- The Moon was out of the sky from dusk to almost 1 A.M.
- It was clear
- The dark site observing field was essentially snowless
- It was an incredibly warm evening--by 1 A.M. it had fallen only to around 40F.
- The wind was for the most part very light to calm, so there was no real wind chill factor.
It's difficult to emphasize how rare that evening was. The February 17 average high and low for nearby Cannon Falls is 29 and 10, so it was a good 20 degrees warmer than average. Usually the warmer weather correlates positively with clouds, too.
I originally intended to image the Witch Head nebula because my previous image of it is rather poor; noisy and crossed by an amazing number of geosynchronous satellites. A slow start to the evening made me go with something a little easier--the far brighter M42 area. It turned out better than i expected for 2.1 hours of 5 minute exposures at f/5.6:
I was able to faintly capture some of the dimmer clouds in the outlying areas just to the left of M42. The red patch at the upper right of center edge is an extension of the Horsehead nebula area.
When M42 began to sink I went to comet 45P and got almost an hour and a half of that:
This wasn't deep enough to get even a hint of the fainter, bluer tail. Oh, well...I'll take it!
One of the best things of the night was using BackyardEOS for the first time. It's a joy to use, and despite its power it keeps things easy to use. Next time I'm going to use it to tackle the mystery dithering!
I also got a demonstration of PoleMaster, a hardware/software tandem that makes getting an excellent polar alignment easy, fast, and actually fun (well, compared to drift aligning, anyway). It's definitely on my to-buy list ($300 from OPT). I would really like to take some very long light frames this year in Nebraska, and this would help. Even though PHD2's polar alignment utility is slick and gives good results, I can see how much easier (and probably better) PoleMaster would make getting a good PA.
----------------------
President Trump continues in his attempt to convince the nation that he's in need of psychiatric help. The recent lowlights include an other-worldly press conference in which he demonstrates his inability to grasp how many Electoral College votes he got and the fact that reporters aren't a part of government and can't set up meetings. (Apparently in his mind black reporters can do that with the Congressional Black Caucus because they're all, well, black.) He doesn't seem to be able to listen to questions (case in point, the one involving anti-Semitism) without the voices in his head taking over.
He's now off on his horse about how the press is the enemy of the American people. It's normal, if not expected, that those in power attack the press. A properly functioning press is the enemy of those who would abuse the power with which they've been entrusted. Isn't it funny how Trump was happy with the press's reporting of the DNC and Clinton leaks before the election, but now that he's in power, leaks are terrible. That's the double standard of power, I guess.
What's worst about this is that he seems to be moving in a direction of eventually taking action against a free press. It's easy to see how he and sympathetic Republicans in Congress might begin to chip away at First Amendment rights by changing libel laws. Maybe the way some of the leaders Trump seems to admire (Putin, Erdogan) deal with their own opposition journalists is a telling sign. While it's possible the courts would block any serious changes, the censoring of the press has happened in other countries. It could happen here, changing the United states from a democracy to a dictatorship. I think Senator McCain has it right, and I'm glad he put the fears of a lot of people into words.
After about a month in office, Trump's mental constitution appears fragile at best. After yet another bad week in which his entanglement with Russia flared into a more serious issue, his badly flawed Labor Secretary nominee had to drop out, his National Security Advisor resigned (and the first choice to replace him basically threw the offer back into Trump's face), and there was that Twilight-Zone worthy press conference, the bewildered President had to stage a rally for his supporters so that he could heal his psychic wounds. And then we got a look into the bizarre reality of his mind when he started talking about the terrible recent events in Sweden. No one knows what he's referring to, including the Swedish government. Did he just make up the whole thing? Did he completely misunderstand something he'd been told? Did he read this on some fringe web site, or some other "alternative fact" media outlet? Was this classified information that he just blurted out recklessly?
Or is he on the verge of becoming unhinged?
---------------------------
Scientists are planning marches in various parts of the country to protest what is beginning to look like the rape of the EPA and the portion of NASA that does global warming research. Even though I'm only a retired scientist, I'll be adding my support to the effort. More on that as we get closer to the planned date, April 22 (Earth Day). Want to get involved? More information is HERE.
No comments:
Post a Comment