Little Bear runs with meteors just in time for the week's holiday revels, as stargazers enjoy the moon going caroling with our nearest and dearest neighbors, Venus and Mars.

Each and every streak of light you see in the shower comes courtesy of sand-grain-size cosmic dust, particles shed by the passage of comet Tuttle, discovered in 1790, on its 14-year circuit around the sun.

Meteor showers owe their names to the constellations from which they seem to radiate. That explains the Ursids, which seem to trace their path from Ursa Minor, the Little Bear, in the northeastern evening sky. The best views arise after the moon sets around midnight, in dark skies away from city lights. (To read about the 1833