This summer will be a little bit longer than usual. A tiny little bit: one second, to be precise. The world’s official time keepers are adding a single second to the clocks at the end of June. This "leap second" is needed to keep various time scales in synch. It’s a bit of a pain and won’t really affect people much, but if it weren’t done things would get messy eventually.

This gets a bit detailed — which is where the fun is! — but in short it goes like this. We have two systems to measure time: our everyday one which is based on the rotation of the Earth, and a fancy-schmancy scientific and precise one based on vibrations of atoms. The two systems aren’t quite in synch, though, since the Earth counts a day as a tiny bit longer than the atomic clocks say it is. So every now and again, to get them back together, we add a leap second on to the atomic clocks. That holds them back for one second, and then things are lined up once again.

There. Nice and simple. But that’s spackling over all the really cool details! If you want a little more info, you can read the US Naval Observatory’s press release on this (PDF).

If you want the gory details, then sit back, and let me borrow a second of your time.

Time after time

There are lots of ways of keeping time. The basic unit day is based on the physical rotation of the Earth, and year is how long it takes to go around the Sun. But we need finer units than those! So we decided long ago to divide the day into 24 hours, and those into 60 minutes each, and those into 60 seconds each. In that case, there are 86,400 seconds in a day. OK, easy enough.

For most of us, that is enough. But scientists are picky (or "anal" if you want to be technical) and like to be more precise than that. And the thing is, the Earth is a bit of a sloppy time keeper. Tidal effects from the Sun and Moon, for example, slow it a bit. Other effects come in as well, changing the rate of the Earth’s rotation.

To account for this, in 1956 the International Committee for Weights and Measures made a decision: we’ll base the length of the second on the year, not the day. In fact, we’ll take the year as it was in the year 1900 (a nice round number, so why not) and say that the length of the second is exactly 1/31,556,925.9747 of the year as measured at the beginning of January 1900^*.

OK, fine. Now scientists have their anal precise definition, normal people have calendars, and we’re all happy, right?

Right?

Sunrise, sunset

Yeah. Not so much. (more…)

You may have seen the particle zoo plushies: stuffed versions of various particles like the bottom quark and the electron antineutrino. They’ve been plugged on lots of other websites and I have to admit they’re pretty cute (and maybe even a good way to get kids indoctrinated interested in science).

My friend Scott Romanowksi just tipped me off that they have a new item: the Cosmic Microwave Background plushie. It’s pretty funny:

Awwwwww.

… but. Reading the accompanying text, I had to laugh.

It says, "The variations in the [CMBR] pattern corresponds to density variations which formed galaxies and were first detected by NASA’s KOBE explorer."

The satellite to which they refer is the Cosmic Background Explorer, or COBE. Not "KOBE", which is either a tasty Japanese beef or a basketball player with a somewhat checkered history. Also, to be über-pedantic, the E is for "explorer", so it’s like saying "ATM Machine", and etc. I’ve sent them an email about it, and I fully expect them to shower me with plushies out of gratitude. Or, more likely, they’ll send me an email back making fun of me. [Update: Feel the true power of the BABLog: I got an email from Julie at Particle Zoo, and she's already corrected the image! Awesome.]

Either way, better get your plushie now: once Planck starts mapping the CMBR these’ll be collectors’ items.

OK, major Doctor Who spoiler alert! Well, kinda– not a plot spoiler, but a series 5 spoiler about the new companion.

OK, is that enough? Den of Geek is spreading the rumor that the new companion for the new Doctor is a young lass named Hannah Murray. I’ve not heard of her, but she was on a BBC show called Skins. She’s very young, 19, which come to think of it was how old Rose was supposed to be in the first series (Billie Piper was actually 23 in 2005).

Sticking with the theme, Ms. Murray is a cutie, but I’m starting to wonder. With the new Doctor being played by an actor who is only 27, they may have picked her to make the Doctor look older. I’m starting to suspect that after the next regeneration, the Doctor will be played by a fetus.

Anyway, consider this in the rumor stage. But it’ll be a while before this one’s confirmed, since the first of the last shows with David Tennant won’t air until Easter, and the next one after that won’t be until — cripes! — December! The rumor mill will have at least a year to churn, so expect lots of twists in this particular plot as time unfolds.

I’ve been a huge fan of singer/songwriter Sara Hickman since like 1990. She is a fantastic singer, and her songs are intelligently and lovingly written. I’ve seen her in concert a few times, and she’s wonderful. She lives in Austin, Texas, and is also very giving to the community, sponsoring projects for kids and people in need.

My family spent Thanksgiving visiting friends in Austin, and they knew of my unrequited crush on Sara. So after some finagling, they managed to get her to come to their house and give us a private concert! I was swooning the whole time, but managed to get some video. With her permission, here is Sara singing one of my favorites (I asked her to sing this, in fact), "Simply". It’s a love song. On the video I missed the first few seconds of her description; she’s saying she wrote this song when she was 17 and had a crush on a boy… the actual song starts about 2 minutes in, but listen to her intro since it’s delightful.

She was a total sweetheart, even letting The Little Astronomer use her guitar and play a song she’s learning.

You can find out more about Sara at SaraHickman.com. My HUGE thanks to Gennie and Bill for getting this put together!

Note added after I initially wrote this: To see what else Sara is capable of — in a totally different but hauntingly beautiful way — watch this video of hers of "Mad World". It’s astonishing.

Genetic material is not a finite resource. It’s not used up like printer ink or oil or raspberry jelly (note to self: need to go shopping). Watered liberally with nurture, nature can produce a lot of talent in one family. For example, my sister sings opera, and she’s really good. Yet I can play trombone, showing that musical talent is not a non-renewable resource.

Writing is the same, y’know. My extraordinary abilities, generally eclipsing those of mere mortals, are not alone in the family font. I present to you my brother’s blog, hosted at his site Plait Solutions. He does computer tech support in his town of Roswell (I know, I know, but this one is in Atlanta, not New Mexico; the only aliens there show up for Dragon*Con), and started a blog to help out his clients and give them some basic, useful information. He does have some solid advice there, as well as the odd ramble or two.

Sounds familiar. But then, what is the root of the word familiar?

I’m traveling to St. Louis for a meeting (if you’re in the area, come to our blogger meetup!). But, in the tradition of the web, today is Caturday, a day when you can legitimately blog about your cat.

So why not take the chance to welcome everyone to my newest — sorta — family member, Dinger?

The reason I say "sorta" is because my wife and I got her when she was a kitten quite some time ago, before The Little Astronomer was even born (I have a picture of Dinger peering curiously into my daughter bassinet). We had her for several years, but when we moved to California we decided she might enjoy life on my in-laws farm more, so we gave her to them. She stayed with them for about four years, but now they are moving to Colorado (just a couple of towns over, in fact), so we took her back.

She’s 14. Fourteen. So she’s the newest member of the fam, but in subjective years she’s like 128. She mostly sits around and sleeps, purrs, and growls when Canis Major or Canis Minor get too close (C. Minor is terrified of her, actually). She still hasn’t gotten tooth and claw with our other cat, whom I will simply call Lynx, keeping with the astronomical pseudonyms (though getting her real name isn’t all that hard to do).

Which reminds me: Dinger is in fact the new cat’s real name. It’s short for Schrödinger.

Feel free to LOL her.

I’ll be attending the American Astronomical Society meeting in St. Louis starting Sunday (in two days! Aiiieee!), where I’ll be reporting on all the astronews goodness I can.

A bunch of astronomy bloggers will be there, and following our awesome meetup we had in Austin in January, we decided to do it again. Pamela Gay (Star Stryder, Astronomy Cast), Chris Lintott (Chris Lintott’s Universe, Galaxy Zoo), me, Nancy Atkinson (Universe Today) and probably a bunch of others will be there.

We’ll be meeting at the KitchenK restaurant on Tuesday, June 3, at 7:00 p.m. We’ll be eating, drinking, chatting, bragging, mixing, matching, gerundizing, and probably other things for which there are no words.

Be there, or B²!