Goodby Decade and Blue Moon

Well, here it is, New Years Eve, 2009! In just a few short hours we begin a new year and a new decade. Who knows what the next decade will reveal to us. For me, it's been quite an adventure. I remember watching TV at the beginning of the new melemnium. It started with a single man blowing a conch shell on an island in the Pacific, the first land mass to welcome the new century. Now, we are going out with a blue moon! How cool is that?
A blue moon refers to a second full moon in a calendar month. Many people assumed this must have referred to ancient observations concerning the rarity of tow full moons in a month, the earliest record of this usage dates back only to 1946, when it appeared in an issue of Sky & Telescope magazine.
The author of the piece, James Hugh Pruett, an astronomer from Oregon, cited a 1937 edition of the Maine Farmers' Almanac. However, an investigation by Roger Sinnott, the current editor of Sky & Telescope, and Donald Olsen, a Texas physicist and authority on almanacs, revealed that there was no mention of a second full moon of the month in the Maine Farmers' Almanac.
They scoured more than 40 editions of the almanac and while they found plenty of blue moons, not one of them was the second full moon of the month. In ancient folklore, a blue moon is said to have face and talk to you or if you let the blue moon shine on you, you will turn mad! LOL
Have a wonderful and safe New Year everyone!