'Earthshine' sheds light on the moon's night side during conjunction

I went outside my friends' house Saturday night and saw these two celestial objects setting in the western sky. Jupiter and the moon came close together for a conjunction. Only a crescent of the moon was illuminated by the sun's direct light. The rest of the natural satellite, however, was lit by "earthshine," or sunlight that bounces off Earth, then hits the moon.

A lucky rainbow

I'm clearly getting behind on posting, so I'm just going throw things out there. This was a rainbow that formed around 6 p.m. one recent day. I had been inside all day up until that point because I had been sick and home from work. It was pure coincidence that I left my apartment for the first time just as the full rainbow formed. Luck helps in photography sometimes. ... Too bad there's an ugly apartment complex in the foreground.