Good Morning!

Well, by now you must know the drill...if it's an early Saturday Morning blog, I must be off to donate platelets!

It's certainly an interesting process...and if you've been a whole blood donor before, why not take the next step? It doesn't hurt...much, and the need is always critical.

But what do platelets do? I asked once, and the Dedham (MA) donor center where I go almost exclusively supports both Boston's Children's Hospital and the Dana-Faber Cancer institute (which you all should know as the "Jimmy Fund Hospital".) Apparently, chemotherapy blasts platelets, so a replacement therapy is often needed for cancer patients. In any case, your mileage may vary.


And speaking of mileage, last night was our pack's Pinewood Derby. As incredible as it may sound, last night was Javi's penultimate race as a scout. Fortunately, he won all his races at the den level, and is eligible to represent the pack at the District-Wide pinewood derby next weekend. It does run in the family; somewhere in the cellar is a box of my old pinewood derby cars...and trophies.

Finally this morning, did you hear about the curious astronomical event called the "Supermoon"? Every few months, there's a full moon in conjunction with orbital perigee, or closest approach to Earth. But the moon's orbit is a tad wobbly, so every few years the perigee coincides with one of those 'wobbles' and the moon is at its closest point to Earth.

Tonight is one of those wobbles....the moon is going to be a mere 220,000 miles from the Earth's surface! Some have suggested a link to terrestrial seismic activity. The coincidence is hard to ignore, actually. The last time there was such a 'supermoon' was shortly after the Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004. Makes you go 'hmmmm.......' doesn't it?

Of course, like most astronomical events, the media has it all wrong. For days now, we've been hearing how 'big' the moon is going to look tonight. I suppose if you hit the moon illusion just right....but otherwise it's not going to look any bigger than any other ordinary 'supermoon' we'd see in a given year.

So....I hope that's enough to keep us entertained this Saturday. (and there's one more thing that "supermoon" signifies tonight....IT'S FUCKING SPRING!)