It's the last "blue moon" of the decade, and you can totally miss it

I am all for an exciting "blood moon" (aka: a total lunar eclipse) or even just a little interesting "super moon"When the full moon looks a little bigger in the sky, but there's absolutely no reason to get excited for Saturday's" blue moon ".

You may have already seen other titles claiming that this would be the last time this single moon would rise until 2021, but nothing actually allows an astronomer to distinguish a blue moon from any other Moon.

According to the Library of Congress, a blue moon occurs when a given season has four full moons rather than the three normal ones. When this happens, the third moon of the four is called a blue moon.

It has nothing to do with the coloration of our natural satellite, nor with the space, for that matter.

This is one of the naming conventions of the old farmers' almanacs: the same as calling the January full moon "lupine moon " because wolves have often been heard screaming at the winter moon, apparently.

This is the oldest definition of a blue moon, at least. This also comes to be defined as the second full moon that falls in the same calendar month. So, if there is a full moon on the first day of each month (except in February), you will get a blue moon about four weeks later.

Again, this new definition really has nothing to do with the Moon itself, which simply deals with its business in normal orbit. On the contrary, a blue moon depends on the rather arbitrary calendar that we all decided to use to keep track of our lives.

So, although the blood moons are not really bloody and the supermons are really "cool" rather than super, both are worth going out to see. A blue moon, on the other hand, is really identical to the full moon of last month. If you miss it, there will be a rehearsal showing four weeks later, without the fancy title.