In most of Canada it's just about warm enough to lie outside in the middle of the night watching for shooting stars — just in time for the annual Lyrid meteor shower.

The tails of the meteors will point toward the constellation Lyra, which will rise in the northeast and be high overhead toward dawn. (NASA)

The celestial show is already underway, but is expected to peak on Thursday morning, with up to 20 meteors per hour. According to NASA, Lyrid meteors are about as bright as the stars in the Big Dipper and often produce luminous dust trails that can be seen for several seconds.

There's also a chance that we'll get lucky and this year's shower will bring an "outburst" — an unusually heavy downpour of meteors. That happened in 1982, when the Lyrids peaked at 90 meteors per hour, and twice in the 19th century.

"No such outburst is predicted for 2015 — but then again, no outbursts were predicted on those previous occasions either," astronomer Tony Phillips wrote in NASA Science News.

This year, the meteors will be easier to see than usual, weather permitting, as they will streak across a dark sky — the crescent moon is expected to set shortly after midnight.

The best time to watch for the meteors is in the hours before dawn, someplace with a clear view of the sky away from city lights.

Anywhere in the sky

The Lyrids are reportedly the oldest recorded meteor shower, first described by the Chinese in 687 B.C. (iStock)

The meteors will generally seem to come from the constellation Lyra, featuring the bright star Vega. But they can appear anywhere in the sky, so you don't need to look in any particular direction, advises Slooh, an organization that streams astronomical events live online. Nor do you need any special equipment — the meteors are best seen with your eyes.

If you don't feel like staying up late, getting up early, or going outside in the cold, you can watch online. Slooh will stream the meteor shower from its observatory on the Canary Islands with commentary from astronomers starting at 8 p.m.ET Wednesday.

Meteor showers take place when the Earth passes through a stream of debris left behind by an object such as a comet. In the case of the Lyrids, the dust and particles were left behind by a comet called Thatcher C/1861 G1, which orbits the sun once every 415 years. When the meteors hit the Earth's atmosphere and burn up, they appear as shooting stars.

The Lyrids aren't as spectacular as August's Perseids or December's Geminids, which peak at about 100 meteors per hour. But NASA notes that they're the oldest recorded meteor shower, first described by the Chinese in 687 B.C.