I just moved all of the 2008 entries over to Volume 2 of this blog which is at the address http://starsights2.blogspot.com
posted by Charlie at 15:30
17 July 2008
31 December 2007
31 December 2007
| The Moon and the year travel and pass away;
Also the day, also the wine. Also the flesh passes away to the place of its quietness. Mayan |
| Observing Location | Chief Dennis L. Devlin Park, Bronx, NY | ||||||||||||||||
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| Observational Period | 1300-1315 EST | ||||||||||||||||
| Atmospheric Conditions |
It is comfortable until the wind blows.
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| Instruments | 25x30 “spyglass” telescope - Charlie
I cleaned it again, this time using computer screen cleaner, and it looks like I got most of the small dust, but now it lools like there are two huge paramecia floating in the FoV; probably drops of screen cleaner that dried leaving a residue | ||||||||||||||||
| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway |
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| Observing Location | TotL | ||||||||||||||||
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| Observational Period | 2030-0030 EST | ||||||||||||||||
| Atmospheric Conditions |
The sky looked splotchy gray but I can see stars. When I picked up my tripod case at the end of the session the upeard-facing surface of it was encrusted with frost.
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| Instruments | Brunton 8x21 compact binocular – Charlie
Nikon CoolPix 990 digital camera – Charlie
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| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway |
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I tried making pictures of Orion
When the fireworks started going off at midnight I made pictures as fast as I could.
I had set the camera to manual focus at infinity but found that each time I set it to self-timer it reset itself to Macro so all the stars, street lamps, and me are out of focus. I remember that there is some trick to fool the camera into staying focused at infinity when you put it into self-timer mode but I can’t remember what it is. I will have to check with Peter and see if he knows.
Sunspots Observed
The Sun has finally developed some spots so I have done a bit of observing when the weather was conducive to that activity.
Observing Hours for the Year 2007
| Day | Night | Total | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hours | Days | Avg | Hours | Days | Avg | Hours | Days | Avg | |
| Jan | 4.25 | 12 | 0.35 | 7.75 | 9 | 0.86 | 12.00 | 16 | 0.75 |
| Feb | 3.50 | 14 | 0.30 | 20.75 | 5 | 2.04 | 24.25 | 15 | 1.17 |
| Mar | 9.25 | 16 | 0.40 | 36.75 | 10 | 2.76 | 46.00 | 17 | 1.71 |
| Apr | 4.00 | 14 | 0.38 | 22.50 | 7 | 2.83 | 26.5 | 16 | 1.70 |
| May | 11.75 | 16 | 0.45 | 31.00 | 9 | 2.97 | 42.75 | 20 | 1.80 |
| Jun | 7.00 | 15 | 0.46 | 18.50 | 8 | 2.86 | 25.50 | 18 | 1.74 |
| Jul | 5.75 | 18 | 0.43 | 30.00 | 10 | 2.88 | 35.75 | 19 | 1.76 |
| Aug | 8.00 | 13 | 0.45 | 42.25 | 14 | 2.91 | 50.25 | 19 | 1.88 |
| Sep | 2.25 | 6 | 0.38 | 44.50 | 15 | 2.97 | 46.25 | 16 | 2.89 |
| Oct | 1.25 | 3 | 0.42 | 20.50 | 11 | 1.86 | 21.75 | 14 | 1.55 |
| Nov | 0.00 | 0 | 0.00 | 21.00 | 13 | 1.62 | 21.00 | 13 | 1.62 |
| Dec | 4.76 | 13 | 0.37 | 13.25 | 7 | 1.89 | 18.00 | 13 | 1.38 |
| TOTAL | 61.75 | 140 | 0.44 | 308.75 | 118 | 2.62 | 370.00 | 196 | 1.89 |
Year-to-Year Observing Comparison
posted by Charlie at 23:59
29 December 2007
29 December 2007
| Observing Location | PSC | ||||||||||||||||
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| Observational Period | 1330-1345 EST | ||||||||||||||||
| Atmospheric Conditions |
It rained overnight and there are puddles everywhere including out in the grass. Everything is already saturated. Unless it dries out for a while we are in for flooding. The clouds are still mostly thin but seem to be building and the barometer is dropping. I think they were predicting rain after midnight and some tomorrow also.
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| Instruments | Brunton 8x21 compact binocular w/Welco gold shade 14 welder's filter - Charlie | ||||||||||||||||
| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway |
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| A circle around the moon, "Twill rain soon. |
| Observing Location | MO | ||||||||||||||||
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| Observational Period | 2330-0145 EST | ||||||||||||||||
| Atmospheric Conditions |
Peter was encouraging me to go down to TotL but when I went home at sunset there were clouds coming out of the W up to around 20° elevation. I checked Planetarium and it said that the Moon would mot be waking up until around 2300 EST so I decided to stay home and read the last of the Annotated Flatland and go up to the oval if it was clear at 2300. The sidewalks are still wet from rain last night and the air feels moist. The cold air seems to be aggravating my asthma which is something that has not happened in a long while. I am so little bothered by it that I don’t routinely carry an inhaler. I wish I had it tonight.
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| Instruments | SAR: Coulter CT-100 Newtonian reflector - Charlie
Brunton 8x21 compact binocular - Charlie | ||||||||||||||||
| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway |
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In the Avu ObservatoryThaddy, the chief observer, was down with a slight fever. His assistant, Woodhouse, paused for a moment in silent contemplation of the tropical night before commencing his solitary vigil. The night was very still. Now and then voices and laughter came from the native huts, or the cry of some strange animal was heard from the midst of the mystery of the forest. Nocturnal insects appeared in ghostly fashion out of the darkness, and fluttered round his light. He thought, perhaps, of all the possibilities of discovery that still lay in the black tangle beneath him; for to the naturalist the virgin forests of Borneo are still a wonderland full of strange questions and half-suspected discoveries. Woodhouse carried a small lantern in his hand, and its yellow glow contrasted vividly with the infinite series of tints between lavender-blue and black in which the landscape was painted. His hands and face were smeared with ointment against the attacks of the mosquitoes. Even in these days of celestial photography, work done in a purely temporary erection, and with only the most primitive appliances in addition to the telescope, still involves a very large amount of cramped and motionless watching. He sighed as he thought of the physical fatigues before him, stretched himself, and entered the observatory. The reader is probably familiar with the structure of an ordinary astronomical observatory. The building is usually cylindrical in shape, with a very light hemispherical roof capable of being turned round from the interior. The telescope is supported upon a stone pillar in the centre, and a clockwork arrangement compensates for the earth’s rotation, and allows a star once found to be continuously observed. Besides this, there is a compact tracery of wheels and screws about its point of support, by which the astronomer adjusts it. There is, of course, a slit in the movable roof which follows the eye of the telescope in its survey of the heavens. The observer sits or lies on a sloping wooden arrangement, which he can wheel to any part of the observatory as the position of the telescope may require. Within it is advisable to have things as dark as possible, in order to enhance the brilliance of the stars observed. The lantern flared as Woodhouse entered his circular den, and the general darkness fled into black shadows behind the big machine, from which it presently seemed to creep back over the whole place again as the light waned. The slit was a profound transparent blue, in which six stars shone with tropical brilliance, and their light lay, a pallid gleam, along the black tube of the instrument. Woodhouse shifted the roof, and then proceeding to the telescope, turned first one wheel and then another, the great cylinder slowly swinging into a new position. Then he glanced through the finder, the little companion telescope, moved the roof a little more, made some further adjustments, and set the clockwork in motion. He took off his jacket, for the night was very hot, and pushed into position the uncomfortable seat to which he was condemned for the next four hours. Then with a sigh he resigned himself to his watch upon the mysteries of space. There was no sound now in the observatory, and the lantern waned steadily. Outside there was the occasional cry of some animal in alarm or pain, or calling to its mate, and the intermittent sounds of the Malay and Dyak servants. Presently one of the men began a queer chanting song, in which the others joined at intervals. After this it would seem that they turned in for the night, for no further sound came from their direction, and the whispering stillness became more and more profound. The clockwork ticked steadily. The shrill hum of a mosquito explored the place and grew shriller in indignation at Woodhouse’s ointment. Then the lantern went out and all the observatory was black. Woodhouse shifted his position presently, when the slow movement of the telescope had carried it beyond the limits of his comfort. He was watching a little group of stars in the Milky Way, in one of which his chief had seen or fancied a remarkable colour variability. It was not a part of the regular work for which the establishment existed, and for that reason perhaps Woodhouse was deeply interested. He must have forgotten things terrestrial. All his attention was concentrated upon the great blue circle of the telescope field—a circle powdered, so it seemed, with an innumerable multitude of stars, and all luminous against the blackness of its setting. As he watched he seemed to himself to become incorporeal, as if he too were floating in the ether of space. Infinitely remote was the faint red spot he was observing. Suddenly the stars were blotted out. A flash of blackness passed, and they were visible again. "Queer," said Woodhouse. "Must have been a bird." The thing happened again, and immediately after the great tube shivered as though it had been struck. Then the dome of the observatory resounded with a series of thundering blows. The stars seemed to sweep aside as the telescope—which had been undamped—swung round and away from the slit in the roof. "Great Scott!" cried Woodhouse. "What’s this?" Some huge vague black shape, with a flapping something like a wing, seemed to be struggling in the aperture of the roof. In another moment the slit was clear again, and the luminous haze of the Milky Way shone warm and bright. The interior of the roof was perfectly black, and only a scraping sound marked the whereabouts of the unknown creature. Woodhouse had scrambled from the seat to his feet. He was trembling violently and in a perspiration with the suddenness of the occurrence. Was the thing, whatever it was, inside or out? It was big, whatever else it might be. Something shot across the skylight, and the telescope swayed. He started violently and put his arm up. It was in the observatory, then, with him. It was clinging to the roof, apparently. What the devil was it? Could it see him? He stood for perhaps a minute in a state of stupefaction. The beast, whatever it was, clawed at the interior of the dome, and then something flapped almost into his face, and he saw the momentary gleam of starlight on a skin like oiled leather. His water-bottle was knocked off his little table with a smash. The sense of some strange bird-creature hovering a few yards from his face in the darkness was indescribably unpleasant to Woodhouse. As his thought returned he concluded that it must be some night-bird or large bat. At any risk he would see what it was, and pulling a match from his pocket, he tried to strike it on the telescope seat. There was a smoking streak of phosphorescent light, the match flared for a moment, and he saw a vast wing sweeping towards him, a gleam of grey-brown fur, and then he was struck in the face and the match knocked out of his hand. The blow was aimed at his temple, and a claw tore sideways down to his cheek. He reeled and fell, and he heard the extinguished lantern smash. Another blow followed as he fell. He was partly stunned, he felt his own warm blood stream out upon his face. Instinctively he felt his eyes had been struck at, and, turning over on his face to protect them, tried to crawl under the protection of the telescope. He was struck again upon the back, and he heard his jacket rip, and then the thing hit the roof of the observatory. He edged as far as he could between the wooden seat and the eyepiece of the instrument, and turned his body round so that it was chiefly his feet that were exposed. With these he could at least kick. He was still in a mystified state. The strange beast banged about in the darkness, and presently clung to the telescope, making it sway and the gear rattle. Once it flapped near him, and he kicked out madly and felt a soft body with his feet. He was horribly scared now. It must be a big thing to swing the telescope like that. He saw for a moment the outline of a head black against the starlight, with sharply-pointed upstanding ears and a crest between them. It seemed to him to be as big as a mastiffs. Then he began to bawl out as loudly as he could for help. At that the thing came down upon him again. As it did so his hand touched something beside him on the floor. He kicked out, and the next moment his ankle was gripped and held by a row of keen teeth. He yelled again, and tried to free his leg by kicking with the other. Then he realised he had the broken water-bottle at his hand, and, snatching it, he struggled into a sitting posture, and feeling in the darkness towards his foot, gripped a velvety ear, like the ear of a big cat. He had seized the water-bottle by its neck and brought it down with a shivering crash upon the head of the strange beast. He repeated the blow, and then stabbed and jobbed with the jagged end of it, in the darkness, where he judged the face might be. The small teeth relaxed their hold, and at once Woodhouse pulled his leg free and kicked hard. He felt the sickening feel of fur and bone giving under his boot. There was a tearing bite at his arm, and he struck over it at the face, as he judged, and hit damp fur. There was a pause; then he heard the sound of claws and the dragging of a heavy body away from him over the observatory floor. Then there was silence, broken only by his own sobbing breathing, and a sound like licking. Everything was black except the parallelogram of the blue skylight with the luminous dust of stars, against which the end of the telescope now appeared in silhouette. He waited, as it seemed, an interminable time. Was the thing coming on again? He felt in his trouser-pocket for some matches, and found one remaining. He tried to strike this, but the floor was wet, and it spat and went out. He cursed. He could not see where the door was situated. In his struggle he had quite lost his bearings. The strange beast, disturbed by the splutter of the match, began to move again. "Time!" called Woodhouse, with a sudden gleam of mirth, but the thing was not coming at him again. He must have hurt it, he thought, with the broken bottle. He felt a dull pain in his ankle. Probably he was bleeding there. He wondered if it would support him if he tried to stand up. The night outside was very still. There was no sound of any one moving. The sleepy fools had not heard those wings battering upon the dome, nor his shouts. It was no good wasting strength in shouting. The monster flapped its wings and startled him into a defensive attitude. He hit his elbow against the seat, and it fell over with a crash. He cursed this, and then he cursed the darkness. Suddenly the oblong patch of starlight seemed to sway to and fro. Was he going to faint? It would never do to faint. He clenched his fists and set his teeth to hold himself together. Where had the door got to? It occurred to him he could get his bearings by the stars visible through the skylight. The patch of stars he saw was in Sagittarius and south-eastward; the door was north—or was it north by west? He tried to think. If he could get the door open he might retreat. It might be the thing was wounded. The suspense was beastly. "Look here!" he said, "if you don’t come on, I shall come at you." Then the thing began clambering up the side of the observatory, and he saw its black outline gradually blot out the skylight. Was it in retreat? He forgot about the door, and watched as the dome shifted and creaked. Somehow he did not feel very frightened or excited now. He felt a curious sinking sensation inside him. The sharply-defined patch of light, with the black form moving across it, seemed to be growing smaller and smaller. That was curious. He began to feel very thirsty, and yet he did not feel inclined to get anything to drink. He seemed to be sliding down a long funnel. He felt a burning sensation in his throat, and then he perceived it was broad daylight, and that one of the Dyak servants was looking at him with a curious expression. Then there was the top of Thaddy’s face upside down. Funny fellow, Thaddy, to go about like that! Then he grasped the situation better, and perceived that his head was on Thaddy’s knee, and Thaddy was giving him brandy. And then he saw the eyepiece of the telescope with a lot of red smears on it. He began to remember. "You’ve made this observatory in a pretty mess," said Thaddy. The Dyak boy was beating up an egg in brandy. Woodhouse took this and sat up. He felt a sharp twinge of pain. His ankle was tied up, so were his arm and the side of his face. The smashed glass, red-stained, lay about the floor, the telescope seat was overturned, and by the opposite wall was a dark pool. The door was open, and he saw the grey summit of the mountain against a brilliant background of blue sky. "Pah!" said Woodhouse. "Who’s been killing calves here? Take me out of it." Then he remembered the Thing, and the fight he had had with it. "What was it?" he said to Thaddy—"The Thing I fought with?" "You know that best," said Thaddy. "But, anyhow, don’t worry yourself now about it. Have some more to drink." Thaddy, however, was curious enough, and it was a hard struggle between duty and inclination to keep Woodhouse quiet until he was decently put away in bed, and had slept upon the copious dose of meat-extract Thaddy considered advisable. They then talked it over together. "It was," said Woodhouse, "more like a big bat than anything else in the world. It had sharp, short ears, and soft fur, and its wings were leathery. Its teeth were little, but devilish sharp, and its jaw could not have been very strong or else it would have bitten through my ankle." "It has pretty nearly," said Thaddy. "It seemed to me to hit out with its claws pretty freely. That is about as much as I know about the beast. Our conversation was intimate, so to speak, and yet not confidential." "The Dyak chaps talk about a Big Colugo, a Klang-utang—whatever that may be. It does not often attack man, but I suppose you made it nervous. They say there is a Big Colugo and a Little Colugo, and a something else that sounds like gobble. They all fly about at night. For my own part I know there are flying foxes and flying lemurs about here, but they are none of them very big beasts." "There are more things in heaven and earth," said Woodhouse—and Thaddy groaned at the quotation—"and more particularly in the forests of Borneo, than are dreamt of in our philosophies. On the whole, if the Borneo fauna is going to disgorge any more of its novelties upon me, I should prefer that it did so when I was not occupied in the observatory at night and alone." H. G. Wells |
posted by Charlie at 16:12
28 December 2007
28 December 2007
| Observing Location | PSC | ||||||||||||||
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| Observational Period | 1400-1415 EST | ||||||||||||||
| Atmospheric Conditions |
There is no visible cloud but the sky is not blye and through the binocular I can see variations in the density of the atmosphere between the Sun and me.
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| Instruments | Brunton 8x21 compact binocular w/Welco gold shade 14 welder's filter - Charlie | ||||||||||||||
| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway |
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The BBC today posted an article speculating that the launch os Atlantis with the ESA Columbus module may not take place until late January or sometime in February. It appears that NASA hasn't identified the problem with the ECO sensors and they are trying to juggle the Atlantis launch with the launch of the ESA Jules Verne automated cargo transport vehicle. Jules Verne has to be up there before the two Shuttle flights after STS-122 can launch. Jules Verne can launch and go somehwere and hang out while Atlantis is at the ISS and then dock afterward. But NASA still has to get the sensor problem fixed.
Meanwhile, in another news source, NASA said yesterday that they are going to try to resolve the sensor problem by cutting off the connector that mates to the outside of the pass-through connector and soldering the wires directly to it. I don't see any indication that they are sure that the problem is on the outside of the tank though.
NASA's Shuttle splash page says that a 10Jan08 launch is out of the question but, since they don't know how long it will take to solder the pins, reapply the foam, and test the repair, they don't have a new target launch date.
posted by Charlie at 16:09
26 December 2007
26 December 2007
| Sounds travel far and wide, A stormy day will betide. |
I set the alarm to wake up early this morning to take a look at a Mag -5.7 flare from Iridium 81. But I was tired and shut the alarm off and went back to sleep. It is probably just as well since when I did wake up it was overcast. The weather history for Central Park says it has been clear since midnight though. That doesn't stack up with what I have been observing this morning. Switching to LaGuardia airport they reported overcast at 0551 EST, mostly cloudy at 0651 EST, and overcast thereafter. That is more in line with what I have been seeing. I don't think the Central Park weather station is very reliable.
I dropped my film off at DuaneReade to be developed and scanned and they only scanned 4 frames. They said that there is nothing on the first part of the roll and the images of the horizon Moon were blurred so their machine refused to scan them. I am having them try again since I have gotten blurry images of the Moon out of that machine before when I haven't asked for them. In the meantime I have crunched the numbers to find when the best time to make these pictures will be during the coming year. The Moon is highest above the horizon in December so that should make the size difference most dramatic at that time. The full Moon of Dec08 is also a perigean full moon and the largest full Moon of the year. So that will be the best time to get another set of pictures. The full Moons of Oct08 and Nov08 are also larger than any other moons between now and then.
posted by Charlie at 14:34
25 December 2007
| Observing Location | MO | ||||||||||||||||
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| Observational Period | 0100-0145 EST | ||||||||||||||||
| Atmospheric Conditions |
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| Instruments | Minolta X-700 SLR – Charlie
Nikon CoolPix 990 digital camera – Charlie
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| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway |
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| 0108 EST | Moon Transits |
Space Weather says the sun is blank but Active Region Explorer says Group 979 is near the trailing limb. I am not sure I should trust Active Region Explorer though since the site says the maps are being generated but have not been tested and they are showing Group 978 in the middle of the back side of the Sun.
The Sun is 0.001 AU closer today than it was yesterday. A thousandth doesn’t sound like much until you consider the size of an AU (~96 million miles) and do the arithmetic.
The sky is still to bright and there are clouds where it was due to culminate.
The clouds were to thick for the satellite to shine through.
Observing Location In Bed, Parkchester, Bronx, NY Observational Period 0600-0630 EST Atmospheric Conditions
Cloud Cover Clear Temperature 37° Wind Calm Humidity Moderate Barometric Pressure 30.16" Hg
RisingFeels Like
The weather outside is irrelevant, other than the cloud cover, since I am in my overheated apartment.
Transparency Good Seeing Instruments Naked-eye - Charlie Observing Party Charlie Ridgway
0538-0611 EST Astronomical Twilight 0611-0645 EST Nautical Twilight
Target Iridium 80 Flare Constellation Lyr Category Satellite Time
yyyymmdd.hhmm20071225.0613 EST Comments The satellite was bright and appeared below and to the right of Vega and moved to the east/south into Hercules.
Alt. 21.4° Az. 63.5° Mag. -0.9
Target Iridium 77 Flare Constellation Vega Category Satellite Time
yyyymmdd.hhmm20071225.0625 EST Comments Not Seen
Alt. 26.1° Az. 65.6° Mag. 0.5
0645-0715 EST Civil Twilight 0845 EST Moonset
Observing Location PSC Observational Period 1330-1400 EST Atmospheric Conditions
Cloud Cover Scattered Clouds Temperature 43°F Wind Light Breeze Humidity Moderate Barometric Pressure 30.24" Hg
FallingFeels Like Mild
There are a few widely scattered cirrus clouds around. The breeze is very light. I see only light boiling on the Sun’s limb.
Transparency Excellent Seeing II Instruments SAR: Coulter CT-100 Newtonian reflector w/Baader AstroSolar filter film - Charlie
Observing Party Charlie Ridgway
Target Sunspots Constellation Category Solar Time
yyyymmdd.hhmm20071225.1300 EST Comments
Distance
Light Time0.983 AU
8m 11sAngular Size 32' 34.7" Altitude 22.9° Heliographic Latitude
(B0) -2.20° Heliographic Longitude
(L0) 43.2° Position Angle
(P) 5.36° Carrington rotation number
(CR)2064 Groups Spots R North 0 0 0 South 0 0 0 Total 0 0 0 R = (Groups * 10) + Spots)
Kilometers Miles 149,598,000 92,956,000 x 0.001 149,598 92,956 ~ 12 Earth diameters
~ 40% of the distance to the Moon
~ 1 Jupiter diameter
~54% of the diameter of Saturn’s rings
Observing Location Chief Dennis L Devlin Park, Bronx, NY Observational Period 1645-1700 EST Atmospheric Conditions
Cloud Cover Broken Clouds Temperature 41°F Wind Light Breeze Humidity Moderate Barometric Pressure 30.24" Hg
RisingFeels Like Cold
Transparency Poor Seeing Instruments Naked-eye - Charlie Observing Party Charlie Ridgway
1636 EST Sunset 1636-1706 EST Civil Twilight
Target ISS Visible Pass Constellation Category Satellite Time
yyyymmdd.hhmm20071225.1651 EST Comments Not Seen
EST Alt. Az. Mag. Begins 1651 horizon 302.2° +0.8 Max. Alt. 1655 15.9° 227.5° +0.5 Ends 1659 horizon 163.8° -0.2
Observing Location St Helena’s RC Church, Olmstead Ave @ Benedict Ave, Bronx, NY Observational Period 1700-1715 EST Atmospheric Conditions
Cloud Cover Broken Clouds Temperature 39°F Wind Light Breeze
gusting to
Gentle Breeze Humidity Moderate Barometric Pressure 30.30" Hg
RisingFeels Like Raw
Transparency Poor Seeing Instruments Naked-eye - Charlie Observing Party Charlie Ridgway
1706-1740 EST Nautical Twilight
Target Iridium 52 Flare Constellation Cam Category Satellite Time
yyyymmdd.hhmm20071225.1713 EST Comments Not Seen
Alt. 22.4° Az. 23.6° Mag. -1.3
1740-1813 EST Astronomical Twilight 1828 EST Moonrise
Observing Location MO Observational Period 2100-2215 EST Atmospheric Conditions
Cloud Cover Clear Temperature 37°F Wind Light Breeze Humidity Moderate Barometric Pressure 30.30" Hg
FallingFeels Like Cold
Wind Chill 32°F
Transparency Poor Seeing Instruments SAR: Coulter CT-100 Newtonian reflector - Charlie
25x30 “spyglass” telescope
The spyglass is easier to use than the pocket telescope/microscope and has a sharper image although it is still dust filled. It is hard to hold it still enough to get more than an idea of marea and highlands. I don’t know how the pirates did it on a pitching boat.
8x Selsi StyleScope pocket telescope/microscope
This is a cheap combination telexcope/microscope that I was given many years ago and came across in a drawer so I took it out to see what it would do. It is a tube within a tube construction, like the spyglass. You pull off the outer tube and use the inner for the microscope. It isn’t much. It is even more difficult to hold on an object and focus than the spyglass and produces a very poor image,
Observing Party Charlie Ridgway
Target Moon Constellation Category Lunar Time
yyyymmdd.hhmm20071225.2100 EST Comments
Lunation 1051
Phase
Age Distance
Light Time
(from earth)368,860 km
1.23sElongation 152.6° W % Illuminated 94.4% Morning Terminator Colongitude (λ E) 111.0° Evening Terminator Colongitude (λ W) 191.0° Libration in Latitude -2°47’ Libration in Longitude 6°56’ Magnitude -12.1 Angular Size 32' Altitude °<.40/td>
Virtual Moon Atlas graphic
Terminator In Sunlight Feature In Shadow <<< de la Rue <<< Endymion <<< Mercurius <<< Lacus Spei <<< Messala <<< Bernouilli <<< Geminus <<< Burckhardt <<< Cleomedes <<< Mare Crisium <<< Langrenous <<< Lohse <<< Vendelinus <<< Laume <<< Petavius <<< Balmer >>> <<< Vales Palitzsch <<< Palitzsch <<< Hase <<< Rima Hase >>> <<< Funerarius <<< Fraunhofer <<< Vales Rheita <<< Biela <<< Rosenberger <<< Hagerius
posted by Charlie at 13:32
24 December 2007
24 December 2007
| Observing Location | PSC | ||||||||||||||||
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| Observational Period | 1330-1345 EST | ||||||||||||||||
| Atmospheric Conditions |
NOAA says it is gusting to 22 mph but it is more than that up here. It is difficult to walk against the stronger gusts.
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| Instruments | 25x30 “spyglass” telescope - Charlie | ||||||||||||||||
| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway |
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| Observing Location | McDonalds, Westchester Ave near Benedict Ave, Bronx, NY
Lat: 40° 49’ 59.5” Long: -73° 51’ 28.3” | ||||||||||||||||
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| Observational Period | 1630-1645 EST | ||||||||||||||||
| Atmospheric Conditions |
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| Instruments | Naked-eye - Charlie | ||||||||||||||||
| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway |
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| 1635 EST | Sunset |
| Observing Location | St Helena’s, Olmstead Ave @ Benedict Ave, Bronx, NY
Lat: 40° 50’ 2.49” Long: -73° 51’ 26” | ||||||||||||||||
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| Observational Period | 1700-1745 EST | ||||||||||||||||
| Atmospheric Conditions |
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| Instruments | Naked-eye - Charlie | ||||||||||||||||
| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway |
| 1635 EST | Sunset |
| 1635-1706 EST | Civil Twilight |
| 1706-1740 EST | Nautical Twilight |
| 1712 EST | Moonrise |
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| 1740-1813 EST | Astronomical Twilight |
| Observing Location | MO | ||||||||||||||||
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| Observational Period | 1915-1945 EST | ||||||||||||||||
| Atmospheric Conditions |
It feels a little raw. The sky is completely covered with thin stratus clouds which the Moon is shining through.
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| Instruments | Minolta X-700 SLR – Charlie
Nikon CoolPix 990 digital camera – Charlie
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| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway |
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posted by Charlie at 16:05
22 December 2007
22 December 2007
| The cold and darkness of winter, with the naked deformity of every object on which we turn out eyes, make us rejoice at the succeeding season.
Samuel Johnson |
It has been a dreary day today with no hope of seeing the sun alignment at the McGraw-Hill Sun Triangle, and it really doesn't look like we will ever see the sun again.
Four QuartetsBUIRNT NORTONAre both perhaps present in time future, And time future contained in time past. If all time is eternally present All time is unredeemable. What might have been is an abstraction Remaining a perpetual possibility Only in a world of speculation. What might have been and what has been Point to one end, which is always present. Footfalls echo in the memory Down the passage which we did not take Towards the door we never opened Into the rose-garden. My words echo Thus, in your mind. But to what purpose Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves I do not know. Other echoes Inhabit the garden. Shall we follow? Quick, said the bird, find them, find them, Round the corner. Through the first gate, Into our first world, shall we follow The deception of the thrush? Into our first world. There they were, dignified, invisible, Moving without pressure, over the dead leaves, In the autumn heat, through the vibrant air, And the bird called, in response to The unheard music hidden in the shrubbery, And the unseen eyebeam crossed, for the roses Had the look of flowers that are looked at. There they were as our guests, accepted and accepting. So we moved, and they, in a formal pattern, Along the empty alley, into the box circle, To look down into the drained pool. Dry the pool, dry concrete, brown edged, And the pool was filled with water out of sunlight, And the lotos rose, quietly, quietly, The surface glittered out of heart of light, And they were behind us, reflected in the pool. Then a cloud passed, and the pool was empty. Go, said the bird, for the leaves were full of children, Hidden excitedly, containing laughter. Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind Cannot bear very much reality. Time past and time future What might have been and what has been Point to one end, which is always present.
Clot the bedded axle-tree. The trilling wire in the blood Sings below inveterate scars Appeasing long forgotten wars. The dance along the artery The circulation of the lymph Are figured in the drift of stars Ascend to summer in the tree We move above the moving tree In light upon the figured leaf And hear upon the sodden floor Below, the boarhound and the boar Pursue their pattern as before But reconciled among the stars.
At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Time before and time after In a dim light: neither daylight Investing form with lucid stillness Turning shadow into transient beauty With slow rotation suggesting permanence Nor darkness to purify the soul Emptying the sensual with deprivation Cleansing affection from the temporal. Neither plenitude nor vacancy. Only a flicker Over the strained time-ridden faces Distracted from distraction by distraction Filled with fancies and empty of meaning Tumid apathy with no concentration Men and bits of paper, whirled by the cold wind That blows before and after time, Wind in and out of unwholesome lungs Time before and time after. Eructation of unhealthy souls Into the faded air, the torpid Driven on the wind that sweeps the gloomy hills of London, Hampstead and Clerkenwell, Campden and Putney, Highgate, Primrose and Ludgate. Not here Not here the darkness, in this twittering world.
Descend lower, descend only
The black cloud carries the sun away. Will the sunflower turn to us, will the clematis Stray down, bend to us; tendril and spray Clutch and cling?
Chill
Only in time; but that which is only living Can only die. Words, after speech, reach Into the silence. Only by the form, the pattern, Can words or music reach The stillness, as a Chinese jar still Moves perpetually in its stillness. Not the stillness of the violin, while the note lasts, Not that only, but the co-existence, Or say that the end precedes the beginning, And the end and the beginning were always there Before the beginning and after the end. And all is always now. Words strain, Crack and sometimes break, under the burden, Under the tension, slip, slide, perish, Decay with imprecision, will not stay in place, Will not stay still. Shrieking voices Scolding, mocking, or merely chattering, Always assail them. The Word in the desert Is most attacked by voices of temptation, The crying shadow in the funeral dance, The loud lament of the disconsolate chimera.
The detail of the pattern is movement,
EAST COKERHouses rise and fall, crumble, are extended, Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass. Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires, Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earth Which is already flesh, fur and faeces, Bone of man and beast, cornstalk and leaf. Houses live and die: there is a time for building And a time for living and for generation And a time for the wind to break the loosened pane And to shake the wainscot where the field-mouse trots And to shake the tattered arras woven with a silent motto.
In my beginning is my end. Now the light falls
Across the open field, leaving the deep lane
Dawn points, and another day
With the disturbance of the spring And creatures of the summer heat, And snowdrops writhing under feet And hollyhocks that aim too high Red into grey and tumble down Late roses filled with early snow? Thunder rolled by the rolling stars Simulates triumphal cars Deployed in constellated wars Scorpion fights against the Sun Until the Sun and Moon go down Comets weep and Leonids fly Hunt the heavens and the plains Whirled in a vortex that shall bring The world to that destructive fire Which burns before the ice-cap reigns.
That was a way of putting it—not very satisfactory:
The houses are all gone under the sea. The dancers are all gone under the hill.
The vacant interstellar spaces, the vacant into the vacant, The captains, merchant bankers, eminent men of letters, The generous patrons of art, the statesmen and the rulers, Distinguished civil servants, chairmen of many committees, Industrial lords and petty contractors, all go into the dark, And dark the Sun and Moon, and the Almanach de Gotha And the Stock Exchange Gazette, the Directory of Directors, And cold the sense and lost the motive of action. And we all go with them, into the silent funeral, Nobody's funeral, for there is no one to bury. I said to my soul, be still, and let the dark come upon you Which shall be the darkness of God. As, in a theatre, The lights are extinguished, for the scene to be changed With a hollow rumble of wings, with a movement of darkness on darkness, And we know that the hills and the trees, the distant panorama And the bold imposing facade are all being rolled away— Or as, when an underground train, in the tube, stops too long between stations And the conversation rises and slowly fades into silence And you see behind every face the mental emptiness deepen Leaving only the growing terror of nothing to think about; Or when, under ether, the mind is conscious but conscious of nothing— I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love, For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting. Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought: So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing. Whisper of running streams, and winter lightning. The wild thyme unseen and the wild strawberry, The laughter in the garden, echoed ecstasy Not lost, but requiring, pointing to the agony Of death and birth. You say I am repeating Something I have said before. I shall say it again. Shall I say it again? In order to arrive there, To arrive where you are, to get from where you are not, You must go by a way wherein there is no ecstasy. In order to arrive at what you do not know You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance. In order to possess what you do not possess You must go by the way of dispossession. In order to arrive at what you are not You must go through the way in which you are not. And what you do not know is the only thing you know And what you own is what you do not own And where you are is where you are not.
That questions the distempered part; Beneath the bleeding hands we feel The sharp compassion of the healer's art Resolving the enigma of the fever chart.
Twenty years largely wasted, the years of l'entre deux guerres Trying to use words, and every attempt Is a wholly new start, and a different kind of failure Because one has only learnt to get the better of words For the thing one no longer has to say, or the way in which One is no longer disposed to say it. And so each venture Is a new beginning, a raid on the inarticulate With shabby equipment always deteriorating In the general mess of imprecision of feeling, Undisciplined squads of emotion. And what there is to conquer By strength and submission, has already been discovered Once or twice, or several times, by men whom one cannot hope To emulate—but there is no competition— There is only the fight to recover what has been lost And found and lost again and again: and now, under conditions That seem unpropitious. But perhaps neither gain nor loss. For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.
THE DRY SALVAGESIs a strong brown god—sullen, untamed and intractable, Patient to some degree, at first recognised as a frontier; Useful, untrustworthy, as a conveyor of commerce; Then only a problem confronting the builder of bridges. The problem once solved, the brown god is almost forgotten By the dwellers in cities—ever, however, implacable. Keeping his seasons and rages, destroyer, reminder Of what men choose to forget. Unhonoured, unpropitiated By worshippers of the machine, but waiting, watching and waiting. His rhythm was present in the nursery bedroom, In the rank ailanthus of the April dooryard, In the smell of grapes on the autumn table, And the evening circle in the winter gaslight.
The river is within us, the sea is all about us;
The silent withering of autumn flowers Dropping their petals and remaining motionless; Where is there and end to the drifting wreckage, The prayer of the bone on the beach, the unprayable Prayer at the calamitous annunciation?
There is no end, but addition: the trailing
There is the final addition, the failing
Where is the end of them, the fishermen sailing
We have to think of them as forever bailing,
There is no end of it, the voiceless wailing,
It seems, as one becomes older,
Among other things—or one way of putting the same thing: That the future is a faded song, a Royal Rose or a lavender spray Of wistful regret for those who are not yet here to regret, Pressed between yellow leaves of a book that has never been opened. And the way up is the way down, the way forward is the way back. You cannot face it steadily, but this thing is sure, That time is no healer: the patient is no longer here. When the train starts, and the passengers are settled To fruit, periodicals and business letters (And those who saw them off have left the platform) Their faces relax from grief into relief, To the sleepy rhythm of a hundred hours. Fare forward, travellers! not escaping from the past Into different lives, or into any future; You are not the same people who left that station Or who will arrive at any terminus, While the narrowing rails slide together behind you; And on the deck of the drumming liner Watching the furrow that widens behind you, You shall not think 'the past is finished' Or 'the future is before us'. At nightfall, in the rigging and the aerial, Is a voice descanting (though not to the ear, The murmuring shell of time, and not in any language) 'Fare forward, you who think that you are voyaging; You are not those who saw the harbour Receding, or those who will disembark. Here between the hither and the farther shore While time is withdrawn, consider the future And the past with an equal mind. At the moment which is not of action or inaction You can receive this: "on whatever sphere of being The mind of a man may be intent At the time of death"—that is the one action (And the time of death is every moment) Which shall fructify in the lives of others: And do not think of the fruit of action. Fare forward. O voyagers, O seamen, You who came to port, and you whose bodies Will suffer the trial and judgement of the sea, Or whatever event, this is your real destination.' So Krishna, as when he admonished Arjuna On the field of battle. Not fare well, But fare forward, voyagers.
Pray for all those who are in ships, those Whose business has to do with fish, and Those concerned with every lawful traffic And those who conduct them.
Repeat a prayer also on behalf of
Also pray for those who were in ships, and
To report the behaviour of the sea monster, Describe the horoscope, haruspicate or scry, Observe disease in signatures, evoke Biography from the wrinkles of the palm And tragedy from fingers; release omens By sortilege, or tea leaves, riddle the inevitable With playing cards, fiddle with pentagrams Or barbituric acids, or dissect The recurrent image into pre-conscious terrors— To explore the womb, or tomb, or dreams; all these are usual Pastimes and drugs, and features of the press: And always will be, some of them especially When there is distress of nations and perplexity Whether on the shores of Asia, or in the Edgware Road. Men's curiosity searches past and future And clings to that dimension. But to apprehend The point of intersection of the timeless With time, is an occupation for the saint— No occupation either, but something given And taken, in a lifetime's death in love, Ardour and selflessness and self-surrender. For most of us, there is only the unattended Moment, the moment in and out of time, The distraction fit, lost in a shaft of sunlight, The wild thyme unseen, or the winter lightning Or the waterfall, or music heard so deeply That it is not heard at all, but you are the music While the music lasts. These are only hints and guesses, Hints followed by guesses; and the rest Is prayer, observance, discipline, thought and action. The hint half guessed, the gift half understood, is Incarnation. Here the impossible union Of spheres of existence is actual, Here the past and future Are conquered, and reconciled, Where action were otherwise movement Of that which is only moved And has in it no source of movement— Driven by daemonic, chthonic Powers. And right action is freedom From past and future also. For most of us, this is the aim Never here to be realised; Who are only undefeated Because we have gone on trying; We, content at the last If our temporal reversion nourish (Not too far from the yew-tree) The life of significant soil.
LITTLE GIDDINGSempiternal though sodden towards sundown, Suspended in time, between pole and tropic. When the short day is brightest, with frost and fire, The brief sun flames the ice, on pond and ditches, In windless cold that is the heart's heat, Reflecting in a watery mirror A glare that is blindness in the early afternoon. And glow more intense than blaze of branch, or brazier, Stirs the dumb spirit: no wind, but pentecostal fire In the dark time of the year. Between melting and freezing The soul's sap quivers. There is no earth smell Or smell of living thing. This is the spring time But not in time's covenant. Now the hedgerow Is blanched for an hour with transitory blossom Of snow, a bloom more sudden Than that of summer, neither budding nor fading, Not in the scheme of generation. Where is the summer, the unimaginable Zero summer?
If you came this way,
If you came this way,
Is all the ash the burnt roses leave. Dust in the air suspended Marks the place where a story ended. Dust inbreathed was a house— The walls, the wainscot and the mouse, The death of hope and despair, This is the death of air.
There are flood and drouth
Water and fire succeed
Yet differ completely, flourish in the same hedgerow: Attachment to self and to things and to persons, detachment From self and from things and from persons; and, growing between them, indifference Which resembles the others as death resembles life, Being between two lives—unflowering, between The live and the dead nettle. This is the use of memory: For liberation—not less of love but expanding Of love beyond desire, and so liberation From the future as well as the past. Thus, love of a country Begins as attachment to our own field of action And comes to find that action of little importance Though never indifferent. History may be servitude, History may be freedom. See, now they vanish, The faces and places, with the self which, as it could, loved them, To become renewed, transfigured, in another pattern.
Sin is Behovely, but
With flame of incandescent terror Of which the tongues declare The one discharge from sin and error. The only hope, or else despair Lies in the choice of pyre of pyre— To be redeemed from fire by fire.
Who then devised the torment? Love.
And to make and end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from. And every phrase And sentence that is right (where every word is at home, Taking its place to support the others, The word neither diffident nor ostentatious, An easy commerce of the old and the new, The common word exact without vulgarity, The formal word precise but not pedantic, The complete consort dancing together) Every phrase and every sentence is an end and a beginning, Every poem an epitaph. And any action Is a step to the block, to the fire, down the sea's throat Or to an illegible stone: and that is where we start. We die with the dying: See, they depart, and we go with them. We are born with the dead: See, they return, and bring us with them. The moment of the rose and the moment of the yew-tree Are of equal duration. A people without history Is not redeemed from time, for history is a pattern Of timeless moments. So, while the light fails On a winter's afternoon, in a secluded chapel History is now and England.
With the drawing of this Love and the voice of this
We shall not cease from exploration
T.S. Eliot |
posted by Charlie at 15:32
