I admit that sometimes I'm a sucker for the stars.  Hence I must take the pleasure in informing all of you out there (if you haven't read or heard about it already) that today, December 21, 2011 at precisely 10:17am Israel Time; 3:17am EST (approx 45min from now) will be the midpoint of a total lunar eclipse.  This phenomenon, while fascinating and beautiful, is not the full miracle of the date.  The crazy part is that today is also the arrival of the winter solstice.   Amazing!

Today the world is in rare form.

For a great article covering the nitty-gritties of this event have a look at this article in the Washington Post.  Happy Lunar Eclipse / Winter Solstice day, everyone!