[GFischer]

Edit: I found this interesting piece which details how Steve Padilla has been doing the drawings for 40 years!

http://www.latimes.com/local/columnone/la-me-c1-mt-wilson-su...

He says: he likes the tradition, this convergence of science and art.

"The value," he says, "is not so much in the individual achievement but in maintaining the daily record."

However, the telescope's annual budget of $250,000, cobbled together with grants from NASA and the National Science Foundation, runs out in the spring, and Ulrich says odds of getting more money from NASA are long.

Edit - previous speculation I wrote: Hmmm.. maybe Steve Padilla wrote it as 12-11-2013 (like we write it in South America) instead of 11-12-2013 like in the U.S. ?

[anigbrowl]

I said '11 Dec 2013' so I don't think it's euro/US date format confusion (and I'm Euro myself, so I wholeheartedly approve of putting the mday before the month like every other sane person).

[anigbrowl]

s/I/It