jupiter hoops

Jupiter is peeking through the parted clouds and all is well again. A few hours ago, as in when it was still dark and the previous sentence was less metaphorical, I went out and noticed how clear and dark the night sky was, random billows aside. I grabbed the scope.

Of course, by the time everything was aligned the massive cloud from the south was covering my eastern view. (Sirius just had to hide behind that tree.) I should have pointed manually. I'm a big girl; I can see Jupiter without following the slew. Still, it was a perfect autumn night. No skeeters, a light but constant wind, and bright, familiar lights: Capella, Betelgeuse, Castor, Pollux, Saturn, Jupiter...

The moon was there too, in horn form. I looked at it. As I later told Mike, it's a little too scary when you put the Barlow on the 6mm (~440x). Like a sack of rocks looming over the Earth. At least now I know I can do that with the two eyepieces.

I was content for the cloud train to pass and once it did I looked at Jupiter. Even with the 25mm it looked better than the little Wal-Mart scope from last summer. Very crisp, with one wee moon above, one below.

I put on the Barlow, then the 6mm, then the 6mm with the Barlow. I was more aware of the haze remnant as the magnification increased, but it was still good. I could see two dark bands running vertically top to bottom. That was very good. I didn't know it at the time, but the moon above was Ganymede and the moon below was Io. Mike is fascinated by Io and its angry lava spitters. Poor Io, tormented via the gravitational wringer.

I then looked at Saturn and Titan, again trying out my new magnification prowess, and it was as good as before although I still can't see the Cassini (sp) division. (And I still can't keep my eyelashes from fluttering madly in the eyepiece.)

I used the GoTo menu to point at Rigel because it was listed as a double star. I thought Sirius was a double star, but it wasn't listed. In fact, I'm 99.8% sure it's a double star. Anyway, Rigel looked like a single star in the scope. Yawn.

Then I used the GoTo to slew to the Orion Nebula, but of course since the alignment is still off (technically made worse by my not even aligning the second star, but to be honest alignment seemed better) I wasn't sure if I was seeing the ON. I'm guessing I'd know if I had. I did see a pretty pocket of stars, though.

Around this time the neighbour's Insanely Bright Porch Light (IBPoL?) did one of its random activations (or else someone in there hits the wrong switch every time they get up to pee during the night) so I was a little glum, but I took a last look at Jupiter. [...] [...] [...] That was great. I can't wait to get more intelligent on adjusting the slew rate. With the right lawn furniture I could sit for hours with one squinted eye on the mysterious above.

Next month's issue of Astronomy came yesterday. So much seems to be discovered every week. I bought a new astronomy textbook early in the year and I feel like so much is already outdated. Which is exciting, but it seems difficult for an amateur to keep up. Even stuff I learned about, say, the number of exosolar planets, or Saturn's moons, or measuring the universe with white dwarf supernovae, or the nature of gamma rays, is all dated.

Of course, they seem to discover a new solar system with Jovian planets every ten days or so, so I can hardly be faulted for being behind.