The Moon and the Night Sky

Tidal forces on the moon by the Earth make it a little bit oblong. Nothing in the universe is perfectly round. There are no actual circles out there, maybe even not the event horizons of black holes due to quantum effects. Eventually the Earth pulls on the moon to make it oblong. And then they get stuck in this stable equilibrium where that long bit is always pointing towards the Earth because gravity on that long part is a little stronger. So it's like a pendulum dangling towards the Earth.