The inner solar system has been visited by a lot of debris left over after all the planets where made.  This stuff is made out of some dust, some rock, and lots of ice.  That is why they have the nickname of "dirty snowballs".  So, where do these things come from?  Billions of them make up a huge cloud that orbits our sun.  This circular Oort cloud doesn't start until after you get past Pluto's orbit.  Every now and then one of these objects gets knocked out of its place in the cloud and starts an extremely long orbit that dips near the sun and then back out past Pluto.  Sometimes, they plunge into the sun.

On this journey of theirs they put on a great show for us.  Here are a few examples.  This first picture has two comets in it, one at the upper left and one at the lower right:

 

 

This next one sure does have a long tail:

 



This one is a little further out:

 

 

All comets have two tails.  On is the ion tail that always points directly away from the sun because it is caused by the solar wind.  The other tail is a dust trail laid out behind the comet as it travels through space:

 

 

Another example of two tails.  This time they are almost in opposite directions:

 

 

And here are four more for your viewing pleasure:





 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I uploaded all these pictures to my computer last night but I didn't bother to add their names, figuring that I would go back to where I found them and ad their names today as I was writing this blog.  Trouble is, I can't find where I found them.  The names of most of them would not be familiar to all of you, they weren't for me.  The night sky is amazing.  Don't forget to look up when you go out at night.  You may see some amazing things!!  Now, you all have a great day and a great night, you hear?