I've had a few disasterous nights!
One... while packing the truck with the scope to go observing, I got interrupted... Finally, I got all packed up and drove 22ks out to my dark sky site, went to set up... no tripod!
:lo l:
On numerous occasions I've set up just in time for the clouds to roll in...
sometimes they really like to play with my sanity and wait until I'm drift aligned or nearly drift aligned before they roll in... then if they
really want to wind me up, they clear off after I've packed up...
On another occasion it was very cold and the temperature was dropping very quickly. I had the scope set up with my back to it, getting out my guiding EP to start drift aligning, and I heard a loud "crack"... looked at the scope but couldn't see anything wrong...
I spent 4 to 5 hours troubleshooting why I couldn't drift align... eventually gave up in disgust. When packing up I found the centre bolt for the mount was loose!
My theory was that the "crack" I heard was thermal stresses released the tension on the centre bolt which perhaps wasn't done up properly but bound in the thread so it felt tight...
Astronomy is one of those hobbies that pushes boundaries... the limit of seeing, transparency, resolution, patience, persistence, resistance to cold...
Al.