This is a stupid, stupid hobby

[AstralTraveller (David)]

[VENT]

I want to measure the diameters of asteroids using asteroidal occultations. It's my small contribution to astronomy science. I'm not alone, there is a small band of dedicated chasers of very small shadows in Aust and NZ. Presently I'm limited to stars brighter than about 10.5. There are precious few such bright events and over the past many months none of them has occurred on a clear night - until last night when there were two.

Last night there was hope. Was.

I don't yet have an observatory so in the afternoon I set up in the back yard and reminded myself where all the leads and cables go. Check.

The first event was at 8.23. The goto mount was aligned by 7.20 and the Precises Goto landed the scope on a suitably bright star. Checking the finder charts confirmed that I was on target and ready to change the eyepeice for the camera. Now ..... about that small band of cloud to my south. Even on a clear night there tends to be a bit of low cloud over the steel works - they vent a lot of hot wet air. However during the alignment and goto the band had been moving north and now covered all of he southern sky. Luckily the star was in the northeast - I might yet be lucky. Fat (*&%(*) chance. At 8.10 the clouds covered the star. Not completely but far too thick to make reliable observations - sometimes the stars were visible, sometimes they all faded away for 10-20 seconds. So that was event 1 written off.

By 8.35 the sky was again completely clear!! That's right - the cloud arrived 10 minutes before the event and remained until 10 minutes afterwards. It remained clear until after midnight. [I spent much of that time learning to collimate the SCT that's supposed to replace the present setup. Can I go back to a newt, please ]

Remember that second event? It was at 00.43 and in the northwest. Again I was on target in time but I was having trouble confirming the field I saw matched the chart. Luckily, there was only 1 appropriately bright star within the errors of the goto. No matter, it was all hypothetical. This time I didn't see the cloud start to roll in but I can confirm that it covered the target star at 00.38 - five minutes before the event. Why couldn't it wait just 5 &*&%#* minutes more?? You wouldn't want to have been in my backyard at 00.43. It wasn't pretty.

So all that remained was to pack it all away again under a leaden sky and trudge off to bed. I woke up with a headache.

When I look back at all the nights I've spent standing round looking at the clouds (I used to do grazing occultations) I really do wonder what I could have done with all that wasted time. Probably cure cancer and bring peace to the middle-east.

Anyone want to swap a shed load of astro gear for a shed load of decent red wine?? Or, even better, two shed loads of half decent red?

[\VENT]

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

....sorry

Mike
may as well laugh....

[el_draco (Rom)]

Mistake number 1: No observatory. Hence the major equipment set up issue.
Mistake number 2: You played with a new piece of kit.
Mistake number 3: You have curse the astronomy gods and your next ten sessions will be crap.

I have 300 bottles of half decent red out back... I am open to offers...

[Octane (Humayun)]

Pretty much what happened to us at the 2012 Port Douglas eclipse. 3 days of driving up, only to be stymied by cloud during the eclipse.

H

[dannat (Daniel)]

Originally Posted by Octane

Pretty much what happened to us at the 2012 Port Douglas eclipse. 3 days of driving up, only to be stymied by cloud during the eclipse.
H

bugger, its why we drove a good 100km inland to increase our chances

i felt sorry for the paying cruise passengers who's captain put them below totality..obv. not familiar with the coordinate system

[The Mekon (John Briggs)]

Yes it is a stupid hobby. Who else would enjoy sweeping the ice off a frozen telescope tube on a winter's night, toes frozen, while trying to view a small black dot transit a greyish orb? - And that is the good times!

That is why I enjoy the annual South Pacific Star Party. Cloudy skies? - just break open a few more bottles of red with good friends and great conversation, makes it all worthwhile.

[edwardsdj (Doug)]

I know the feeling all too well.

[pgc hunter]

Definitely should've drank some beer!

[Greenswale (Wren)]

So who even gets any clear bits between cloud?

[deanm (Dean)]

I wish someone would come up with a smartphone app that is able to use current, real-time local weather indications to identify presence/absence of clouds, and disable the 3:00 AM wake-up alarm if overcast.
Come on, IISers - someone should be able to do this!?
I'd buy it.
Dean

[DarkKnight (Kev)]

I've just replied to a thread in the beginners section and it's good (not) to note that you experienced folk have similar frustrations to us newbies, although I'm pretty sure the Cloud God is not selective

[billdan (Bill)]

Originally Posted by The Mekon

Yes it is a stupid hobby. Who else would enjoy sweeping the ice off a frozen telescope tube on a winter's night, toes frozen, while trying to view a small black dot transit a greyish orb? - And that is the good times!

Reminds me of this old joke you may have seen before.
Cheers
Bill

[LostInSp_ce]

Originally Posted by billdan

Reminds me of this old joke you may have seen before.

Haha. That sums it up perfectly.

[38degsouth (Dean)]

Originally Posted by AstralTraveller

I'm not alone, there is a small band of dedicated chasers of very small shadows in Aust and NZ.

Hang in there David, hang in there...
Dean, Melb.

[AstralTraveller (David)]

Thanks to everyone who offered support, both here and privately. I'm normally pretty resilient and don't let the 'slings and arrows of outrageous fortune' affect me. I think that it was the combination of a few other issues plus the cloud that got to me.

If the saying 'what doesn't kill you makes you stronger' is true astronomers should be mentally strong!

Originally Posted by el_draco

Mistake number 1: No observatory. Hence the major equipment set up issue.
Mistake number 2: You played with a new piece of kit.
Mistake number 3: You have curse the astronomy gods and your next ten sessions will be crap.

1) True. Dave Gee reckons an observatory is the best ever observing aid. He can open the obs and be on target in 10 minutes, which makes doing those 3.00am events on a weekday plausible. The obs is being planned. In fact..

2) I was playing with the new kit to help plan the obs (plus get it working well). I wanted to know how high I wanted the pier (I will use the scope visually so eyepiece height is important) and how much floor area I need.

3) I didn't start cursing until after the event but then I cursed a lot more than just the weather gods.

Originally Posted by pgc hunter

Definitely should've drank some beer!

At the time that would have change the situation from 'not pretty' to 'downright ugly'. Anyway, it would have been red wine. I like beer well enough but it doesn't like me.

Originally Posted by el_draco

I have 300 bottles of half decent red out back... I am open to offers...

You'll need a bigger shed than that!

Originally Posted by dannat

bugger, its why we drove a good 100km inland to increase our chances

We went 100km inland and when we had cloud there the two mornings before the eclipse we went another 100km. We wound up closer to the west coast of Cape York than the east. I'm pleased to say that I have a 3 from 3 success at total solar eclipses. Plus all possible Venus and Mercury transits successfully observed.

Originally Posted by Greenswale

So who even gets any clear bits between cloud?

Actually, I find total write-offs to be less frustrating than last-minute cloud outs. At least I can just sit back and read a book or listen to music.

Originally Posted by billdan

Reminds me of this old joke you may have seen before.
Cheers
Bill

Actually it reminds me of this one.

Originally Posted by 38degsouth

Hang in there David, hang in there...
Dean, Melb.

I'm hanging, I'm hanging.


Thanks again everyone for all the support, it's much appreciated

Originally Posted by strongmanmike

....sorry

Mike
may as well laugh....

I could take exception to this, but that mightn't be wise. People used to say I was built like a caber and I know what you do to those.

[sil (Steve)]

As for cloud prediction I use the meteoblue website which I find gives very accurate predictions a day or two out for a given latitude/longitude. Well its been spot on everytime I've checked the sky, eg full cloud cover at 7pm and completely clear 8-9pm so I'd start setting up at 7 and at 8 the skies were clear and stayed clear. Most online services use the same data from the few main weather stations, usually in my case from the airport which is vastly different (on our scale) to me on the opposite side of town.


Its one of those frustrations. I highly recommend reading Chasing Venus to see the sorts of troubles astronomers had to contend with to co-ordinate observations of the transit of venus. With the last transit I went through the same frustrations and emotions many in that book suffered (minus crossing frozen rivers and months on ships). I spent months planning for the event. Doing test photos of the sun optimising my settings. Simulating where the path of the sun would be for the event and making sure I had a viewing spot where I could cover the entire event without trees etc getting in the way. Also included testing every weather service I could find, seeing how its 1 and 3 day forecasts panned out. It was tons of stress and work. Then two weeks before the transit the clouds visited Canberra to stay. My enthusiasm hit rock bottom, all that preparation for naught it seemed. Morning of transit, am up before dawn, peek outside and could see stars! Rushed outside to a short rise and horizon to horizon it was stars, no hint of clouds!. Elation isnt good enough to explain the relief. I went into action, spent the day outside behind my place taking photos and wanting to run out into traffic and drag people out of cars to show them what James Cook saw before discovering Australia. Then I read the book and the same high and lows were all there.

So yes, there are times when this is a stupid stupid hobby, but there are times when its so much more too.

[Tinderboxsky (Steve)]

Yes, Venus Rising is an interesting and compelling read. I often reflect on their monumental trials and tribulations when cloud interrupts my plans and all I need do is retreat to the warmth inside.

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Originally Posted by AstralTraveller

I could take exception to this, but that mightn't be wise. People used to say I was built like a caber and I know what you do to those.

Hey, while I could certainly lift and carry bluudy heavy things, I was never really very good at the caber ...and besides, about all I can lift now...is a cold beer so no fear

Someone should blow clouds up! (T.Bullpitt)

Mike

[Orionskies (Julian)]

Sounds like you missed a great opportunity to take some nice pics of some clouds.. That's a hobby as well you know...... Better luck next time.

[netwolf]

A most familiar tale indeed.

The seeing was not good last night in Sydney, I was testing an new ETX-125 OTA on my Evo mount. No clouds but seeing was not great, Jupiter was just ok at 59x 32mm TV plosl but mushy at 126x 15mm Vixen. At 76x 25mm vixen only fleeting sharpness. Moon was nice and sharp but you could see it burbling at times also. Now I have a really bad sore throat, that's what you get for wearing shorts and T-shirt on a cold winters night.

As long as you can remember the few good nights, then you stick with it. Most of my bad nights have always coincided with my desire to do imaging. But when i just do visual they seem to be better. Maybe our expectations our higher when we are setting up more equipment to image and we are let down by weather.