Dark Short Fiction,
Dark Romantic Fiction,
Horror short & flash fiction stories,
And the occasional bottle of wine...
  OCTOBER 2020 THE FULL HARVEST MOON & THE FULL BLUE MOON  The sun greets us every morning, many times with a beautiful sunrise, but unlike the moon, it's always a circular orb that glows with warmth. The moon greets us each night (even the new moon hidden in the shadows), showing us a different shape and phase, as it moves through its magical, monthly journey. The full moon, however, gets most of our attention. A full moon calls the werewolf to transform, for witches to gather around their cauldrons, and some say, causes human to behave a bit 'looney." The moon (Luna, in Italian and Spanish, with Latin origins) gave us the word lunatic and many illegal 'sprits' were brewed beneath the moonshine as not to get caught.  In Tarot, the Moon Card is a Major Arcana and traditionally depicts the full moon lighting a path with two towers (good and evil) in the distance, helping navigate through the two forces one must face on life's journey. 2020 has been a tough year, but for those of us who love Autumn, Halloween, and all things that go bump in the night, this month 2020 has no tricks up her sleeve, but an astronomical treat - 2 full moons. The Harvest Moon is the full moon closest to the Autumn Equinox. Sometimes it's in September, sometimes, October. This year's Harvest moon was on October 1st and it was a beauty! Scientifically - the moon usually rises about 50 minutes later than the night before, but the Harvest moon due to its alignment with the equinox, rises only 30 mins later each night. This can sometimes give the appearance of the a huge moon hanging in the sky, but it's an illusion - a very cool one, but nevertheless, an optical illusion. Historically - many crops are ready to be picked in Sept/October. For centuries and probably millennia, farmers noticed the difference in the moon at this time of the year and without our modern technology, worked late into the night, with the moon light guiding them, to a successful harvest. A Blue Moon happens approximately every 2.5 years, when instead of 12 full moons a year, we have 13. (or 4 full moons during one season, not 3). This year we have a Blue Moon on October 31st! Yay!! No one can pinpoint when or why it's been called a Blue Moon. There's a reference to the phrase in the 16th century by Cardinal Wolsey mocking the intelligence of his enemies by saying "they would believe the moon is blue." By the 1700's it become a term for an 'absurdity or impossibility." But in the early 1900's, the Farmer's Almanac in Maine, coined the term "Blue Moon' one year that had an extra full moon in a season, and it stuck. Halloween will arrive this year is all it's creepy glory, and while we may have to celebrate differently than we're used to, at the very least we can all sit back and gaze up at the wonder of the 2020 Blue Moon, cocktail in hand...  ~ I hope everyone had a good time at this year's October Frights Blog Hop. Thanks again to everyone who stopped by this week and to Anita Stewart for organizing and doing all the hard work. Please leave a comment to be entered in a drawing for a $10 Amazon Gift Card. HAPPY, HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE! STAY SAFE AND HEALTHY, BE RESPECTFUL OF OTHERS, AND HAVE A SPOOKY GOOD TIME!  PLEASE VISIT THE OTHER AWESOME HORROR AND PARANORMAL AUTHORS PARTICIPATING
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Debbie
10/15/2020 11:59:38 am
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Debbie Christiana
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