Next stop: Planet Sedna -- just when you think you can remember basic facts from fourth grade, like the number of planets in the solar system, they go and change them. Later today NASA will give more details on the new "planetoid," three times more distant than Pluto and 400+ degrees below zero. The article also mentions Quaoar, a recently discovered not-quite-planet in the Kuiper Belt I'd never even heard of. Time to pay more attention to the skies...

Meanwhile, if you're like me, you'll be interested to read the tale of the Inuit goddess Sedna, for whom the celestial body is named. Quaoar is also named for a deity: the "great force" in the creation myth of the Tongva people, the native inhabitants of the Los Angeles area. If you're inspired by all of this to name a star after yourself or your favorite god, click here and go crazy.