Mercury Retrogrades in your Calendar?
Q:What does it mean (astronomically speaking) when Mercury is in Retrograde?
The word “planet” comes from the Greek term asteres planetai i.e. “stars that wander.” Partly, what this is referring to is how from time to time planets will appear to shift direction and move backwards as compared to all the other stars in the night sky. This “backwards” movement is retrograde motion. See below for a video that illustrates this very well.
Q: Will I be able to observe this while skygazing?
Not easily. You would have to be very patient to notice the retrograde “motion”. This event is mostly of significance to astrologers. To learn more about both the astronomical and astrological significance of the Mercury Retrograde event, click here. If you aren’t sure that you know the difference between astronomy and astrology, click here.
Q: Well, what’s this doing in my astronomy calendar? Hey, you got chocolate in my peanut butter!
A: While I’m generally a scientific-minded fellow, I couldn’t help but notice this odd correlation in my own life between communications-related foul-ups (hard drives crashing, email going wrong, websites disappearing) and the three or so times a year when astrology-minded friends would warn me to brace for “Mercury Retrograde”. I’m not talking about an observation bais correlation, I mean a downright creepy correlation. I started avoiding things like major systems upgrades during mercury retrograde. This gave me extra time to deal with all the other batshit crazy computer stuff that happened to my clients during retrogrades. I can’t explain it, but it works for me, so maybe it will work for you too.
Many calendar applications allow one to create and share ics files. Assuming the question is that you also want to see the chinese lunar calendar at the same time so you can define the birthdays in relation to it, then you'd just need to subscribe to an ics url that suits. Subscribing to this public calendar (.ics file) will insert dates and times of events of astronomical significance into your iPhone / iCal / other calendar program / cybernetic mutant brain chip. This calendar is something I curate by hand at the beginning of each year to highlight full moons, new moons, eclipses, solstices, equinoxes, mercury retrogrades, plus a meteor shower or two and some other surprises. Each ICS file contains – Descriptions + Emojis: to help you easily identify optimal vs less optimal periods and their significance – Planetary Events: Basic planetary aspects, retrogrades + stations, ingresses – Lunar Events: New and Full Moons, Eclipses, 1st and 3rd Quarter Moons, Lunar Ingresses and VOC.
To the hardcore positivist scientist types who subscribe to my calendar, I sincerely apologize for getting my chocolate in your peanut butter. But just for kicks… see if you notice anything funny going on with your comms/intelligence gear during these periods, and let me know…
Contact
Found an incorrect date or time? Need to dispute the date or spelling of an astro-pagan holiday? Have some additional advice to contribute?
You can contact Canton at canton@gmail.com.
The author of this calendar, relaxing on the surface of the moon wearing his earthrise goggles and dust-retardant rave-wear.
Thank you once again for sending me the mercury retrograde [calendar]. I still have problems accepting the entire idea but unfortunately for my sanity, a few days ago, my site went offline and my mail app (which is directly connected to my site) began messing up.
It finally occurred to me to bring up my calendar. WAAAAHHHHHH! But thank you again. 🙂
Rimone
Full moons and meteor showers for your calendar
Subscribing to this public calendar (.ics file) will insert dates and times of events of astronomical significance into your iPhone / iCal / other calendar program / cybernetic mutant brain chip. This calendar is something I curate by hand at the beginning of each year to highlight full moons, new moons, eclipses, solstices, equinoxes, mercury retrogrades, plus a meteor shower or two and some other surprises. This calendar has been running continuously since 2007 and has over 110,000 subscribers.
Not sure if you want these items added to your calendar? You can preview what items will be inserted here.
iPhone / Macintosh OS X users, use Safari to click here to subscribe to these events using iCal.
The ICS URL (for google or yahoo calendar, etc.) is:
https://cantonbecker.com/astronomy-calendar/astrocal.ics
Q: Does this work with Google Calendar or Yahoo Calendar?
https://www.cantonbecker.com/astronomy-calendar/astrocal.ics
Q: Why do events such as the Full Moon have both a date and time?
A: Because the time shows the exact moment when the the moon will appear most full. Depending on where you are in the world, you will want to plan your full moon adventure on the night that is closest to the full moon. For example, the September 26, 2007 full moon happened at 3:45 pm Eastern Time. If you were in Europe, that was 7:45 or 8:45 pm. If you were in New Zealand, that was 7:45 am
on the following day – September 27th. So if you were in London, you’d want to howl at the moon on the night of the 26. But if you were in New Zealand, it’s the night of the 27th when the moon appeared brightest.* Event times in this calendar are entered as UTC or Mountain Time – but your software should automatically convert to your local timezeone.
Q: How do I unsubscribe?
A: That depends on your device or software.Just try googling for something like, “how to unsubscribe calendar iPhone”.
Contact
Chinese Calendar
Found an incorrect date or time? Need to dispute the date or spelling of an astro-pagan holiday? Have some additional advice to contribute?
You can contact Canton at canton@gmail.com.
Lunar Calendar Ics Login
I came here to say “Thank You”
YOU’RE WELCOME! I love putting together this calendar each year. Everyone needs a reminder to look up at the sky from time to time. If you’d like a way to say “thank you”, then buy YOURSELF a present! If you purchase anything from amazon.com after following this link then I get a 5% kickback from whatever you’ve added to your cart. (It doesn’t cost you anything extra.) Use this link to start ALL your holiday shopping!
Here are some gift ideas for yourself:
- THE MOST AMAZING STAR TOY IN THE UNIVERSE. (I own two, no kidding.) Not at all cheesy like the picture would leave you to believe. Quite stunning, with minuscule laser dots wandering around in every which direction…
- Seveneves by Neal Stephenson. Rip roaring science fiction. It starts off with the moon blowing up. (Not a spoiler, it happens on page two.)
- A great starter telescope for under $100. Great for looking at our planets, the moon… I used this to look at the transit of Mercury in 2019 (with a sun filter of course.) Kids love refractor telescopes because they don’t invert the image… which means they can use them to spy on their neighbors!