Elaine's Life

Well today, I have read a number of interesting websites on astronomy, also read Terence Dickinson's Nightwatch earlier on this evening. Another day on the computer. Very disappointed at the sky tonight it was all cloudy, therefore, unable to see anything. I was also reading about some stargazing holidays - wow I would really like to do that. I may investigate some more. It seems that more people than ever before are dabbing in astronomy. I suppose we are voyagers on the earth through space, as passengers on a ship, and many of us have never thought of any part of the vessel but the cabin where we are quartered.

Tonight I observed Orion, although the sky was rather cloudy. I also noticed 3 stars, which I think were Leo. The problem is I could not differentiate between Gemini and Leo as they both show very stong set of arched stars, for Gemmi this inlcludes Pollux, Castor and Alhena. Still have not seen the Milky way and as Sirius is very low in the sky this will make it hard to see. The best and brightest open cluster is Pleiades and I think this is really amazing. A cluster of stars helps you drift away to another world. The binoculars that I have 15x70 are heavy, especially when I raise these up to the night sky. I was dissapointed with my Camera - I was trying to take a photo of the moon and ended up resorting to taking this through my binoculars. Anyway, that is really all for tonight.

What a boring new years eve I had this year. Just stayed in front of my computer apart from at 12 when I managed to pull myself away and watch Big Ben on TV. I am thinking about going up into the dead of the country with my 15x70's just to see if I can catch a glimse of the shooting stars.