You’ve probably been hearing about it for months. When it arrives, your dog will go insane, everyone will stream outdoors into the parking lot wearing dorky glasses, and the world might end!
I’m talking, of course, about the solar eclipse. It’s been all over the news for multiple weeks.
People reportedly drove thousands of miles and spent thousands of dollars to see the eclipse, a rare example of a total eclipse over the United States.
If you watched the eclipse from California, though, it’s OK if you didn’t find it particularly interesting. In fact, it’s totally fine to admit that here in the Golden State, the eclipse was pretty boring.
Why is that? It has to do with the path that the eclipse followed. As the moon passes over the sun and briefly blocks it out, the area that is fully blocked is called the path of totality.
Although that path fell over the United States, it wasn’t anywhere close to California. In the middle of the country, the sky actually descended into darkness during the eclipse.
Here in California, however, it just meant that the sky got a little darker at about 11:15 this morning. The effect was more like a cloud passing over the sun than a blotting out of all light.
That said, because the sun wasn’t really covered that much at all today, it would’ve been a really bad idea to view California’s eclipse without special protective glasses.
Even if you had those glasses, you’d be treated to a slightly darker, smaller-looking sun. Not exactly something worth spending thousands of dollars on.
Maybe you went outside today during the eclipse expecting to be awed, and walked away bored. That’s OK.
Or conversely, maybe the eclipse here in California left you thinking you should travel to a place where the sun is fully blotted out the next time an eclipse arrives.
In that case, you’ll have to wait about 20 years until August 23, 2044. You’ll also have to travel to a remote part of North or South Dakota, which is where the next total eclipse will pass through the United States.
So start waiting, folks! Or maybe head to YouTube and just watch some of the cool videos of people who captured today’s solar eclipse in a place where it was actually interesting to look at.
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