When astronomers meet

Right now, the American Astronomical Society -- the professional society for spacey-types here in the U.S. -- is holding their bi-annual meeting. The meetings are usually a terrific amount of fun, with lots of astronomy talks, seeing old friends, and tons and tons of very cool astronomy news. I usually attend, but circumstances gave kept me away this year. Still, there's no need for you to miss out on the news. First of all, you can always go to Universe Today, which always has a lot of info on the astronews from the meetings. Furthermore, Pamela Gay of StarStryder has the schedule of live press conferences on her blog, and she is live-streaming them on UStream. Even cooler, you can join the chat room in the stream, and ask questions that may very well get relayed to the scientists holding the presser. So you can ask astronomers questions! We've done this in the past and it's a great way to see what's what in cutting edge science. Don't be shy!