The King of Winter meets the Lion of Summer

As with most temporal events things are a changing. In case you haven't noticed, or were just not paying attention, the days are getting longer and we are having more hours of daylight.

Since the winter solstice we have gained about one hour and 26 minutes as of today and will be gaining more until the summer equinox when our days will begin going the other way.

The currently visible planets and the moon change their location nightly often involved in an intricate dance or game of Hide-and-Seek.

The stars, however, do not seem to change. We can go outside every night of our lives on our birthday and see the same stars in the same place they were on the day we were born.

As interesting a statement as that is, it is technically not true, the stars are moving, it is just that we -- with our pitifully short lifetimes -- do not notice the movement. To do that we would need an expanse of days stretching into the thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of years.

Having said that, let me say this, from our vantage point on this spinning and orbiting ball we live on, our view of the stars does change. Each night we have moved a little more in our orbit and our view of the night sky changes--the stars have not moved, we have.

With that in mind, let us be outside tonight (or any night for the next week) looking south at about 8 p.m. MST. High above the horizon will be our old friend, Orion. He will be standing tall and upright astride the celestial meridian that divides east from west.

Orion is the epitome of winter, or as some have called him, the "King of Winter," a perfect symbol of the season. We see Orion, we know winter is either near or upon us.

But, now he is on the dividing line of the sky and during the next month or so will be descending toward the western horizon soon to leave the sky.

If you have trouble locating him, it looks like he is holding the moon with his upraised arm.

Now, since we are already outside, look east where we will find another of our old friends, Leo, the Lion seeming to be in position ready to leap into the sky for his turn for our attention.

Leo is the first of the constellations of spring which to our ancestors gave hope for the warming of the weather and the promise of crops to come.

He is easily located if you look for a backwards question mark indicating his head and mane and tangle of stars just above the horizon marking his hindquarters.

As sort of an extra added attraction to Leo, the bright planet Jupiter is located just below him

Now, just for grins and giggles, if you are still awake at midnight go back outside and look south where we will discover that Leo is now standing high on the meridian and Orion is just above the horizon.

SKY WATCH: First quarter moon, February 15 and full moon, February 22. The early morning parade of planets is still visible, if you hurry. Mercury is about to leave the morning sky followed shortly by Venus. Looking southeast about 45-minutes to a half-hour before local sunrise bright Venus is easily found. Much smaller, and dimmer Mercury is found to its lower left just above the horizon. Binoculars will be essential for locating it. On the evening of February 21, the bright star Regulus (the brightest star in Leo) will be close to the almost-full moon in the early evening, and in the early morning hours of Monday, February 29, the moon has moved on to be near brightening Mars.

NEXT WEEK: More astronomical blathering.