>
> Those of us who stayed home maybe wished we'd gone out. Not a loss for me
> though, my daughter and I went to see the movie 'Chicago.' Back hoime and
> it's 10:30 here on Saturday night in Oakland and the sky is perfectly clear,
> and the seeing is excellent. The Clear Sky Clocks gets an "F" this report
> card period. More nice views of Jupiter through my homemade 8" dob and a TV
> 101 refractor. Glad I set these up before I left. :-) The contrast in the
> refractor is remarkable and makes for such a pleasing view. There's more
> detail in the 8", but the contrast isn't as pronounced.
>
> Hope the rest of you got to do some oberving either in the backyards or at
> one of your favorite dark sky sites!
>
> Richard
Clear, and steady, but down here (San Jose) the transparancy . . . wasn't.
I've seen M42/43 better from the same location (more details, and brighter)
in my 6" than I did in my 12.5" tonight. Ditto for M51 - I had a better view
of it last night after moonrise than I did tonight with no moon. M101/102
wasn't really visible at all, the contrast was so poor.
Very frustrating - a nice, dark, night, steady skies, and contrast so poor
that even bright Messier galaxies were mostly washed out ;-( I hit a few
of the brighter Messier galaxies, some open clusters, and a couple of
planetaries and called it a night.
Still glad I observed, but contrast last night was a lot better.
I'm hoping for nice, clear, TRANSPARENT skies next weekend. To be spent
somewhere darker than my backyard.
Dana