Quote from: leith;149947

I miss knowing the GD would be playing today as they loved to play on the Solstice.

I did not know that. Was there a reason behind this? such as energy or something heady?

fair enough. I\'m sure that there is an energy created on today that is unlike any other day.

Solstice brings longest day, strange traditions[/i]
By Richard Stenger
CNN.com Writer

(CNN) -- A scientifically precise event that happens once every six months, the solstice has inspired mysterious celebrations and been blamed for irrational conduct for centuries.

The summer solstice arrives when the sun reaches its farthest point north of the equator. It marks the longest day of the year and the beginning of summer for the Northern Hemisphere. The event produces the opposite effect in the southern half of the planet: the shortest day of the year and the onset of winter.

The annual changing of the seasons bathes the Arctic in sunlight and plunges much of the Antarctic in darkness for months. But southerners take heart. After the solstice occurs, the sun begins a march south, concluding six months later with another solstice in which the seasons reverse themselves.

The North Pole tilts slightly more than 23 degrees toward the sun on the day of the solstice. The vertical noon rays are directly over the Tropic of Cancer. In late December the conditions reverse, with the South Pole tilting toward the sun and the solar rays shining over the Tropic of Capricorn.

Civilizations have celebrated summer solstices since ancient times. The Romans honored Fors Fortuna, the goddess of fortune. The Druids assembled at Stonehenge, a mysterious prehistoric arrangement of mammoth stone slabs in England.

The circle of megaliths is arranged to capture the light of the summer solstice sunrise, much like a temple the Incas built centuries ago in Peru.

Legend holds that the summer solstice, also known as midsummer, prods humans to engage in strange behavior. The myth inspired Shakespeare in his "A Midsummer Night\'s Dream," a romantic, nonsensical comedy that took place on the summer solstice.

The moon appeared unusually bright and colorful when it was full four days. Known as rose or strawberry moons, full moons in June often put on such displays.

They follow the lowest path across the sky of all full moons. And moons seen just above the horizon look much larger than normal because of an optical illusion.

Such moons can look more colorful for the same reason that sunsets appear red. The low-hanging moon often takes on a pink or orange hue as a result of scattered moonlight in the atmosphere.