The transit of Mercury is underway! But I won't be seeing it. The sky in the Northeast is overcast and dripping rain.

No Mercury today, so below is the Venus transit in 2004. In June 2012 I hope to improve on my Venus transit photos, and in May 2016 I'll get another crack at Mercury. Hopefully I'll be in a less dreary location for those occasions.

Considering that Venus is roughly the size of Earth, it shows how teeny and insignificant we are. Mercury is smaller and further away than Venus, so if you see it today it will be even more teeny. A fellow in Texas posted an early shot of the Mercury transit in a forum on the Cloudy Nights site. On the face of the sun is a gigantic sunspot that is several times as big as the planet.