Question about the moon's "angle?"?

Question

Read my question carefully because it's difficult to explain. I'm in the northern hemisphere (about 35 degrees north lattitude). Late in the evening (Halloween) I saw the moon was up about 45 degrees. It's a half moon. What's weird is that the line between the dark half (top) and the light half (bottom) wasn't parallel to Earth's horizon. I would expect the sun to be south to the equator so the line through the moon would go from the top right (left is Earth's north) to the bottom left. Instead, it was the other way as if the sun was even farther north than I am. Why is that?

Answer 1

The geometry of astronomical things can he hard to visualize and even harder to explain in words. Suffice it to say that the bright half of the Moon points to where the Sun would be if you could see it below the horizon. In fact if you wait long enough, the Sun and half Moon will both be above the horizon and in the sky at the same time and you can just see it. If you saw the half Moon THIS Halloween (today), then it must have been in the early predawn morning. Just wait until sunrise and you will see the Sun come up long before the Moon sets, and then you can just look at them both and see the relationship. Or if not, still, just look at the sky any time tomorrow morning. You will see the Sun and a half moon in the sky all morning, up to about noon, tomorrow.

Answer 2

I think that what you see is the result of a nearly spherical body
producing a shadow on another nearly spherical body and it will vary as the angular relation between the three celestial bodies change during any lunar month. This is just my own personal opinion about this phenomenon.