Pluto is Fired!

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/08/24/pluto.ap/index.html

Pluto is no longer officially a planet. I'm not sure how I feel about this. It's a major enough thing to me to blog about. Space has always been a subject of dinnertime discussions in my family. I grew up with books on astronauts to look at. When we moved to Florida in 1985, right near the Kennedy Space Center, it only became more so.

I've *taught* solar system subjects to 3rd graders before! Now... Pluto is out the window. Well, ok, it's been "reclassified" as a dwarf planet, but unless you live in Ironforge that's small consolation (geek joke). I can see the reasoning, that based on the criteria decided upon, Pluto doesn't make it as an official planet. It's just weird to think of our solar system with 8 planets, not 9.

It could be worse though. The extra celestial bodies out past Pluto could have made it in as planets also. Then we'd be dealing with Planet Xena and it's moon Gabrielle. No, that's not a joke. Michael Brown, from the California Institute of Technology discovered it and wanted to name it that. Somehow, that's just taking fandom a bit too far.