Save beauty in this universe... Save Hubble!

New ring around Uranus is blue, scientists find - Yahoo! News

Read that Yahoo! News headline again, but this time out loud. "New ring around Uranus is blue." (tee! hee!) Am I the only one who gets a really nasty mental image coming to mind? Oh the poor soul... He just found out he had a ring around his anus! And it's a blue ring! Silly, eh? A bit immature of me too... Anyway, let me switch gears and wipe that picture right out of your brain. This story is about how scientists just found out there is a ring of blue around the planet Uranus. When I was growing up, Saturn was the only planet in our solar system with rings. Now this picture of Uranus is emerging thanks to the Hubble and Keck telescopes. Up close, I bet this planet's rings could actually rival the beauty of Saturn's. Scientists can barely detect its blue ring from earth, but it is there in all its glory. What a spectacular place we live in... this solar system, this universe. We should all fill our heads with such mental images as these. It's much prettier than the picture that first came to mind when I read Yahoo's headline. Don't 'ya think? This is just one of the many scientific findings that's come from Hubble. Now this workhorse of a telescope is expected to go out of commission in a while because its servicing missions were scrapped. Some of the most majestic images that exist of our universe are thanks to this hardworking space telescope. If you love them as much as I do and want to do something about it, check out this site. You can let the powers that be know how you feel. Then maybe we can continue to fill our minds with the beauty and wonder the universe and let scientists continue their work with what they call, "the most significant tool in the history of astronomy."