Ramblings of a geek with a few hobbies…
On Saturday night, Ana and I went camping with Jay and Katherine. The weather was perfect – the temperature probably dipped in the low 60s, give or take, with very low humidity. I dragged the telescope along with us and Jay and I were out under the stars until close to 4am while the girls slept. I’ve never been to a darker site or seen the
Milky Way appear so bright.
We all had a lot of fun, are tired, and look forward to doing it again.
Snapped a picture of the Andromeda Galaxy too.
If you enjoy classical music and haven’t listened to any Yo-Yo Ma, you are definitely missing out. Over the course of the past 3 weeks I’ve purchased 4 of his CDs and have enjoyed each and every one of them.
Ana and I are tossing the idea around of hiring someone to build us a floor-to-ceiling, wall-to-wall bookcase in our living room. I really don’t have the slightest idea on how much a project like that will cost, but it would be a welcome addition to our house. I hate having 4-5 bookcases throughout the house holding various types; a 20’x9′ should rectify that situation.
It has been a long week at work and I’ve been looking forward to the 3 day weekend. Ana and I don’t really have anything planned, maybe just a project or two around the house.
Earlier in the week I was disappointed to learn that Deep Impact’s collision with comet Tempel 1 will not be visible from Illinois on Monday morning. I was planning on watching it (watching the side-effects I suppose would be a better term – the comet is expected to get noticably brighter) as it happened but I would need to be west of the Mississippi. Instead, I’ll just check it Sunday night and again on Monday night to compare the brightness. I may even setup the camera and see if I can get a photo or two.
This weekend turned out to be pretty busy. Ana finished sanding one of our pieces of bedroom furniture and was able to prime and paint it; photos soon. Shopping for Father’s Day gifts took up most of the day on Saturday, and I spent Friday and Saturday night out under the stars getting some pretty good pictures of some small Deep Sky Objects. They can be seen in my gallery. Last night I was out until 1:40am so I’m looking forward to getting some rest tonight.
Took the telescope out last night, it was a very clear evening. I was able to snap a few shots of M57, The Ring Nebula. I was pretty suprised they came out like they did, this was the first time I’ve used the 15 second exposure option on my digital camera – I had the mount aligned pretty good so there aren’t very long “star trails” from the long exposure.
M57, The Ring Nebula, is a Planetary Nebula 2300 light-years (which google tells us is 1.35205496 × 10^16 miles) away from us. A Planetary Nebula is a “shell” of gas and plasma that is left when some types of stars die/explode. At the center of this is that star, a white dwarf now. Unfortunately you can’t see it in my picture.
The Ring Nebula is the small doughnut looking shape in the center.
Took a few photos of the sun with the solar filter. Click to view gallery.
Picked up my copy of X-Files Mythology 1 tonight from Best Buy. I really enjoyed X-Files when it was on, but stopped really keeping track of the main story line once I went to college. Watching the Pilot episode now!
At work today we only had a half day, we spent the other half at Lake Springfield for a family picnic. Ana was able to take off the afternoon and partake as well. The food and drinks were good and I set up my telescope for some solar viewing – a couple dozen people and their kids were able to take a look. It turned out to be a lot of fun, albeit hot (90s I think).
Nothing really planned for the weekend right now, we’ll see what transpires.
My anniversary gift from Ana, a new Solar Filter for the new telescope, arrived today. I had to go to FedEx and pick it up after work but tried it out when I got home. It’s amazing what this telescope can do compared to my old one. I didn’t think it would make much difference on the sun, but it surely does.
A neighbor came down to see what I was looking at, but just when he did the sun went behind a think blanket of clouds. Maybe it’ll be clear tomorrow and he’ll get to see it then. I also plan on taking some pictures with the new setup.
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