Today:
The waning Moon doesn’t rise until a few minutes before midnight, allowing dark evening skies to reveal the splendors of the Milky Way arched over the top of the sky. Early this evening, in the midst of the Milky Way and directly overhead near 7:55 PM, the star Capella sparkles as the 4th brightest star we can see.
Sunday:
On the next clear night, it should be quite easy to find the brightest star – the North Star, right? No! As you scan the skies, tonight our brightest star emerges from the twilight in the southeast near 6:00 PM, and will be due south at 9:20 PM. You are watching Sirius, known commonly as the “Dog Star”, relatively close to us at only 8.6 light years away.
Monday:
Night owls can see the Moon, just one day past its Last Quarter, rise in the southeast near 2:15 AM tomorrow. Just to its lower left will rise the red star Antares, rising at about 2:50 AM, and the brightest star within the constellation Scorpius. The two will ride low through the sky during the predawn hours, before fading into the twlight, one quarter of the way up and due south, at 6:40 AM.