Eclipse: PR stunt.

The more I think about it, the more I understand that today's so-called "solar eclipse" is nothing but a public relations stunt. Yeah, you heard me. Who by? Who else? By the same people who brought you green cheese: the moon.

You got it -- I'm willing to take on Big Satellite here.

The moon has been trying to get attention for some time now. Remember last year's Supermoon? That turned out to be a big bust -- nothing but trouble. I was willing to cut the moon some slack at the time, but now I am more cynical. Now that I see the moon is just out for what it can get, that it only thinks of its own interest, I am convinced it caused all kinds of trouble on that fateful day and will probably get up to more lunar high jinks today.

Already the stupidity is starting. Price gouging for eclipse-related travel is an actual thing. Fake eclipse glasses may wind up causing permanent vision damage to the poor fools who bought them. And speaking of fools, there's the mom who wanted the eclipse moved so it wouldn't conflict with school, and the professor complaining in print that the path of the main eclipse zone has willfully followed non-black areas of the country. The Eclipse Is Racist!

Clearly, the moon is making us even dumber than usual. It is part of its plan.

And seriously, does the moon even need publicity? IMDb has more than 200 productions with the word "Moon" in the title. AllMusic lists over 1,000 songs with "Moon" in the title, and over 1,000 albums. Even the US Patent and Trademark Office lists 4,861 trademarks with "Moon" in it somewhere. If anything, the moon is suffering from overexposure.

I, for one, am not buying into this. I'm going to protest this eclipse nonsense. I'm going to totally ignore this desperate cry for attention. I understand our moon is lonely, all by himself up there (unlike Jupiter's greedy cache of 69 moons), but is that our fault? The moon was formed when something punched our planet -- it was an act of galactic violence. We didn't invite it. We're the victim here. And despite that we went through a lot of trouble to go visit, and even left some neat presents. Well, we'll see if we'll bother with that again anytime soon.

So you may be watching the skies today, but count me out of the hoopla. I'll just be enjoying the shade.