Observing Report -- September 7, 2013

Tonight I set the new scope on the front porch; I'm getting a wagon tricked out for it, so for now I don't have the energy, time or money (four tanks of gas last month thanks to three trips out of town for dark skies; yikes!) to drive out right now. I figured I'd just sit and see what I could see...wouldn't be much, but better than nothing. Since I can't see Polaris from my porch, I couldn't do a proper alignment. Instead, I did the next best thing: stood ten feet back where I could see it and eyeballed it. Align on Vega and Altair, and see how we do.

Regular point-to crash test subject M57 was right there, and M27 showed up too -- nice! M57 was nice and bright, but M27 was faint...big, hard to see, not much contrast. I was still able to see it without the O3 (though that definitely helped). Lights from neighbours threw out my night vision to a surprising degree -- surprising because there are two big lights right across from me, close enough I could reach out a broom handle and nearly put them out.

Looked up M29 and confirmed it with The Messier Album, by Mallas and Kreimer...not much to see, just like last time, but it's very nice to be able to run inside and grab a book when you need it. I let the hand controller show me NGC 6883, a very pretty open cluster nearby. Sketched it, but it's really hard for me to compare this to other sketches...the new orientation of the cat versus that of the Dob is throwing me off. I'm going to have to start marking down North/West arrows or some such. Tried for the Blinking Nebula (NGC 6826), but I don't think I saw it. Found M15; just on the edge of resolution.

NGC 6811 was another one the controller showed me, and this was interesting. There was a very bright asterism (as it turns out) nearby, and the cluster proper was a faint, ghostly, but pretty collection just out of the FOV. Originally, I thought the asterism was my cluster, and was trying to figure out what the hell this other thing was -- must be some cool obscure thing I should be glad to see from a well-lit suburban porch, right? Well, maybe, but the faint fuzzy was my cluster and the asterism was part of the Deep Sky Hunters catalog -- Teutsch J1935.3+4633, to be exact. (Oh, and btw 6811 has exoplanets -- Kepler 66b and 67b. I had no idea this was in Kepler's FOV. Sadly, both stars are, at mag 15 and 16, 'way out of my league.)

At that point I called it a night and headed home...which meant taking five minutes to drag the tripod, OTA and books inside. Which, let's face it, is AWESOME. No, it's not a dark site by any means, but it was nice as hell to be in and out so quick.

One last note: I'm reluctantly beginning to think I need to name my scopes; it feels awkward to refer to "the Dob" and "the Meade". Why reluctant? Beats me; I name computers all the time and it feels natural as hell, but for some reason it's just too cute with the scopes. I've come up with half a dozen names for the Dob that never stuck; latest is Ranger, after the series of satellites NASA sent to the moon to take pictures until they were destroyed on impact. The Meade? Still working on it.