When it comes to eyepiece candy, the Carina Nebula (including Eta) ranks up there with the Orion Nebula for owners of small & medium scopes. Big scopes, too, but **sigh**, I don't have one. No matter. Today I came across a paper about the formation and dissipation of
"Pillars of Creation" clouds in the Carina Neb. Unlike most of the objects in the professional papers, these pillars we can actually see. I just came in from a quick look under so-so skies, and by gummy, I could identify a gratifying number of the objects shown in the paper. The accompanying text is a very good explanation of how cloud pillars take and lose their shape. Now if I can just sweet-talk the Household Budget Director into a 300mm Dob . . .