Venus is a brilliant beacon in the early morning sky before sunrise.
It passes close to the bright star Regulus the next few mornings, and the changes you can see each day make it easy to appreciate how rapidly Venus moves against the background stars.
Venus will be 13 degrees directly above the eastern horizon on Friday at 5 a.m. Regulus will be two degrees below Venus, toward the horizon.
Venus will only be a degree above Regulus on Saturday and will pass half a degree north (to the left of Regulus) on Sunday. By Monday, Venus is slightly closer to the horizon than Regulus.
Regulus, at the heart of Leo the Lion, is about 79 light-years away and 150 times brighter than the sun in visible light.
It is actually a quadruple (four-star) system. The main star is spinning so fast on its axis that its poles are somewhat flattened, with the star looking like an egg on its side.
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Goodbye summer
Autumn begins at 2:19 p.m. Tuesday.
That's the official time of the autumnal equinox when we go from summer into autumn. At that time, the sun appears to cross the celestial equator from the northern part of the sky to the southern part of the sky.
"Equinox" means "equal night" — the hours of day and night are equal.
There is actually somewhat more daylight than night because the atmosphere acts as a giant lens and bends the sun's light up above the horizon a few minutes before sunrise and a few minutes after sunset.
Around the times of the vernal (spring) and autumnal (fall) equinox, the sun rises due east and sets due west.