Looking at the sky between 8 and 9 p.m., stargazers will notice a lot of bright stars on the rise in the eastern sky. The later one stays up, the more of these winter constellations will be seen. In the western sky, a few summer constellations remain, but Cygnus the Swan, Lyra the Harp, Aquila the Eagle, Delphinus the Dolphin and others are making their exit from the celestial stage.

I loved it when we set our clocks back last Sunday morning to Eastern Standard Time.

First off, we got an extra hour of sleep, but more importantly for stargazers, it's dark enough for stargazing right after dinner. You can go out as early as 7 p.m.

Without a doubt, we're entering the best stargazing season of the year! Bundle up and take in the best show in the universe — your universe.

If you look a little later on, between 8 and 9 p.m., you will notice that there are a lot of bright stars on the rise in the eastern sky. The later you stay up, the more of these wonderful winter constellations you'll see.

I call this part of the sky "Orion and His Gang" because the majestic constellation Orion the Hunter is the centerpiece. Orion is up by 10 p.m. but before then you'll see the Pleiades, the best star cluster in the sky, which looks like a miniature Big Dipper.

Over in the western sky there are still a few summer constellations hanging in there. Cygnus the Swan, Lyra the Harp, Aquila the Eagle, Delphinus the Dolphin and a few others are slowly migrating to the west a little more each night, making their slow exit from our celestial stage.

In the high southern sky is the primo autumn constellation, Pegasus the Winged Horse, with Andromeda the Princess tagging along.

Turn around and face north and you'll see old friends like the Big Dipper, barely above the horizon, with the Little Dipper hanging by its handle higher in the northern sky.

Cassiopeia the Queen, the constellation that looks like a giant sideways "W", is proudly showing off her stuff in the high northeast sky. The W outlines the throne of the Queen, and Cassiopeia is tied up in that throne.

She really ticked off Hera, the queen of the gods, by proclaiming that she was even more beautiful than Hera's godly self. So Hera threw Cassiopeia up into the sky, eternally bound to her throne for all to see.

Unfortunately there are no planets to see in the night sky this month, but this Wednesday, Mercury is going to put on a rare show as it crosses in front of the sun. This is called a solar transit.

Every 88 days, Mercury orbits the sun, and every so often it actually passes across the disk of the sun from our vantage on Earth. The last time it happened was in 2003, and it won't happen again until 2016.

From around 2:12 p.m. Wednesday afternoon to around 5:10 p.m. that evening, Mercury will cross the lower half of the sun from east to west. Under no circumstances should you stare at the sun with either your naked eye or especially with a telescope. Looking at the sun anytime with a telescope can cause permanent blindness.

However, if you project the image of the sun through your telescope onto a piece of paper, you can safely watch the silhouette of Mercury saunter across the sun. Just use the shadow of the telescope to aim correctly to get the sun's image inside the scope. You may need to focus the image of the sun to make it sharp and clear on the paper. You'll see dark, blotchy spots on the sun that are sunspots, but Mercury will appear as a distinct little dot. Let's hope for sunny skies this Wednesday!

Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis and author of the book, "Pennsylvania Starwatch", available at bookstores and at his website www.lynchandthestars.com.