An Evening with the Stars
At my mother's urging this evening, my son was enticed into the backyard to look at the Moon (he has a habit stopping whenever he's outside and pointing at it, if it's visible). I decided that, it being a pleasant and clear evening, I would accompany them. It was nice enough that a good number of our local ecliptic wanderers were visible. It was time to bring out the telescope.
After a quick setup and look see at Arcturus and Vega (not quite, it was just below the roofline of the house, but close enough for alignment purposes), I set off to get a good close view of the moon. It was still a strong cresent and that threw the landscape into high relief. Very nice to see, especially when the craters look like bottomless inky pools. Had a quick look at Jupiter, very clear with well defined cloud-banding visible and four very obvious moons. Saturn was also very clear, the ring structure very clean and beautifully evident, too small to get any detail with my current set-up though. Really need to get a more powerful eyepiece, only have a 26mm at the moment. Mars was somthing of a disappointment, not really very distinct; it was very near the horizon and the light pollution of downtown LA. Mercury, unfortunately got away from me, by the time I got ready to train the scope on it, it had set. Need to plan more carefully next time, I guess.
All in all, a good night. Nice and cool too.
Here's what we had tonight 
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