Hi Chris & All,
Quote:
Originally Posted by Screwdriverone
After a good and long day in the backyard gardening with "she who holds the telescope purse strings" ...
... Well, after about an hour of observing I had gleefully checked out the following objects; Eta Carinae, The Jewel Box, M41 the beautiful open cluster just south of Sirius, M45 Pleiades, Taurus, Orion and M42, LMC, SMC, 47Tuc, Omega Centauri, IC2602 a beautiful open cluster near Eta Carinae (my favourite) and a host more.
Add to that, I saw 5 Orionids meteors flash across the sky from south to north and one of these was even a quite bright 3 second fireball that was a spectacular orange and blue streak! 
All of this was observed over the hour I was there with......wait for it.................................
My eyeballs and an 8 x 40 FINDERSCOPE!
Yes, I had done the unforgivable and left my eyepiece case which contained ALL my eyepieces, my charts, planisphere, red light torch, my jumper and even my binoculars! at HOME sitting in my garage in the box I normally grab first when I am heading out.
... So there I was, all alone standing in an observing field, holding a finderscope like some sort of sad Astronomical Pirate looking at the cosmos at 8X magnification.
Still, I had a GREAT time, after I got over my initial HOMER moment of DOH! 2 mins AFTER I arrived and found I had left all the goodies behind. 
|
Mate, we've all had a night like this before but it's good you got home with a smile on your face and having seen quite a bit anyway.
... like a sad astronomical pirate !! Loved it
And as for "she who holds the telescope purse strings" -- never a truer word said in jest !!
I worked at Syd Obs tonight and I suppose it won't help one bit to tell you the seeing (though not the transparency) was actually pretty steady from there!
Better luck next week ...
Best,
Les D