! Uh oops shit no not like that https://aerospace.org/reentries/28485

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  There are thousands of snow geese flying over Regina, across the twilight sky, heading south, leaving winter behind.

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  I got incredibly bad medical news about a friend yesterday and I'm still reeling from it. When I went out to do barn chores this morning, it was foggy but I could still see the stars directly overhead this morning if I looked up and focused. That's kind of what my brain feels like, waiting for more bad news on so many scales...

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  Sitting in on a meeting of radio astronomers and learning that the FCC is gradually auctioning off the radio frequency bands we need for weather forecasts. Fantastic.

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  A friend gave me her jack-o-lanterns.

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  Despite their best efforts, goats are not very helpful on farm projects (unless the project involves clearing brush)