I wasn't planning on watching the partial solar eclipse this afternoon in Gainesville...besides, they seem to be forecasting cloudy if not stormy weather here. But just in case, I Googled "shoebox solar eclipse" and got the needed link to YouTube giving directions on how to build a safe viewer (please don't directly look at the sun during the eclipse, it will cause vision damage). I went into the garage, found a box resembling a shoebox, and then went to work on it, cutting small square holes in the lower small side and, in the corner of the adjacent long side, another one. I cut a small patch of unwrinkled aluminum foil and taped it covering the small side hole. Then, on the inside end of the box opposite the aluminum foil I taped some white paper. I pricked a tiny pinhole in the aluminum foil and then closed up the box, covering any inadvertent openings with duct tape. Then I took it outside and tried it on the sun. I held the box with my back to the sun and let the sunlight go through the foil's pinhole and project onto the white paper inside. I looked through the side opening: voilà, it works, there's the sun on the paper! You can get a sense of my contraption by the photo...the foil is on top and the viewer hole is below it on the adjacent side...it's really quite easy to assemble: most of the time spent involved me looking for stuff...
When the partial eclipse hits its peak at 2:47 pm in Gainesville, I'll most likely be on the road to work. Maybe I'll get to see it, maybe I won't. I think it's kind of funny how in our society a threshold can be crossed with public interest about something and it becomes a mass mania...I hear it's pretty congested right now in the "total eclipse" band spreading west across the country from South Carolina to Oregon. On one hand I'm happy about any public interest in astronomy...on the other, I doubt it will adequately transfer to greater sustained interest about space exploration...
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