More from my favorite astronomer

Once again, ladies and gentlemen, I bring you Edward Gleason:

From the USM Southworth Planetarium
"In a manner of speaking...."
THE DAILY ASTRONOMER
July 26, 2007
Mars Madness



Our sincerest apologies!
The sound that just thundered across the terrain causing windows to splinter, asphalt to crack, cars to suddenly brake, and hearts to cease was the abject screaming from the remotest depths of the Southworth Planetarium.
Finally, after having for so long set the standard of sanity for the entire Science Building (an impressive accomplishment), we've lost our minds!

Why, you might ask, would we have succumbed to such a nerve disorder? Simple: the Internet Mars announcements are not going away! They continue, despite our ardent pleas to the heavens, our appeals to Google, and our unrelenting campaign against the dissemination of
misinformation. (well, at least the misinformation that doesn't result in a tidy profit).

We figured that since we're all now irreversibly batty, why not propel you into madness, too, with another article about Mars.

First of all: here is what's NOT going to happen on August 27, 2007:

Mars will NOT be closer to us than it has been in 60,000 years.
Mars will NOT be the size of the full Moon.
Mars will NOT cause higher tides and interruptions in the communication infrastructure
and Mars will NOT don a cane and top hat, lock arms with the Moon and sing, "Yes, we have no bananas."
(I told you we've lost our minds.)

This perennial internet announcement is based upon an event that happened about four years ago.

At the end of August 2003, Mars was closer to Earth than it had been in the previous 60,000 years. At this close approach, it looked like a bright, ruddy-red star. Quite lovely, but not nearly as large in our sky as the Full Moon. The only way Mars would ever appear that big is
if one of those ultra mega-giants from the epsilon sector of the Galaxy picked up Mars and in an indignant fit, threw it at us!

So, let us assure you in a serene and friendly manner, that none of these Mars rumours are true.
Mars will look like a moderately bright red-star like object in the post-Midnight August sky. A beguiling sight for the star watcher, to be sure, but not nearly as amazing as these alerts suggest.

PLEASE do the world in general and us in particular the great service of forwarding this announcement to every single person you've ever met. Inform all the recipients that they must forward these announcements to everybody they know or else they'll be jinxed for five years, their coffee will spill, their luggage will be rifled through by over enthusiastic garden gnomes, and the love of their life will turn into one of those spore-emitting mushrooms that everybody playfully kicks on nature walks.