9 December 2005

Observing Location	New York City
Observational Period	EST
Atmospheric Conditions	I have mixed feelings about observing tonight. With 6" of fluffy white stuff on the ground I am not sure how conditions will appear even if there aren't any clouds. The snow will reflect a lot of light from the street lights and the waxing gibbous moon will be up until after curfew too. CSC says there won't be any clouds and the air will be pretty transparent so I should go out. Clear Sky Clock graphic NOAA says it will be windy although diminishing through the night, like the temperature. The lines on the graph were too close together to be able to read the wind chill predictions so I checked their official graphical interface which uses a map. It is placing the wind chill at about 17°F. With the wind out of the NW it could be uncomfortable on the face and eyes. NOAA graphic   1900 EST 2200 EST 0100 EST Temperature °F 30 29 28 Wind Speed MPH 19 16 12 Cloud Cover % 45 42 39 Apparent Temperature °F 17 17 18 Relative Humidity % 69 69 65 I checked on the IR satellite loop and the combined satellite/radar loop and it looks like there is a front through the area that is holding most of the clouds to the NW of us but they do press the front back occasionally and if it should retreat cloud cover would increase quickly. I had thought that I might to out locally to do a NELM test and maybe look at the moon but it is treacherous out there. I didn't even go where I had planned for dinner because there is so much black ice around. The air isn't perfectly clear but it looks very nice out there. There is no ring if illuminated clouds around the moon and I can see some stars in a very dark charcoal sky. Conditions might be a little better right now than CSC was predicting. And the wind NOAA had forecast doesn't seem to be blowing but in among the irregularly shaped and oriented apartment buildings with hills and valleys is not a good place to judge that/
Instruments
Observing Party

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Tonight at RadioShack, while shopping for connectors to make my occultation timing setup work better, not that it was problematic this past Wednesday, I came across a hands-free mini task light (part 63-1143) that looked like it would be good for astronomy. As is usual at RadioShack the salesperson couldn't tell me anything more about the product to help me make an informed purchase decision than I could read on the packaging. (Just for fun, walk up to the counter some time when all the clerks are gathered there talking about everything but business. Ask them a technical question. You will be amazed at how quickly everyone but the clerk who has to watch the cash register becomes invisible.)

The small light's battery holder clips over your ear like a Bluetooth telephone headset and has a bright white LED attached on a short, somewhat flexible stalk. There is no spring in the ear clip so it fits loosely over the ear but is still a little annoying after about 30 minutes. You can bend the stalk to direct the angle of the light somewhat but it has a lot of memory and doesn’t like to stay where you put it. Fortunately I found that it didn’t require lot of bending to get the light where my eyes were pointed. The bulb rides low enough I my cheek that I don't notice a lot of reflection from my eyeglasses. The package claims 100,000 hours on the two CR2032 batteries (already installed although the store computer tells the salesperson they are not) [Oops -- I guess 100,000 hours (~11.4 years of continuous use) is the life of the bulb and not the batteries.]. The light is bright enough that I can see the 1” text at 15’ and can tell the orientation of parquet floor times at 20’. The clip can ge rotated so the light can be worn on either ear but it only stays on the shaft of the clip by friction so switching ears frequently is likely to wear the clip shaft down to the point that the light falls off of it.

I see two drawbacks to this light.

1. Because it is attached to my ear it is at my eye height, which, coincidentally, is near the eye height of many other astronomers and could prove bothersome for them. So I will have to remember to power it off when I don’t actually need it.
2. It is a white light and there doesn’t seem to be an option for getting the light with a red LED. This problem could be rectified by the judicious application of red nail polish over the lens. Unfortunately I am fresh out of red nail polish at the moment.

The light cost $10 (plus tax).