Today:
The star Antares, the “heart” of Scorpio, the Scorpion, shines due south, only one quarter of the way above the horizon at 11:30 PM, shimmering a bright orangish-red. Antares was one of the four Royal Stars in Persian astronomy, marking the position of the Sun at the beginning of autumn thousands of years ago. You can see the head and shoulders of the Scorpion – a trio of stars – to the upper right.
Thursday:
With the Summer Solstice but three days hence, you might think that the Sun will pass directly overhead. It’s true that the Sun reaches its highest point at our latitude on the Summer Solstice, though it runs just shy of 70 degrees above the southern horizon near 1:00 PM. To see the Sun directly overhead, you would need to travel south to the line on the globe marked the Tropic of Cancer, the northernmost point at which this happens on the Summer Solstice.
Friday:
At dusk this evening, the Moon appears about a third of the way up in the west-southwest. As the Moon lowers toward the western horizon, a companion will emerge from the evening twilight at around 9:40. This is the star Regulus, the brightest in the constellation Leo. Looking farther toward the horizon in the west-northwest, the two align well with Venus, Jupiter, and Mercury.