Just once in a blue moon

Blue moon over Brooklyn. The last one we'll see of its kind until 2015. 

I was so thrilled to learn just a few hours ago on my way home that tonight's full moon is actually a blue moon! I teach the adverbial expression ONCE IN A BLUE MOON in the classroom quite a bit, so I was psyched to finally have the chance to photograph one! This may be the very first blue moon I've ever seen.

I found out about this on the train while scrolling through my Twitter feed and quickly googled it to verify that it was, in fact, a blue moon and that it was, in fact, tonight. I learned a couple of things from my quick research. One, that the definition of a blue moon that I had been using in the classroom was actually a second, more common definition that was actually a mistake made by a magazine in 1946 (according to the Huffington Post). This definition says that a blue moon is the second full moon in a calendar month, which usually only has one full moon.

The original definition describes a blue moon as the third full moon in a season with four full moons. A season, which runs between a solstice and an equinox, usually only has three full moons, so one with four is also very rare. The last one before today, August 20, 2013, was on November 21, 2010 and the next one won't be until 2015.

Blue moon behind some clouds.

Btw, if you've forgotten, a solstice is either the beginning of summer or of winter when we get the most or the least daylight, while an equinox is either the start of spring or fall when we get equal amounts of day and night.

I don't usually get this excited over celestial events, but this one has linguistic connections. So here I am, chucking my to-do list for the night and blogging, posting, and tweeting about this blue moon, instead. It's all good. :-)