VENUS AND THE MOON:

Last Monday, February 19th, I observed an interesting astonomical sight. It was about 6pm, and the setting cresent of the Moon was about 15 to 20 degrees above the horizon. Underneath it, seperated by about 5 degrees, was the planet Venus. The pair presented an amazing sight in the evening sky. Presently the Moon is far seperated from Venus. Nothing that I had read alerted me to the sight of last Monday. The questions I have are 1)what phase was Venus in on Monday (it looked like a waxing gibbous to my binoculars) and 2)when will Venus no longer be visible from the Central Time zone and what will its phases be like until then. In other words I'm having some trouble looking this up. Comments are invited.

Molly