Almost a punchup over Jupiter...

[Daring Dave]

Direct from the land of the absurd..

Can ya dig this....

I was at work last night (2nd job) and whilst outside taking a smoko with the fellas I mentioned that Jupiter was nice and bright high in the sky...

Unfortunately I was met with ' Thats Bull....' from a few of the guys...

No matter how much I tried to convince them that it was not a bright star they gave me heaps.....

I tried telling a few of them to check out the net to see I wasn't talking rubbish and even invited a few to pop over to look through my scope...

They were incapable of comprehending that some planets are easily visible by the naked eye.

Next thing I know this bloke I don't know very well (1 foot taller and 60kg bigger) offers to resize my head for talking rubbish !!

I give up !!!

I must work at sceptics central...


:rofl:

[h0ughy]

were they draging their knuckles and dribbling profusely at the corner of their mouth :D to them the earth is still flat, and Newcastle will win the premiership this year!

[ballaratdragons]

Geez Dave, don't dare tell them that those 3 stars over near the horizon are Saturn, Mercury and Venus. We will have to visit you in hospital!

[Daring Dave]

I was about to Ken but didn't bother... My mood was fairly poor afterwards... :bashcomp:

Neanderthal man is alive and well in some places....

[ballaratdragons]

If you really want to get them going, tell them about the 'Muti-Universe' theory, then RUN!

Well, you are called 'Daring Dave'.

[Daring Dave]

'You can see other galaxies from your backyard' !

Nope....Not telling them that either.... :scared3:

I think being a sceptic is fine....I was once too in a way.......but...after being invited to see for yourself and refusing the offer is just plain stoopid...

[ballaratdragons]

By the sound of them, do you really want them at your place?

Take a small scope to work and show them!!

[Orion]

They refuse the offer because deep inside they know that they might be proven wrong. Some people are like horses with blinkers on, they only walk straight ahead with there heads down never bothering to look around to see the big picture. They believe that it is all just happening at there feet.

[acropolite]

Should have bet them a couple of cartons of stubbies.. they wouldn't have been able to resist.

[tornado33]

Dave
You never know, about Newcastle anyway, the Knights won their first game last night hehehehe.

[atalas]

Hey stuff this, lets go an knock them in to orbit !


Louie :tasdevil:

[cahullian]

There has been lots of chat on the radio and in the press lately they mustn't have learned to hear or read. Send them my way as my baseball bat is a great educator.:fight:

Gazz/Irish

[Starkler]

Yep I would have seen it as an opportunity and offered a bet :D

P.S. If people got punched up for talking crap at my workplace, it would look like a warzone hospital ward :lol2:

[dhumpie]

There are still many ignorant people in these world that don't have a clue. With people like that, I just don't bother telling them anything :D Its just not worth it.

Darren

[fringe_dweller]

Its 'cool to be a fool' is alive and well - welcome to amateur astronomy in Oz! You will need a blackbelt in martial arts heheh, they obviously feel threatened by your knowledge Dave, if they offered to make you see stars! :atom: Should of told them it was a UFO they might of believed that?
Kearn

[Sausageman]

Hey Dave,
I have the opposite to you, on clear nights up in SE Qld, I usually take the 4.5 inch Transportable And Succinctly Crap Observatory, (TASCO) to work.
I end up with 20 or more guy's looking through it. It's hard to get them back to work.
:eyepop: :jawdrop: :2thumbs:
They must be a better class of worker's LOL
Mike

[dhumpie]

There are those that are open and there are those with closed minds. I have conducted many of such "introduction to astronomy 101" on Mounth Cootha (Brissie) for friends with my 80ST and my 6"f/5 and most of the times I capture the audience. I even got one of my friends so interested that he bought a scope :)

Darren

[asimov]

Yeah, *sigh* I can relate. There's some real drips out there that know stuff-all about our surroundings. Just tell them the night sky is a black piece of felt with holes in it.

Every time someone happens to see one of my scopes, they say.."wats that thing!??" when I tell them, they get that " derrr...the light's are on, but nodody's home"...glazed look in their eyes.....5 mins later, they'll ask "how much did that microscope cost??" Now I just tell them it's a home-made newk launcher, just in case the little town I live in get's bombed..:scared2: :bashcomp: :thumbsup:

[fringe_dweller]

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: Myself and some observing friends know the famous 'eye's glazed over look' sadly only to well John. One day I am going to get a photo of it! I wonder what they are thinking when they do that? Why is the universe so boring to so many people? And regarding getting a enthuisiastic audience of newbies on occassions - do they still respect you in the morning? :)
Kearn

[asimov]

Respect? I'm known as "that mad scientist guy with those newk launches & the trusty hack-saw", :einstein: :bashcomp: :work: but ONLY get's em' out at night-time....{.:scared2:the glazed look}


just keeping the town safe, people's! :2thumbs:

[fringe_dweller]

:ship2: Cmon John they all know your communicating with the mothership at night out there (*insert x-files theme here*) :ship2: :anaut: just watch out when the townspeople start making lots of burning torches and heading your way :D
Kearn

[fringe_dweller]

My favourite form of self abuse is picking up a pack of 35mm astrophotography prints from the professional developers. Give you some of my favourite examples
*Case No 1/ (all time fav) Stewart picks up photos - (they always look at them before giving them to you) owner of store says "OOOOOOOOOOOOHHH little green men" while gesturing with arms, and making a humorous face.
*Case No.2/ to Barry who had taken small comet shots in " oh here's the little blue dot man"
*Case No.3/ to me on picking up some widefield shots "i was trying to clean all the dust off, but then I realised it was stars" he thought that was hilarious hehe

Then I have lost count of the many looks/expressions on these workers/owners faces we have had to endure for 5 years. Sometimes it was like we were picking up some kind of weird/sick **** photos!!!? i think we would of got a better response LOL
But then one time i had one lady assistant wax lyrical about a simple star trail shot like it was a hubble shot - go figure :)
Kearn

[asimov]

:rofl: HAHAHAHA!

That's a classic Kearn! "wiping the dust off the photo"!

:scared2: Hmmmm...I see a group of 15-20 lights in the distance.....heading my way.....:eyepop: :astron: :scared: :( :hi: :ship2: BYE!!

[ballaratdragons]

I had one of those . . . Duh! . . moments last night.

I wanted to take shots of the Moonrise (pics in other thread) and I had the scope in the front yard for the first time, and sharing the view with next door neighbour (he wanted to freeze too!).
Phil from down the road was walking past with his dogs and he walked over and said 'what's that Ken?'.

My neighbour (the Proffessor, remember him?) answered for me and said 'It's a telescope Phil'.

Phil: What's the big barrel thing under it for?

Me: Where?

Phil: (pointing to OTA) There!

Me: That's the telescope.

Phil: Oh! I thought that was (pointing to the finderscope). Wondered why you had it on a barrel.

He is not to know. But when offered a look through the scope he declined and said 'no thanks, gotta go. And he slowly strolled off with his dogs. What does it take with some people.

[asimov]

"It takes all kinds" Ken..

[ballaratdragons]

Yeah, but sheeesh! The scope was 2 feet from him, the EP trained on the moon. He only had to take about 2 steps, bend over and have about a 6 seconds look!! :poke:

I guess some people just aren't interested

[ballaratdragons]

Cool! Can you knit me a 12' Dob cover to keep my scope warm & dry outside.

I'm a self taught needlepoint person. I used to enjoy it but now my eyes aren't up to it.

[fringe_dweller]

Ken, you would had to have fought me off the telescope if it had been me walking past, especially if i had never looked through one!!! Thats just strange!
LOL :rofl: John! knitting!! what are you knitting? a cover for the mighty 12.5"? personally i draw the line at needlework :rofl:
Kearn
EDIT: Ken i hadnt seen your reply post before i posted!!! - spooky :scared2:

[h0ughy]

Hey ken, Needlepoint takes a fair bit of patience and skill and talent :2thumbs: . got any images of some of you work.

[ballaratdragons]

Get in line, you . . you . . line jumper you! And what is wrong with needlepoint?

Houghy, no I don't anymore I don't think. I will have a look tommorrow if you are that interested.

[h0ughy]

Don't break a leg over it :D . it was just one of those answers to generate some repect, admiration and acknowledgement that I have no skill :rofl:

[asimov]

:D I'll swap ya a dob cover fer a coupla K-Mart EPs! :thumbsup:

[ballaratdragons]

Actually, I am working on a secret invention along those lines. But I am not letting the cat out of the bag yet until I know it works properly! I wasn't going to say anything, just announce it when it was finished and tested.

No, you can't have my 'very expensive' Kmart EP's. I made a special reducer for them. Plus your signature says you have too many EP's.

[asimov]

yes, it may say that I have too many....but I failed to mention I'm addicted to collecting the damn things!

[ving]

lol. sometimes it just aint worth it :rolleyes:

[Sausageman]

Getting a tad off topic aren't we? LOL

Those are some great stories about un-interested people.

I reckon there are 3 kinds,
Left brain users, right brain users and bottom brain users....LOL

Just ignore the bottoms..... :doh:

Mike

[Daring Dave]

There is a god....and he was in a bad mood tonight..

Went to work tonight...

About an hour after starting work word got around someone had been marched out the door by the boss and the security guys for stealing something....

It was the ROCK APE who gave me a hard time last week about Jupiter....!! :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:


I guess what goes around comes around ..

Cheers

Dave

[asimov]

:D Now that's KARMA!

[Nightshift]

Up here in Queensland they would have believed you! Of course these are the same people that believe that daylight savings fades your curtains and summer days are longer than winter days because everything expands in the heat. But alas, we hold open nights at the observatory and slowly educate them that our sun is in fact a star and the milky way isn't a high altitude cloud, (well actually, it is but that's another story.) Let me guess, that blokes name was Bubba, he wore a white singlet, had a hat made from a hanky with knots in each corner and can bite open a stubby using only his front teeth? I think I used to work with him when I lived down there.

[ballaratdragons]

Blokes name was Bubba, wore a white singlet, had a knotted hanky hat, but has NO front teeth to open anything LOL

p.s. Gravel scars on his knuckles too.