BYD #49 b: See a Lunar Eclipse.

Only two weeks after the Partial Solar Eclipse comes a Partial Lunar Eclipse! Nice! This one was also much easier to see, and I enjoyed it more than the solar one. Maybe because this time you could actually see the change.

It was a partial eclipse, and at the height of the eclipse 81% of the moon was covered by the earth's shadow. I tried to take pictures of it with the camera on my cell phone, but the pictures didn't turn out good at all. So I made my friend Ivar in Gothenburg go outside and take pictures of the moon with his camera (which is slightly better than the one on my phone).

I would still like to see both a total lunar and a total solar eclipse though. Maybe I shouldn't really be counting these two as completed, until I've seen total eclipses. Ah well, if I ever do, I'll promise to blog about it. :)

OaB #18: Win Something.

This is one of the coolest things ever. Yesterday, I received an email telling me I'm the winner of a competition where the prize was a guitar signed by Jason Mraz.

As some of you know, I'm a HUGE fan of Jason Mraz, so this is really the most awesome thing I could have won!

What happened was I found out that Ginza.se had a competition with a guitar signed by Mraz as the prize. Of course I had to participate, considering I'm a huge fan. I had to write why I deserved to win, so I wrote, and I wrote, and I wrote. Far longer than I usually write when entering competitions like these, but I had to. It was almost like a short essay.

I told them how I had used Pandora.com back in 2004, and that they had suggested that I listen to Jason Mraz. I did, and I loved his songs. You can read about all that in one of my older posts. Long story short - few years later, Mraz became uberpopular in Sweden, which means he actually performs in Sweden every now and then! Awesome! I'm going to a concert with him in Stockholm in September. It also means him being involved in competitions, like the one where you had a chance to meet him (which I didn't win) and this competition, which I'm so happy I won.

BYD #49 a: See a Solar Eclipse.

It wasn't as exciting as I had thought, but at least I've seen one. A partial that is. Today, at 11.40, the moon covered part of the sun here in the Stockholm area. I didn't have any coolish glasses, and no binoculars either, so I had to look directly into the sun, a big no-no of course. But otherwise I wouldn't have seen anything (because it didn't get noticeably darker), so with my left eye closed, I looked into the sun with my right eye, and I saw that the moon had covered about 40% of the sun.

It was supposed to be over 50%, but I doubt that would have been more exciting. I guess it takes a total eclipse for it to be a wow-factor. Some day I'll travel to a country where there will be a total eclipse, as I'd love to see one and as the next one in Sweden is in like 2090 or something...

The weather would have been perfect for a total eclipse. Enough clouds to use as filter, and enough cloud free moments to see just the sun.

I took some pictures with the camera on my mobile, but you can't really see anything except for the sun.