Solar Eclipse 2017

Hey guys! Long time no see, eh? Well, I'm back and will be regularly publishing here again.

In case you haven't heard, there will be a total eclipse of the sun on Monday, August 21, 2017. The eclipse path will cross the United States, from coast to coast. They are calling it "The Great American Eclipse."

If you want to see when the eclipse will pass over your area, you should head over to TimeAndDate.com and  look at the eclipse path. I live in southern middle Tennessee, just below the eclipse path, but I should still see a 97% eclipse, so I'm happy. I just hope the clouds go away before Monday.

I'm going to leave you with something that will help you see the eclipse without burning your retinas. Good luck! If you take any photos and would like to share then, just post them in the comment section.

Crescent Wonders - Venus and the Moon

Hello everyone! I know it has been ages since I published here, but I have had many things going on in my personal life, but now I'm back! I hope I've still got some of you with me.

Today, I wanted to share an awesome image from APOD (Astronomy Picture of the Day).

Believe it or not, the smaller crescent you see is Venus. The larger one is our own Moon. Because Venus is much further away it looks a lot smaller. Lucky for us, these two orbs are easily seen in the daylight - but, of course, while in crescent phase, you would need binoculars, (or a telescope).

via APOD

Winter Solstice

The shortest day of the year marks at the Winter Solstice, known to Wiccans as Yule (from the Norse Iul, meaning "wheel"). This is the time when the new Sun God is born to the Mother Goddess. It is one of the Lesser Sabbats of the year and falls at or about December 21.

The myth of the battle between the Holly King and the Oak King that occurs at the Winter Solstice and again at the Summer Solstice can be found throughout Europe. The Yule battle is won by the Oak King, who then rules as the days increase in length and the Wheel of the Year turns toward the summer. In the summer the Holly King wins. Remnants of this belief in the battle may be found in the traditional Yule Mummers play, performed across Britain and Europe (and now even in the United States) often in association with Morris dancing. In the play the light is represented by St. George and the darkness by a Turkish knight.

Part of the Pagan celebration is the gathering and displaying of evergreen boughs, showing the promise of new life in the coming spring. A Yule tree is erected in many areas to represent the phallus, or the spirit of fertility. From this came the Christian Christmas tree (gifts from the tree actually symbolize the semen springing from the phallus). Yule was established as the birth date of Mithra--with veneration for the sun--and was then adopted by the New Religion (within a few days) to mark the birth of the "Son" Jesus.

A Yule log is burned on the balefire at this time. Obtained from the land of the covenstead, the log is ceremoniously carried in and placed in the fireplace (or the balefire, if at the sabbat site) with just one end of the fire. Lit from the remnants of the previous year's Yule log, it is then inched forward as it burns. The end of a fresh Yule log from that fire is then saved and carefully kept until the following year and is used to start that year's fire. The Yule log supposedly protected the house from fire and lightning thoughout the year. The balefire itself was burned to give life to the sun on its journey. Ashes from the Yule fire were mixed with cow manure and sprinkled over the filds as a symbolic aid to fertility, insuring new life and a fertile spring.

An Invitation To the Fringe of Reality

I don't think I have mentioned it here in the ezine before, but I'm thinking that many of you readers would enjoy my new forum - Fringe of Reality - so I invite you all to check it out. Once you're there, I would very much appreciate it if you'd introduce yourself at this thread so we can all get to know you. That way we know you are a real live person, and not an email harvester. We've had a few of those lately, so be sure to check the "hide your email address" option when you sign up.

Just a note about the topics discussed there - well, they can be about anything you like, even if it is something completely off-the-wall. In fact, we welcome those types of topics, because they tend to make one think outside the box. Chances are, if you are subscribed to this ezine, you pretty much think outside the box anyway, so you would be most welcome there! So, if you want to rant and rave about something, that's fine - or if you just want to start a chit-chat thread, that's fine too. Everyone is welcome - except spammers, phishers, and email harvesters, of course!

Hope to see you there!

FRINGE OF REALITY

The Killer In the Backseat | Urban Legend

I was looking around for some cool urban legends and I found this classic. You have probably heard it before. I remember seeing something about it on the movie Urban Legend, I think. Anyway, I thought you guys might enjoy something like this.

--K

The Killer In the Backseat

As told by Emily Dunbar...

One night a woman went out for drinks with her girlfriends. She left the bar fairly late at night, got in her car and onto the deserted highway. She noticed a lone pair of headlights in her rear-view mirror, approaching at a pace just slightly quicker than hers. As the car pulled up behind her she glanced and saw the turn signal on — the car was going to pass — when suddenly it swerved back behind her, pulled up dangerously close to her tailgate and the brights flashed.

Now she was getting nervous. The lights dimmed for a moment and then the brights came back on and the car behind her surged forward. The frightened woman struggled to keep her eyes on the road and fought the urge to look at the car behind her. Finally, her exit approached but the car continued to follow, flashing the brights periodically.

Through every stoplight and turn, it followed her until she pulled into her driveway. She figured her only hope was to make a mad dash into the house and call the police. As she flew from the car, so did the driver of the car behind her — and he screamed, "Lock the door and call the police! Call 911!"

When the police arrived the horrible truth was finally revealed to the woman. The man in the car had been trying to save her. As he pulled up behind her and his headlights illuminated her car, he saw the silhouette of a man with a butcher knife rising up from the back seat to stab her, so he flashed his brights and the figure crouched back down.

The moral of the story: Always check the back seat!

Comments:
In another common variant of this legend, the imperiled female (and it's always a female, please note) pulls into a gas station and is frightened by the odd behavior of the attendant, who keeps trying to get her to leave the car and join him in the office. It turns out he has glimpsed a knife-wielding murderer in the backseat and is trying to save her life!

Folklorists have traced the legend back to the 1960s and believe it may have been inspired by a vaguely similar real event in 1964 involving the discovery by a New York City policeman of an escaped murderer hiding in the backseat of his (the cop's) own car.

"The Killer in the Backseat" was among the legendary horror stories dramatized in the 1998 film Urban Legend. Let us not assume, however, that real-life evildoers never lie in wait for their victims in the backseats of vehicles. As reported in the Decatur Daily News on September 14, 2007, a female college student in Alabama was threatened by a man with a gun who popped up suddenly in the backseat of her SUV. She escaped, fortunately, by slamming on the brakes and bolting from the car.

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