Betelgeuse Beetle Juice Beetlejuice

From www.space.com

"A massive red star in the constellation Orion has shrunk in the past 15 years and astronomers don't know why.

Called Betelgeuse, the star is considered a red super giant. Such massive stars are nearing the ends of their lives and can swell to 100 times their original size before exploding as supernovae, or possibly just collapsing to form black holes without violent explosions (as one study suggested).

In 1993, measurements put Betelgeuse's radius at about 5.5 astronomical units (AU, not Australia)), where one AU equals the average Earth-sun distance of 93 million miles, or about 150 million km. Since then it has shrunk in size by 15 percent. That means the star's radius has contracted by a distance equal to the orbit of Venus.

"To see this change is very striking," said Charles Townes, a UC Berkeley professor emeritus of physics. "We will be watching it carefully over the next few years to see if it will keep contracting or will go back up in size." (Townes won the 1964 Nobel Prize in physics for inventing the laser and the maser, a microwave laser.)

Though the star is shrinking, its visible brightness has not dimmed significantly over the past 15 years, the researchers say.

"But we do not know why the star is shrinking," said Edward Wishnow, a research physicist at UC Berkeley's Space Sciences Laboratory. "Considering all that we know about galaxies and the distant universe, there are still lots of things we don't know about stars, including what happens as red giants near the ends of their lives."

WTF does this mean to you? Probably nothing, just as studying earthquakes means nothing to Gov. Jindal and money for hurricane tracking weather satellites means nothing to Gov. Palen.

Just two of the many simple minded people with their heads buried in their own little world. Oblivious to the greater world outside their view or vision. No need for empathy if they are not “One of us”.

Is this a trait that any presidential hopeful should have? They think so, as does the far right!

Now repeat after me:

“Betelgeuse

Beetle Juice

Beetlejuice”

They all sound the same but who would know without checking?

BTW, if Betelgeuse does collapse and sends a gamma ray burst towards the earth. All life, down to the microbes living in the mud of the Yellow River, will become extinct. This means you numb nuts!

“Thank you babe!”

Steve