I think, among junk mail, science mails irritate the most. Others are pretty bad too, but at least the ones that promise to add a few inches to my appendages have a tongue-in-cheek quality to them. They know that they better entertain, and most of the time they do.But think of all the sheep, the huddled masses who sincerely think that this is the last time the sun will be the brightest, or the moon will be visible and spotless, and they sincerely want to share this wisdom or privilege with you.
This drives me nuts for two reasons.
First, the gullibility. I honestly don't think any of the senders stay up late or make special arrangements to actually check out these cosmic events. And only couple of times a year can the Mars be visible, and two moons may be in the sky, or he meteor shower may look like lord Voldemort. And then the audacity that only once every 10,564 hours, 67 minutes can we see them, so we better drop everything to see this.
Second, the superiority complex implicit in these emails. The senders, who actually have time to meticulously put together these data must have no life, and has to be operating out of their mother's basement, in their spongebob squarepants PJs and 42 day unshaven beard, chugging a sugar free cola substitute made of spyrulina and carrots and a half beaten telescope. And they think they should dictate how you live your life.
Honestly, If you have a telescope, how long will you be looking at the sky before your attention would turn to the voluptuous neighbor next street with the exhibitionist streak? Not long, I'd suppose. But these pseudo cosmo-nuts, they claim to be authentic, and they think that my email deserves to be bombarded with these infantile information about a really old rock which is about to fall, or stand between two other really old rocks, so that it won't be visible by another moron standing light-years away. Physically and mentally.
