The Would-Be "Hut" -- On The Dark Side Of The Moon? Just A... Rock.

Many Earth-bound Sci-Fi lovers had hoped that the blurry images in the distance (originally released in November) from the "Jade Rabbit" Chinese rover on the moon, would turn out to be some form of monolith -- or at least a pristine geometric shape.

Sadly, for the romantics -- that's a. . . nope. It's just an ordinary moon rock, oddly-lit at certain hours, in the orbit. And it all reminds us of the McCracken monoliths found worldwide in late 2020 (thus the legacy image). Here's the non-thrilling denouement, of the story:

. . .The [Chinese] rover has now driven just over 1,000 meters since it arrived three years ago on the moon’s far side, in Von Kármán crater, as part of the Chang’e-4 mission. It is the first mission to land on the far side.

Visual illusions are common in the history of space exploration, whether seen by astronomers peering through telescopes on Earth or robotic explorers on other worlds capturing images with cameras. In a parallel with the rabbitlike rock found by China’s rover, a NASA rover on Mars, Opportunity, spotted something that looked like bunny ears in 2004. Further analysis by engineers on Earth suggested it was insulation or other soft material that fell off the rover itself. . . .

Well -- the next gen Goddard space 'scope (using ifrared), may yet detect a "Dyson Sphere" being piloted around some distant -- and very old "Red Dwarf" star, by some as yet unseen. . . intelligence.

Or. . . (perhaps!) more monoliths may appear this spring in canyons in Utah, Arizona and northern California (or western Oregon). We shall see. . . smiling widely, now.

Confidentially (and tongue firmly in cheek), I've been learning to weld (and preserve!) shiny metal structures, in polished geometric tower-shapes here, in my southwestern hiatus art classes. Hilarious.

नमस्ते