Tuesday, September 12, 2006

Dwarf Planet? Pluton? Lumpy Thing in Outer Space?

At three years of age, Lucia is already asking the hard questions of life. Bede reports:

Planets

9 comments:

Yorkshire Pudding said...

On the day the free world remembered 9/11 you were discussing planets etc with Little Lucia. Hasn't the news filtered through to Seattle yet? Mind you to have spawned a child genius - I can see how you might have been distracted.

Saints and Spinners said...

Alkelda the Gleeful said...
Yes, Yorkshire Pudding, the news has filtered to Seattle. I did live in NYC for two years, and have family in both New York and D.C. On September 11, 2001, when my husband told me that terrorists had attacked buildings in New York and D.C., I first thought they were flying overhead and dropping bombs. For a few seconds, I thought just about everyone I knew and loved had perished.

Some of my friends grew up in countries where their cities were regularly bombed, and are still regularly bombed. I can only begin to imagine what they have gone through.

Liz said...

Lucia likes planets? Now where in the world did that come from ;)

Go ahead and explain it to her. I know she's more than smart enough to understand.

Yorkshire Pudding said...

I accept my spanking.

Saints and Spinners said...

Nonny: I have no idea! It must be in the water or something.
Yorkshire Pudding: You took it like a (hu)man.:)

Lone Star Ma said...

How's she taking it about Pluto? She's so smart!

Okay: I've been very busy, so you have to help me. Ceres? That is the Roman form of Demeter, which fits the pantheon. What happened to the "planet" they named after a Native American goddess a few years back? Did they take it back? Help sort me out, please.

Saints and Spinners said...

LSM: It's fortunate that Pluto was never her favorite. She's a Jupiter and Saturn girl. The Trans-Neptunian object to which you're referring is Sedna, the Inuit goddess of the sea. I'm linking to a photo of a carving of Sedna. She looks like a selkie!

Lone Star Ma said...

Oh! Thank you! She does look like a selkie! And she's red! Us sea goddesses don't get a lot of red play! So is she still a trans-neptunian object like Pluto and Ceres? A dwarf planet? Or doesn't she count?

Saints and Spinners said...

LSM: Of course Sedna counts! Every bit of spinning, rolling rock in outer space counts, just like every dinosaur fossil counts. Ceres is not a trans-neptunian object, though, because Ceres hangs out in the asteroid belt. If Pluto is a dwarf planet, and Sedna is bigger than Pluto, then Sedna must be a dwarf planet too. But I don't know-- that Oort cloud is ridiculously far away from the sun. Hmmmm. Time to do research.