A lil guys adventure in the large universe

Says it all

2011-02-18T22:57:00.001Z

I was on the Highway to hell... no, wait, hang on..?

2010-06-29T20:38:00.008+01:00

Wow, this has been a long time, but ive been planning this post in draft before posting, I think its gonna be a long one. In the past 8 or 9 months, ive learnt that love can turn sour and the system fails, not just most of the time, but all of the time and met dodgy landlords. Along this journey I have made new friends, found new hobbies and still maintainned a keen intrest in stargazing. Albeit not been able to get out much, as I need to repair or replace my current scope, thank you ex-partner.

Last year, a couple of months before Christmas, about the end of October I spent an evening in a police cell, lovely. My now ex-partner exploded, I remember that night as Jessica was playing up and wouldnt go to bed, so I ask her (her being the ex) to take Jessica to bed, as my back was playing up and I couldnt lift my own daughter. She refused, what resulted was a slanging match with her asking me to leave, I said no, so she tried to strangle me instead. Learning she didnt wasnt going to make a good mass murderer anytime soon, she grabbed Jessica (yup, she tried to strangle me infront of our daughter) and ran into the neighbours, prompty pinching my mobile in the process and smashing up the landline phone. About half hour passes and the police showed up, as it was a domestic they took us both in. Spent a couple of lovely hours in a cell, as did she, did the interview thing, the end result was I released without charge and I declined taking any action against my partner, oh what an idiot I was. The police took us home in the same car (!) It was about two in the morning(ish) maybe a bit earier. I managed to talk to her, and we argeed, like adults that we needed to sort something out for Jessicas sake. Next day comes along.

Now, in fairness, the morning started fine. Then the phone call happened. It was my partners parents, I am now told that if I am not "gone" her grandparents wont let us have Jessica back, I pointed out thats illegal and maybe even kidnapping, but my partner thought we couldnt do anything and never see Jessica again, etc etc. I said its simple, they are possibly breaking the law and I should call the police. She starts screaming "Dont call the police on me!" I said, not you, but what your parents are doing, again she runs screaming into the neighbours flat. Okay, police werent called, but about 10 to 15 minutes later, my partner shows back up with brother and mother... and start tidying the bedrooms..? Now, they never once entered the front room where I was, but I wasnt okay with the situation. A couple of hours pass before they go, taking Jessica with them again. My partner says I have to go, and tried phoning my father/sister/anyone she thought I could "go" too. To no avail. As I point out, it was also my name on the agreement, I am not just going to get up and go after going through the whole homeless/hostle situation in my past. I then got the whole "You are not seeing your daughter again" routine, which, couple that with my current state of mind, put me at perhaps my lowest state of mind ive even been.

I made an attempt at my life, no, im not proud of that, but the fact is, it happened. It was perhaps the most surreal moment in my life, I remember making myself a cup of coffee, I asked her where my pills were. Took coffee and pills into the bathroom, go outside, kissed her on the forehead, returned to the bathroom and locked the door, and did what I did. But what made even stranger, it was like I wasnt that person, I was someone else watching some guy try and do himself in, I wasnt that person doing it. A couple of minutes pass when the ex gets a phone call (which turned out to be Wayne, of all people.) And it was Wayne who convinced her to dial 999, next thing I know im in the back of ambalance rigged into various machines, I remembered that I said to the paramedic crews that I refuse to go, because I know she wouldnt let me back in, the driver made her promise to let me back in when I was discharged, that was the last time I saw my flat as my home.

I was put into the highcare part of of the A+E after a couple of hours, I was moved into normal part of the ward because they were sure I wasnt going to die anytime soon, I was discharged next day, with no lift home, like those nice police with nothing but a dying phone battery and a bus pass. I tried to phone home, she hung up on me after I said hello, I tried about 2 more times with no answer, so I made my way to local police station and explain to them. (Bare in mind still, its still my name on the rent card). Police took me round, she refused entry, according to the policeman, because shes already in and im out, its me who has to find somewhere else to go while I get this sorted. Being a Saturday, the council arent open. Kudos to PC Brown, who was livid at the officer who made that choice afters, but cant turn back time I guess.

Step in a couple of good friends Nick and Jenny who allowed me to stay there while I sort something out, and their cats Smokey Bacon and NoTail (3 guesses why shes called that...). Had a rather normal weekend with friends so to speak, and Monday rolled in.

One thing I learnt that Monday from the council, they are very good at telling you what they cant do, not what they can do. I had two options, sign myself off the tenacy or apply for legal action to get my flat back. Signing myself off meant I would completely lose my home, so, for a while I was considering the legal route. But it was my daughters home, and if it wasnt for her, I dont think I would have gone for the option I did. I signed myself off the tenacy, not straight away, of course. I was still living on my friends sofa, and my first port of call was get myself out there and off their sofa, as I am very sure they wanted the space back. Contacted a Homeless Prevention Team who got me to contact a place called 2 Saints (http://www.twosaints.org.uk/) who arranged an interview with me, next day if memory serves me correctly. I speak to this chap called Martin at 2 Saints, who in turn passes me to this guy called Nick, after splitting with my partner and attempt on my life, Speaking to Nick was perhaps mistake number 3 of really big mistakes I made. At first, he contacted this landlord, who had flats in the Shirley region of Southampton, one bed room I was told, but they are still being built/converted. He had a room in a shared house for me to go and wait, the wait which was only meant to be a month or less, so I signed the paperwork. I treated Nick and Jen to a meal of their choice as a thank you. (They went for curry, fyi).

It was around this time I got a letter from Eric Robinsons (That'll be her solicator) telling me to keep my distance after a period of physical and mental abuse, which is something else my solicator is looking at.

Next fun bit was getting my stuff back. Another couple of friends of ours tried to remain in the middle and not take sides, Pat and Cara. Cara acted as some kinda mediator and arranged it for me to phone up my ex to arrange my stuff. (Meanwhile, I contacted BT to place a block on the line, as I was still paying for the phonebill at my now old address, it cost me £26 and she still managed to run up £200+ phone bill. Thanks BT!). To cut a long story short, she refused point blank over the phone for me to get my stuff, I just hang up, she then phones up Pat and Cara and tells them to get round there as shes about to throw all my stuff out. Pat phones me up and we arrange a way for them to meet up with Nick (who has a car) to try and grab whatever.

This next part is relayed to me from Nick, Pat and Cara as I didnt go to the old flat so I wouldnt trigger a scene. She didnt let Pat and Cara into the flat, as she was scared (although she knew both of them now for 7 - 8 years). They had to wait outside for the parents to get there. In trying to get the stuff, the digs where flying, Pat even told them to shut up as it was his friend they were talking about, I understand that Cara tried to act as a mediator again for me to see Jessica, the Mother said no and the ex has told Jessica im dead, so far so good.

Soooo, got stuff out, got place to go to, had nice meal with friends, I move into my little temporary room.

6 Weeks past, Nick hasnt been returning my calls asking about whats happening with this "one bedroom flat". I go down to two saints, he tells me he has got my messages but has nothing to report as they are still being built. I said, well, why dont you just tell me that then? I set out to find another flat, as it seems this one bedroom place isnt happening. Find another landlord, who required a deposit, my sister points out that 2 Saints have a deposit scheme, great! I thought. This scheme was run by Nick. After talking to him over the phone, he asks me into the office, I cant go with another landlord he states. Whys that? asks I. You have already signed an agreement stating I will be moving into this "one bedroom flat" and lo and behold, only when asking for a deposit, do I get word that this flat is now ready! And to top it off, ive got two days to sort the move out. In steps Nick and Jenny again with their amazing car! And the move happens.

Let me introduce you all to my one bedroom flat....
Yes, I like Guitar Hero... call it a guilty plesure...
Anyways, thats pretty much my entire flat at the time, not so much one bedroom... More bedsit, with a closet cunningly disguised as a toilet. The cupboards on the right is what you can see of my kitchen and I shared garden access with one other person, who turned out to be my nightmare.

The flat wasnt insulated properly and it had a small storage heater, with no brick, so it couldnt store. It was very good at costing alot of electricity to use mind, I brought an oil heater from Argos, but even that could help with the change in the weather. I lived there when we had that cold front over Christmas and new year and the flat got bitterly cold, not taking your coat and gloves off was normal and it was still too cold. I kept telling myself it was roof, and I could have been worse off. Just before New Year, my landlord came knocking by, turns out my housing allowence wasnt being covered, I was stuck on Incapacity Benefit and he wanted £84 a fortnight aswell what social was paying him, otherwise get out. With that amount of money out of my pocket and the inability to heat it, the flat was killing me, literary. Couple this with my dungeon neighbour, who was a raging alcholic made my life pretty miserable.

It was getting to around Febuary time, I was pretty down and my dearest adopted sister couldnt help either, until one day she was alone in Starbucks. And bumped into an old friend of ours, Sarah Gale. (She used to be my landlord, if you will, when I had to stay in a YMCA about ten years ago.) She now worked for a seperate homeless team, who, it transpires wont touch Nick with a barge pole, she hooked me up with another Landlord, who got me a place in the centre of town, its a tad small, but it is a proper one bedroom flat, and put me in a better space than I was back in the old place.

Cue Nick and Jenny for another move! (Bless em)

2 Saints Nick has now been, erm, "No longer in his original postion" basically, I believe he got the sack, but there is still people looking into various things around him and my old landlord, im now in my new flat, slowly picking myself back up again.

During all this, the fight for Jessica access is now reaching a point of court action. I wasnt able to see my daughter before Christmas, and only about 4 times since, with my ex no longer returning any messages, ive since contacted my own solicator, so watch this space in that regard. I can predict that my ex will be getting a letter in the post soon she really isnt going to like, but we shall wait and see.

But, im in a better place now, Ive taken up my archery properly and made some new friends along the way, Craig, Steve, Carlos and not forgetting Bev! Close old friends became closer, Nick and Jenny, Pat and Cara, my poor suffering adopted Sister. And reconnected with old friends, Pete, Darren and Wes, so you could say ive been doing better now than I have done in the past, still some issues to sort out, but im getting there.

Long time no see!

2009-09-07T22:47:00.004+01:00

I finally get round to updating my blog, nothing exciting perhaps, but I have been busy, hense the long time between updates. Although I havent been able to get out star gazing. Truth be told, I havent been very well. Recently we have moved, the doctors put enough pressure on the council to get me a ground floor flat, with a garden! Still in the "tail-end" part of the move. You know the one, still got a few odds and ends in boxes and nothings "quite" how you want it just yet, this of course, I mean the whole move thing has been quite stressful, but the flat is great. Lovely garden and fantastic neighbours.

Between now and last time I 'blogged' I turned 32, my partner turned 29 our daughter turned 5 and we had our 9th anniversary, all in the last two weeks of August.

On the star gazing front, the new garden is great, I no longer need to travel now to be able to use the scope, Wayne did pop round where we had a proper Jupiter session, which is my own personnal favorite. I did take alot of shots using his camera and lappy, but im still waiting for the sod to email them over. However I have been using a service called Slooh (http://www.slooh.com/) basically you buy minutes and control a large telescope via an online telescope, heres a collection of pics ive taken using Slooh.

Of course, not as good as the real thing, but Slooh has enabled to me to enjoy my hobby when I get out or simply not well enough. In the meantime I have been trying to look for a Globe of Jupiter, I found Moon and Mars globes, but not one of Jupiter :( the Mars one looks fantastic, and the Moon one I found was offical NASA and looked the business. Jessica has been taking more of an intrest in what I do, again, major boost for me, to have my own daughter intrested in science. Her now old school did a whole host of space type stuff over the Apollo 11 40th Aniversary, and the teachers asked the pupils to get some photos of the moon or other space related things from home. Of course, being Jessica's Daddy, I had to go one better and gave her proper photos that we have taken, but I took the time to type up a desription on the back of each photo, including all the major Apollo landing sites aswell as other places of intrest, trying to write in such a way that a child could understand, so I wrote it as if I was the teacher/speaker talking to the class. Was chuffed to hear my photos were used in most of the classes taking part and used in lessions. I know to some this may seem a small thing, but lighting the fires of intrest in these young people was fantastic. But im sure most will forget where the Tycho Brahe crater is lol.

Next time I hope not to leave too long before I post again.

Slow updates, fathers day and new stuff going on.

2009-06-21T14:51:00.005+01:00

Ok, ive been a bit slow on the old updates, as I havent been out much, as the summer nights drown out most of the sky for me, looking forward to winter though. Hoping to get out there next week, so should hopefully have a star type post then.

But other than that, having a great "first" fathers day, albeit ive been a father now for nearly 5 years, I mark this as my first as this one is my first offical card from Jessica, signed it herself, awwww. Im a pleased as punch, chuffed father who really hopes hes doing a good job in her upbringing.

The picture above is a quick snap of my new toy (modelled by my lovely daughter) Ive got myself a drumkit again. For those that dont know, I was once a live drummer and since my accident all my old equipment went the way of the do-do. My biggest regret is losing my kit and although I could never play as a live drummer again, I can still play for fun at periods of time I feel comfatable with. I got in contact with my old guitar playing buddy. We're going to sort out a lock-up or somewhere where we can have a jamming session without giving anyone a headache.

As much as I want to jump on the kit now, I know I can't. Really wouldnt be fair on the neighbours, so im going to wait until I get a full set of silencers, this should hopefully keep everyone around me headache free, and sane.

Waynes new toy and a barlow!

2009-05-22T15:20:00.011+01:00

Tonight isnt going as planned, with a predicted 75%+ cloud cover, we have decided to put it on hold til next week, next Thursday appears to be at a lovely 1%! So, we're going to go with that. But, with all that aside, my nets been down for a little while and during this time we have been busy. I for one got my new Barlow, the Skywatcher Deluxe, lovely piece for the price, only £30 and rated quite highly in Sky at Night reviews. Its a double coated lens, if anyone wants to know. Threaded end for camera T-Rings to connect straight on and better yet, there is like a rubber ring just inside where you insert the lens, so it kinda "glides in" rather than "Plonk!".

With summer nights, we have been starting later as it isnt getting really dark until 2230 onwards, however I am setting up my scope when its light, which secretly, deep down, I really enjoy, as I dont often get to see it during the day set up.

A Day shot, its nice sometimes!

Of course, the main talking point was Waynes new toy, hes managed to get himself a Skywatcher 10" Dobsonian scope, so we now have two scopes set up each night we go out. He did go for the manual model, so aiming proved a little tricky sometimes and tracking objects can be a bit a cumbersome, but when things are brought into view it does a nice job showing you what your trying to look at!

Waynes new toy, Thats Wayne hiding his now night vision tuned eyes from the camera flash.

Wayne borrowed my red dot finder, leaving me with a rather large 9x50 finder scope. For the record, I love my red dot finder!

Of course with all this equipment laying around, we have another go at getting some piccys, not as good as the moon shots, but still, an attempt of sorts. The next two shots are attempts at taking shots, the first one is a rather poor saturn, not being able to hold to camera still for long periods of time we clearly didnt allow the shutter to stay open long enough. The 2nd shot was admittedly easier to take as it didnt need much time to take. Its an attempt on taking a shot on Vega, a bright star to the east in Lyra.

A couple things of note, my friend Matt, or Jumile whos sites been linked a few times in other posts has moved domains, well tell a lie, it has its own domain! So I shall relink, http://hurtlingthroughspace.com/ if you do want to pop along and have a look at his site. Secondly, I have to say, Blogspots online editor sucks. But that aside, I shall try my best and remain steadfast! More to come, as that say!

It all happens in three's

2009-05-22T00:26:00.002+01:00

Yep, when it happens, its happens. Got lots of lovely star stuff here, but that'll wait til tomorrow, as we're planning a night out and im planning to do an all in one post so to speak. Why not sooner you ask? Well, heres the list of 3 really duff things that has happened to me this week.

1.. Wii brakes down. yep, our Wii decided it was time to pack up. Lucky for us tho Nintendo care center isnt that far from us, so they allowed us to hand it in. The tech guy checked it out and reckons the drive and the motherboard need replacing. Im guessing all they will do is copy my infomation and saves onto another Wii and send that back, unless they can fix it I guess. He says within 5 to 10 days and I should have it back again. Oh well, these things happen.

2.. Internet breaks. Yep, this is the sole reason why I didnt update sooner, my net fell over. Fault on the line I was told, it got fixed tho, otherwise I wouldnt be posting this.

3.. ATM eats my money. Yep, this sucked, the ATM I drew some cash out with, not only didnt hand out said cash, it also took the amount off my balance. Bank said it couldnt be sorted for 48 hours, so I had to arrange an overdraft so I could pay for the important bits and shopping. 48 hours turned out to be 6 days, but at the very least we got there in the end.

So its true, crap things do happen in 3's. Hoping to get some star stuff up either tomorrow or at least over the next couple of days :)

Moon plus Telescope plus Camera equals much fun.

2009-05-06T23:55:00.006+01:00

Once in again, we leave to gaze into space and I can only conclude that cloud sucks. In fact it sucks so much, its like a really sucky thing whos extra sucky on a particually sucky day. Suck suckeddity suck suck suck. Okay, although we do need clouds, do they have to be that thick and fluffy. So with any star gazing out the window, one thing did shine though quite nicely, our closest friend The Moon.

Ok, a rather random odd shot of inside Waynes car.

Apart from the odd random shot above, of the inside of Waynes car (there was another one when we waited outside KFC in traffic, but I wont even bother to put that up). The rest of these shots are what we took of the moon, a couple of which im quite impressed with, bare in mind I still dont have a stand or a tripod, most of these were took holding the camera up to the telescope lens and I believe one is a distance shot, yet my shacky arms dont help. It has to be said, cloud makes a fantastic moon filter! I hope you enjoy these moon pictures, because they were an absoloute blast to take.

The only shame being tonight was a short one, as the cloud got so thick and fluffy even the moon couldnt shine though it. However I intend to keep up the good work as it was and do some more pics next time, and hopefully share my discoverys with anyone who cares to read my journal in my nights star gazing.

Another night in the wild blue yonder!

2009-04-26T02:25:00.008+01:00

So, we step out tonight, which might possibly be the last time in Waynes Mum back garden before we have to move elsewhere. But tonight I get to try out my camera, woot! Infact, double woot! wootwoot!

Before we begin, ive learned that Wayne isnt a very photogenic person, proof:

Erm, thats my Sywatcher next to a Wayne attempting to pose, I did send this picture to his laptop, made it his desktop wallpaper and showed his mum. His wasnt that impressed.

The methold we took pictures this evening wasnt very good, simply by holding the camera over the over piece and hoping, ive yet to buy and sort of equipment to hold the camera in place but believe me I am looking to into it. Because its quite clear I cant take pictures this way as im too shaky, but this is my first attempt and it is a learning curve. I shall share these pictures, albeit not very good.
My first ever shot, this should be a star within Ursa Major before it got to high, as you can see I am way to shaky, plus I didnt allow time for the exposure, as the camera uses a manual shutter system, so again I had to hold it for a length of time, again shaking as I go. I really need a tripod and theres a device I can get that plugs into the camera to control the shutter, rather than holding it.

The same thing happened with saturn, although you can make out its colour, you cant see its rings, which is a shame, as its a beatiful sight and still amazes me no matter how many times I see it.

The rest of these pics are jaggy shake'o'vison of stars I tried to take.

On the bright side, its a learning curve and I see and understand how it works and what I need to do to get better shots, I do however think that I should have started with a brighter subject, the Moon for example would be perfect for this I feel. Im hoping before next time to have some sort of device or tripod to hold the camera in place, rather than me trying to hold it.

Hopefully next time, some even better shots as I go out star gazing!

Sad Summer Days

2009-04-21T15:19:00.002+01:00

Its been rather slow here, instead of putting up adventures and pictures of nights out star gazing, we've had a rather sad set back.

Wayne lost his Grandad about a week ago, he fell very ill before he passed on, this is why we havent been doing anything recently, as Wayne has, understandbly so, been pre-occupied.

We are planning on "getting back out there" tho, and although we missed this months, hopefully we will be sitting in next months local astronmy club public meeting and hopefully join up.

Watch this space! or watch simply watch space, its very beautiful you know.

Bark at the Moon! (Guitar rift)

2009-04-03T00:27:00.011+01:00

Before I start, anyone in, or around or maybe just passing the Southampton area, go to into Bitterne shopping area. Why here you ask? Well, bare with me... Look for the Iceland shop, for people not knowing, its the bottom end of the shopping area, kinda under the Bitterne Baptist Church, which runs above and down one side, another landmark is the large concrete circle next to it, and the Red Lion Pub. Ok, with these landmarks, you should have found Iceland, jolly good, next door to that is one of those family run stationary stores. You know the ones, sell stuff, normally kids colouring books really cheap, kinda like a smaller version of The Works mixed with The Birthday Shop with no real intrest to anyone who doesnt want to colour in 5 year old pictures of Bob the Builder. Okay, still with me? Good stuff, now at the back of this shop, I spied some books, so I went in and had a look, there was a fairly small music section, loads of romatic fiction, mills and boon type stuff and then I saw they had a small Astronmy Section, they had books like Atlas of the Universe, new revised edition from Patrick Moore for a fiver! (Normally RRP is £30) So, if your passing that way, grab some bargins before the owners work it out!

Unless you like Mills and Boon, there was alot of that there, how do they keep churning out so many, I reckon I could do it. "He was the Price, next in line to the Throne, she was but a poor servant girl who dreamed she could be his princess..."

Enough of the that, we didnt set up til late tonight, as the nights here are getting shorter, Orion appears to be to low for us to get now, which is a shame, as we still had alot of looking at Orion to do, oh well, about another 6 months and it shall pop up again for us to look on in wonder.

We did have a very nice half moon and a fairly high up Saturn, tonight was going to be intresting, as we were armed with a filter, specificly for Saturn, as our first steps in using filters we thought best to stay with something we know, and Saturn has been a good friend now every night we went spotting, and even better, had a wonderful display of the moons.

Not a real pic, but one I took! Using Starry Night 6 I can show you Saturn and its moons.

The filter worked wonders, by reducing the light off Saturn and returning to us what looked like a more natural picture of the ringed planet, rather a bright in-your-face yellow, it was a lovely orangey brown with more contrast in the clouds, we could see different colour formations in the cloud structure, never once has Saturn failed to impress, now its even more impressive. For those thinking of playing with filters, I say go for it, tonight for me proved they are worth it, but it might be worth researching first, as there are many different filters for many different things, planets tend to have a filter each and as Saturn is quite common at the moment it made sense to me to start with that one, as the planet filters are cheaper than some of the Nebula filters. (As an example, this filter was roughly £7 including the P+P the Nebula filters started at £35+ with some coming in at above £100, there were CCD filters too that were stupid money, like £200+. Another Filter that is worth looking into, and im sure many star gazers already have are Moon Filters, stops your eys from burning out when looking at the moon. Can also work as a simple Light Pollution Filter, but not as good as a normal Light Pollution Filter, again, look for a Filter wheel, or at least ones you can stack.)

For the 2nd half of the evening we look towards our own Moon, being half moon tonight, it wasnt bleaching everything else, plus slightly easier on the eyes, we still used a moon filter tho, we aint that daft, well, not all the time. I try to convince people im not a complete idiot, because some parts are missing, but no one listens, hey ho.

Again from StarryNight 6, The Moon!

Once again, I found The Moon simply breathtaking, it seems so close though the telescope, its almost as if I could visit it myself by walking there (I wish). We had the half with Oceanus Procellarum (Sea of Storms), Mare Imbrium and Mare Cognitum were clear, so you can imagine it was the flat half it was showing. We could just about make out Plato towards the north end of The Moon. (For the fact fans: Plato was a larva flooded crater, its quite a dark spot on the north surface). As an experiment (I mean this very loosely), with the old Draper Scope I had, it came with a 4mm lens, it isnt very good, by a long shot, quite a shoddy build, very small view hole, it was in all fairness, damn near impossible to use on the Draper, but for a go, we used that and a x2 Barlow to look at the moon. My word! it was HUGE, we were looking at the craters near the terminator line, and we could see what looked like Mountin ranges! However, the eye piece, as I said, wasnt great so image did suffer in the long run, but it was a fun little test, but I think it does mean, and this is to everybody thinking about buying eye pieces... Buy a decent make! Dont go cheap, you'll hate the results and a few extra squids for a clearer, easier to see picture is much better in anyones book.

Anyhows, time came to pack up and come home, as clouds were forming and its was getting cold, plus I believe we set out and achieved everything we wanted to tonight, tested the prospect of using filters is now a thumbs up anyway. Ive ordered a new camera SLR digital type, so, hopefully next time i'll have some proper pics to show you all, but thumbs up to Starry Night its done a brill job!

Fire! Fire! Fire!

2009-03-24T01:38:00.004Z

It was to be a night of star gazing and discovery...
A galatic Adventure.
A Journey in space and time...
A shed caught fire instead.

Tonight was a tad random, as we were set to head out tomorrow (tomorrow being a Tuesday.) A quick check on Metcheck revealed that tonight (tonight being a Monday) was to be the only good night for at least a week, maybe even two, for my region at least.

Without any foreward planning we setup, tonight later than normal (Wayne didnt phone me til gone six, and didnt get here to gone seven, so we didnt set up til gone 8). But, unplanned, rather than concetrate on a single spot or constellation like we have been, or trying! We decided to aim at an area of space that was nice and dark, plug in the 25mm, and simply enjoy.

We where looking at stars we wouldnt see via the naked eye, maybe for the first time (for me at least) and as said above, it was random spotting, so I simply moved the mount controls and had a good search, and enjoyed the splender and beauty of the universe. I now think its a good thing to sometimes do this, unaided, unplanned and just sit back and enjoy what the universe wants to show you.

This moment of joy and glory was brought to a rather sudden tonight, about 22:00, just gone Wayne said, "I can smell a bonfire, whos having a bonfire at this time of night?". "That can't be a bonfire," Said me, smelling it myself, "It way to late."

Thats when we saw the flames, and then the explosion, lucky not a huge one, but enought to get me and Wayne dialing 999. (This was seconds after smelling it.)

A second "pop" or small explosion, captured on phone camera.

Wayne had more phone charge, and gave the fire brigade directions, as it was quite a remote spot. With what battery I had left took two pictures, (one is above, the other, below!)
I watched in horror as two people went right up to and it gave off another explosion, lucky no one was hurt and the people soon got the message and left alone, Wayne told me it was his next neighbours shed, lucky the houses and gardens were divded by a driveway and small parking area, otherwise I wouldnt have been watching. Wayne quicky dashed over to the telescope and fitted the lens caps and then moving it to a safer spot!

The fire in full swing, I caught this picture just before my phone's battery ran out.

The fire caught on very quickly, the fence which the shed backed onto was soon ablaze, wayne pointed out, if the whole fence was to go and the fire was to edge its way towards the house, the neighbours had a shoddly built extension made of wood and plastic, not great in the situation I thought. But, out inital quick thinking dialing 999 the fire brigade were soon there and not long after I found out how lucky I was to not be hurt, the fire brigade guys pulled out two large gas canisters, they soon drowned them in water. Soon the police were there, myself and Wayne did our civic duty and reported to them what we saw/heard, as we pretty much saw it from the start, we got a thank you for calling 999 and the nice chap from the police said they found aerosoles around the area, with the notion that charming teens we're playing with more than they should.

The main thing is, no one is hurt, I think Waynes neighbour is not going to be impressed with the mess their garden is now in, but at least everyone is safe.

Night of the Living Deadplanes

2009-03-18T01:46:00.007Z

Strange title huh? There is a reason for it, I swear tonight we saw at least 2 dozen plans fly overhead, one even came into view while looking though the telescope, what a lovely undersection it was, all planelike with flashy lights and everything! Basically, there was way to many planes up there tonight.

Far too many of these for some reason.

Anyhow, tonight was both a sucess I feel, but also a dissapointment. Dissapointed because its become clear that Orion is becoming difficult to view from our current spot and that light pollution tonight was too high. We really wanted to learn Orion before moving on to a new constellation, but we feel we simply have to wait for it again later this year to go indepth. But of course, this led to new goals, we turn our attention onto Ursa Major. It was in a nice unlit portion of the sky for us, and spends some time above where we are, so that seems to be the good one to go with, hopefully by next post, we'll have some more indepth views, ideas and me just talking on and on and on. I consider this a good sign, cutting the loses so to speak and continue are learning of the stars. So tonight really wasnt nothing more than picking intresting stars or checking Starry Night 6 to see if we could home in on various items. While checking the piece of software, we find out The Whirlpoor galaxy. (Fact Fans: its M51 spiral galaxy, thats 'interacting' with a smaller galaxy, its face on to us, its companion galaxy is NGC5195).

Picture of M51 (From NASA).

Armed with location, (again for fact fans: its in constellation Canes Venatici, the hunting dogs of Bootes) we learn that its a staggering 37mly away. Thats a long way, I mean, a really long way, I know its technically a water drop in the universe itself, but 37mly?! It was a challenge thats for sure! After some familer viewing of our old pal Saturn, which appears to now be a regular view everytime we go out, simply because its amazing to look at no matter how many times you view, plus we're so good at finding it now, we can aim the scope in seconds! We then move on to try and find M51. Im reading up my books and information, its not meant to be that hard to find, and with my power scope, we should at least be able to make out its shape. Ideally a stronger scope is needed to see the arms and generally more detail, but we were confident we will see something.

Wayne really did prove hes somekind of virtual satnav of the stars when it comes to finding things, it didnt take long at all to find it. Looking though the telescope, we could clearly make out the bright centers, and although we couldnt pick out much detail, we could see, what looked a cloud that surrounded them in the shape of the galaxy, some checking up on angles and whatnot (yep, we even check things now!) we are assured we found the Spiral Galaxy, with a joyful glee we look on.

There is not much else to post for tonight, as it seemed the light was really against us, there was alot we wanted to see, but couldnt. But we are confident and will continue, not only to look but also learning as we go.

Its great that with each passing week we are learning something new, everytime we go out, even prepared, we find something that just blows our minds, but we have the power to research, and discover what it was, and next time, we know that little bit more. From stars, galaxys, nebulas and even telescope usage, we learning every step of the way, and its bag loads of fun! Hopefully my next post on star gazing will be a bit more indepth Ursa Major plus a load of random stuff, because thats always fun to find! Also, we're going to look for a new spot and we are going meet up with one of the local clubs and learn even more, its going to be fun!

4th Night into the Great unknown!

2009-03-11T01:10:00.006Z

Tonight we tried to be a bit more selective in our viewing, and try and discover and learn the stars piece by piece, rather than "Wow! whats that!", ok, that still happened, but the start of the evening was planned, honest!

This evening we stuck to observing Orion, its main features and discovering things inside Orion we dont see by the naked eye. With reference card and Planispehere in hand, we set up and turn towards Orion.

Since my last post, Ive learnt alot about magnification and how it works, we ran a short test night before, just outside my flat on the stars confirming that it isnt going up in lens size (ie, 20 to 30 to 40mm and so on) but the other way (20 to 10 to 5mm etc) sucessful test, wasnt much else to write about, as we pretty much only set up for 10 minutes, if that.

Back to tonight and return to Waynes mum garden, we aim up, (side note: red dot finder is a joy to use) and we bring Betelgeuse into view once again. (For fact fans, Betelgeuse is some 430 light years away and its so large astronomers have been able to map out its survice.)

We've used Betelgeuse as a start point all the times we've been out now, its quite a distinct star, its easy to point out and easy to find. Plus seeing as tonight we're staying with Orion, it seemed a great idea to start with its giant red star. We then move on to Orions belt, and in turn pulled all three stars into view, Mintaka, Alnilam and Alnitak. Alnitak with stayed with the longest, a bright double star that looked simply stunning on the scope. Going down slightly, on to what I believe is nicknamed "Orion's Sword", those 3 very faint stars just under Orions belt, little did we know the treat it had in store for us! The faint shape of Orions Nebula! (or M42) we could make out the shape and "the cloud" that made up the nebula, it was then we relised, we really should be looking into getting filters. so that item is now on my research and shop list.

This fantastic picture of Orions Nebula is one of Hubble's photos.

Of course, if your going to view Orion, you as well take a peek at Sirius the brightest star in our sky, also known as the "Dogstar" is even more beatiful though the telescope, it was so bright in the view finder, it "bleached" out everyother star around it, its center a bright white with a pulsing blue outer rim, albeit of course, its a binary star system, so the blue lights may have belonged to Sirius B, the white dwarf star.

Having fun mapping out Orion as we did, the curse of the inner city was upon us again, the bottom part had already started to creep behind the houses, and the top was quickly following. Oddly enough, it wasnt until I started doing all this do I notice how fast these things are moving, they appear even more faster trying to view them!

Of course, the night sky tonight had a full Moon, so, as Orion sunk below the rooftops, we turn our gaze onto the Moon, on the downside, we learn tonight my supplied Moon Filter, simply wasnt any good (better one now on order) we couldnt just look at the moon, it was too bright and hurt our eyes! Its a shame, because what we did see, the telescope showed fantastic detail, better than last time, but we simply couldnt enjoy it, which was a shame, because I was really looking forward to a full moon and identifying features and mapping it out for myself, however like I just mentioned, we were able to order a new filter, so next full moon, we'll hopefully be better prepared, unless my order comes tomorrow, then im sure me and Wayne will grab a sneaky look, ya know, to test things.

The Moon led to another problem, I dont know about the rest of the country, but it lit the sky up really well, hiding other stars, with a sigh, we admit defeat to the moon, but next time coming out with a better filter! And hopefully getting the rest of Orion, before moving onto the next constellation, either way, its fun!

3rd Night out, and a new scope already!

2009-03-06T02:37:00.008Z

Tonight is a bit of an odd one, as it wasnt planned as normal, you see a couple of days ago I treated myself to some new bits and bobs, and today a FedEx van came to my place and delievered it all. Basically, what I started off with was this;
I knew when I got it, it wasnt going to set the world alight, it was a 76mm Newt on a Azimuth mount, little though it was, it did do a great job, however it was clear that something else a bit bigger would be the order of the day, so from that little scope, we move on to this;
Its a Skywatcher 130PM, on a EQ2 mount, after alot of fiddling around we manage to set the mount up correctly, and its been an absolute joy to use, not only is everything clearer (its a 6" so more light for a start) the mount makes tracking a breeze, after a while setting up, this really was a joy to use.

It was quite a jump, and the new scope is excellent, but the Drapper will still have a home here, as we do more star gazing, we seem to attract friends and family, so the Drapper will make a great scope for everybody to use, well, anybody who comes along and wants to try out a scope. They will be on their own when it comes to the finder scope, I still havent got my head around that thing and the new one has a red dot finder making the whole finding process so much easier, we even got the red dot in the center, properly! (Again, like my first post, read the manual, we honestly didnt have a clue until we did!)

I tried to take some pictures using my mobile phone, here they are, completely piss poor, but I shall share them anyway.
This was meant to be Wayne next to the new scope with the old scope behind it, it, erm, didnt quite work, the only light we had, as you can see was his mums secruity light they use for the back garden (we switch this off completely when spotting, we use it when setting up). For want of a camera flash.
This is "meant" to be the half moon we had tonight, again taken with a mobile phone (just pointing upwards) its complete pants, but at least its our own photo!

Most of tonight was the setup and learning of the new scope, I found the EQ style mount a real joy to use, viewing stars for longer without having to re-adjust all the time was a real pleasure.

We did compare the scopes with each other, mainly by lining up on areas we already know and seeing what the difference in quaility is like. Again we pick on Saturn, we cant get tired of the ringed gas giant, always a beautiful sight to behold, and in the new scope we picked up at least 3 of her moons clearly.

Our flashing oddity was back from last time, in roughly the same area of sky, but this time not flashing as violent, although still quite bright and you could still see its colour changes by the naked eye.

Next time we go out, we're going to make a point of only tracking certain items, ie, to make a goal, say for example, view and log Orion, logging it down properly and taking the time to study the constellation before moving onto a new target, thats the plan anyway!

Dave

Second night star spotting, and oh so clear!

2009-03-02T01:47:00.006Z

Great! It was another wonderfully clear night, fantastic time to go star spotting. This time I had the joy of taking my partner and my daughter along for part of it. Again, we had to our friends mums backgarden, although we are thinking of finding other areas, we figured the safety of the garden which was fenced in, plus a nice warm house is better (and safer) for our little ones, Jessica (my lil daughter) is only 4, so safety was top concern, as well as warmth when needed. Our car-able friend, who I shall name now, because its easier to write his name each time, Wayne, also brought along his partner. He was looking forward to bringing his daughter, who is slightly older than Jessica, but was down with the chicken pox.

After such a great first night, I was keen to see what the Universe could show me tonight, and she did me proud. Tonight was fantastic. Even down to the cups of coffee coming out.

Tonight I came a bit more prepared, well, it turns not as well as I hoped, but still better than last time, I came with pen, paper and a red/low light torch as well as references and charts. My copy of Starry Night 6 had by this point already came in the post, after having spent some time learning how it worked, I sat down to mark various places to see. Im quite impressed with the Starry Night software, it took a little bit longer to get around it, but in the end, well worth it.

Anyways, on to our adventure in the stars. We setup alot earier this evening, around 7pm we had the scope set up and ready to go, we started at this time because we wanted to catch Venus before she dissappeared.

Although only a cresent Venus, it was still wonderful.

As you can see in the picture here. (Again, not ours, but this is pretty much bang on). We didnt see the whole planet, we saw the cresent Venus at roundabout 1915 hours, she was still a wonderful planet to spot, albeit only part of her. Its a shame she moves quite quickly, as she was out of our viewable range in about half an hour, again we could have possibly of seen her longer, but alas peoples houses get in the way, the curse of inner-city living.

Next place to spot was the Moon, above Venus and slightly to the left of where we were, although again, not a full Moon, but in her Waxing Cresent phase, but still the brightest object up there by miles. We home in onto the moon, now sadly, ive never seen the Moon for myself, aside from videos/pictures/websites etc, so this was my first time viewing it.

The Waxing Cresent of the Moon.

I was really quite surprized on how much detail our telescope was able to view, I was quite simply in Awe. The best bit, before I go on, is when we got Jessica to have a look, me and Wayne lined up the scope, while my partner picked her up so she could see though the lens. We first explained to Jessica what she was about to see before we showed her, as soon as she saw the brilliant view, my 4 year old angel gasped and said "oh my!" She didnt turn from the scope straight away either, instead getting a good look at the Moon, be a great one to tell her school friends come Monday! At this point, everyone wants to take a peek, so my Partner, then Waynes Partner, Jessica again, then Waynes mum all want a peek at our Moon. Which is both great, but, I wanna see it toooooo! But no matter, afterall, other people getting intrested can only be a good thing. I get my chance to see, I was looking at the Mare Imbrium area, I could quite clearly see Cassini and its "dimple", as well as a whole host of impact craters on it surface. But the details was amazing, I could clearly make out the shadows, cracks, holes, lumps etc. I am so looking forward to a full moon now, its unreal, I really want to see everything it can show me.

Now getting on for part eight o'clock, we aim South and we get Sirius into view, its quite surprizing that we didnt get this last time, considering how bright it is. I didnt know quite how bright Sirius was until I viewed it. We were getting in the same portion of space as our faithful friend from last time, Saturn. It was way past Jessicas bed time and she was getting tired (grumps had started to set it) so I thought what a great way to end the night for her than a glimpse of the yellow gas giant, Saturn itself. As before, me and Wayne aim the scope, while my Partner holds up to the lens, after a small paddy of her not seeing anything, she finally saw Saturn and its Rings, albeit a bit flatter today than last time, but still quite viewable, with the added bonus of what appears to be some of her larger moons in view. Tonight must have made an impact on her, as tired and grumpy as she was, she didnt want to go home and wanted to look some more, so maybe ive started something here! But, school tomorrow and bed she must go, I stayed behind in the backgarden while Wayne kindly got Jessica and my poor suffering partner home. Wayne was quite keen to get back, as we appeared to start finding... oddities...

It was roughly this point, waiting for Wayne to return, I watched the moon myself for a while as it dissappeared behind the houses, I text my other friend Jumile, who has been out himself with his binos looking at Venus and the Moon. After Waynes return, we're now getting on past nine o'clock, Wayne spots a glittering star West of our postion, so we "tune" in as it was.

This is were we lack research now and entering the "unprepared zone", some may argue this is best bits, not knowing what stuff is, at first the glittering star is a nice white center with greens and reds dancing around the outside, it was quite some distance out, thats for sure, we had no idea what we were looking at, however clever old stick me, whos brought his pen and paper out mark down location and time, and when we got back, we did some research in both Starry Night and Stellarium. Cross referening both sets of information we had from both programs, we narrowed down to one possibility, we saw the Great Andromeda Nebula.

Great Andromeda Nebula

Of course, what we saw was no where near as clear as this picture, however as soon as we did see it, before we even knew what it was, we kinda agreed we need a bigger scope! Even before we knew what we were looking at, finding blinking stars or stars doing odd things quite exciting, the not knowing of what it was, was sort of appealing, so we go on to hunt down another.

Getting on for 21:15 hours, we find a lovely glittering suspect in the Eastern sky, a lovely big star, which appeared to be the same as the Nebula, however again, it wasnt til we got home and able to check out our information where we able to tell what we were looking at, and after alot of disscussion, and we're still 100% sure, but we believe we hit upon the star of Vindemiatrix. A bright star in the Virgo constellation. (Apprently, it means Grape Gatherer, in case anyone wondered...)

Wayne was quite keen to go back to Saturn for a while, as we were sure some of its moons were in view, plus the fact it was familier ground again, and plus another fact, Saturn is a joy to behold.
Plus a 3rd fact, Waynes got really good at finding her. We could see smaller objects around Saturn, best guess I feel would be her larger moons doing a show for us, Titan was some ways out according to our Software, although we could see smaller items, I think Titan was just too far and too dark to be seen, Titan was also quite a distance from Saturn at the moment anyway. so I believe at the moment, Titan is a no-no. Doesnt mean it will be like that forever tho ;)

Roughly 22:00 hours, we see an extremely bright, colour changing object between Southwest and West, without hesitation, we set the scope up to view our new found object.

We've never seen something so bright, yet so, for a better word, frantic. It was close to the Orion Constelation, to the left of it infact, but quite low down. It was a dazzling array of color, ranging from purples, reds, blues, greens. Jokingly I said it must be a star on acid, but it was something thats for sure, by this time, im texting Jumile to get him looking out that way, some suggestions were flying back and forth. Jumile hinted that it may have been Procyon a Binary star in Canis Minor. Some checking on various Software later revealed that Procyon was too high for what we were looking at, what we saw didnt appear to be listed the software we were using, including Starry Night 6. Some investigation was needed! Some searching on the web, we found a discussion board talking about a strange star recently found with various world sightings, some possible theorys on what it is but nothing solid. Another discussion board appears to be talking about the same thing. But one thing was for sure, we couldnt find anything solid on what it was. The view however, was amazing, it lit up my entire scope viewfinder, blocking out light from anything else. The light was quite intense at one point Wayne even remarked that looking at it was brighter than the moon. Yet it put on this dazzling light show, to quote something I text Jumile while trying to figure this out, "The colours are dancing on my scope." It was rapidly flashing colour after colour, it was clearly moving from South to West, it was beatiful, yet mindblowing, what was it? I kept asking myself. Wayne did remark, if that answers you back im going! We laughed, but still, this strange thing kept us glued to the scope, it was intense. Even by the naked eye, you could see its colour pattern dance away. Its blown my mind, and I am going to get searching til I get something solid on what it might be, but that aside it appears the universe has lots of wonderous things to show me and I cant wait for our next encounter with any show she cares to prepare for us. Getting on now, past 23:00 hours our odd new friend, like so many others disappears behind houses and various other buildings. We decide to pack up for the night, and get back to research our unknown finds, aside from our new friend and his amazing lightshow, we pretty much catalogue everything we saw. And next clear night, we're going to try to be even more prepared, hopefully :D

There is something here I forgot to include, roughly 21:00 im playing around with the finder scope, when waybe taps my arm, "Look up!". Starry Night 6, predicted that roughly 9 O'clock the APEX satelite would be viewable, and it was pretty spot on, we saw it pass overhead at such an amazing speed, I think setting up the scope for a better look would have been in impossible, however I thought made a nice addition to what we found.

It was also great to see Jessica enjoy herself tonight, Im hoping we can do it again one day soon, it was fantastic when I saw her face get gobsmacked when she saw the Moon, I think she had a "Wow!" moment like I did my first time the other week, she seemed so keen, so I think me and Jessica star gazing may become a bit more regular, who knows? Maybe I have started something great.

Dave

Wasted Years part deux

2009-02-28T00:02:00.003Z

Ok, completely random post, but the Title of the last post is one of more favorite Iron Maiden tracks, so im posting up a video to bang my head to. :D

Wasted Years

2009-02-26T02:00:00.002Z

Although im looking forward to some exciting adventures in space, there are some things that bring me back down with a bump. I shall now bore you with one such event.

Today was one of my regular hospital appointments, anyone who has to have regular check ups know how much of a chore this can be, although they are only trying to help, I cant help but wonder if some appointments cant be handled over the phone. That aside, today I meet with my Psychotherpist. There was alot of talk about Therapies and various options aswell as how im doing in the clinic, and how can the clinic help me etc etc etc.

But the bit the struck most was the letter she was composing, it was like an all incompassing letter, one that explains how im doing, what im doing, what they are doing, whats to come, what options etc. The bit the stood out was the first part, it listed how long I had been with the condition I have, roughly 6 years.

It wasnt til I read that, it finally hit home, what has happened to those six years? I can remember the accident as if it was yesterday, before it happened I was fully abled, looking to build my career in the IT world, then 'BAM' it all changes. And here I am now, 6 years on, its true when they say life can throw anything at you, and yet all I could think about was, wheres it all gone?

Lucky for me, im trying to do/achieve things, many of which you'll more than likely read about here, so now I should be thinking "better late than never". But it would have been so nice to fill those years with something, so far my condition is older than my daughter, my fear currently is that, well, I shall word this how my main consulatant worded it in a letter once "His condition has effected his system globally", lovely huh? But my fear is that as I continue my fight against it, the worse things become, ive gone from walking, to a walking stick, to a crutch, to two fitted crutches and a wheelchair when needed, I hope the wheelchair doesnt take over.

This aside, I shall keep my chin up, and look forward to 'better things' plus all that aside, im still Father to a lovely daughter and at the very least, I can take part in her upbrining which alone is fantastic. She also wants to use the telescope, so I might have to arrange something when the family go spoting, that aside I am planning another night with my able-car friend :) so i'll keep you posted :D

Dave

Slow Sunday

2009-02-22T18:24:00.001Z

Its a slow Sunday, so i'll post up this video off youtube, just to show how small everything 'really' is. Enjoy!

First night in a friends backgarden.

2009-02-21T23:38:00.000Z

Tonights the first night I get to try out the telescope, albeit ive owned it now for about 2 weeks. (Been quite unwell when it was ordered). We did try last night, however the cloudcover was too much, plus we were stalked by a rather evil looking pony, think Cujo, just bigger.
So, on with today, first I recieved a link from my friend Jumile with a site that covered cloud cover in and around the UK (http://www.metcheck.com/V40/UK/HOME/) thanks to Jumile on that one. (Thanks mate!) and we discovered that cloud cover wasnt as bad tonight. Roughly 34% at the time according to metcheck, plus during the day there wasnt a cloud overhead plus I was feeling much better health wise, so tonight was marked as the night we went star gazing for the first time.

We used a great little program called Stellarium to see what was "up there", plus it was a great way to get directions and make notes in journals, I learnt that having a compass really helps matters. On a side note, Stellarium is great, it also opensource, so its free. So, the least I could do for them is pimp them http://www.stellarium.org/. Ok, that aside (Theres also a copy of Starry Night 6 on the way on the post to me.) we took our notes and set out to do some gazing.

This leads to the "bummer" part of the post, although I have Telescope, binos, compass etc etc we didnt have any camera equipment, so we're out of luck on the picture front, im hoping to recitfify this in the future with some way of taking images and posting them, even for my own records, as tonight was amazing and I really wanted to have a "keepsake" for myself, however, its forever in my memory and one day I hope to share pictures of my findings.

Im cursed with a crippling back condition that effects my legs hips and back, however, I have a completely fully-abled friend with a car! Which, I can tell you makes this a whole lot easier, so, we pack scope and stuff in his car, and drive to, oddly enough, his mums house. Upon questioning this rather odd choice, it soon came clear, his mother had a large garden bathed in darkness, now his choice made perfect sense, plus his mum kept coffee coming out! Plus I was able to witness a knock on effect first hand, things we found and saw (which I am getting to!) she wanted to see for herself, and of course, hurried into the house to tell family, of whom of course also wanted to see what was out there, so maybe tonight the seeds of curiosty have been planted in a few more people! :)

(Of course, the more we found, the more coffee came, so it was win win for me...)

All this aside, we set up. We needed a nice bright point to start with, to the South of us we had the constellation of Orion.

Unfortunately, this isnt our picture. However, I have used this to show the Orion system.

It was a wonderfully clear night and the whole of Orion was visable by the naked eye, we used Betelgeuse as our first point to line the telescope up. Betelgeuse is the red star of Orion, also the 2nd largest in the constellation, our reason for choosing this star as refence was the way it stood out, making for us, an obivous choice. Some twiddling and pointing, and not understanding how a finder scope works, reading the manual, learning how the finderscope works, cursing because we playing with the nuts that hold the finder scope on, arent there to hold it on but were for fine-tuning the finderscope, we got over that hurdle... (lession learnt here: read manuals folks!)

So, now we know how the finderscope and twiddling its nuts (can I say that on this...?) to fine tune and how this all works in relation to the main scope, we got it pointed at Betelgeuse. And looked in the view finder of the scope to see...

A splodgey orange blob messy thing.

Now, it does help the viewer if we start playing with the various focus controls of the telescope. (refer back to my lession, read manuals) we then brought Betelgeuse slowly but surely, into focus and then stars I had never seen before tuned into crystal clarity. I looked away from the finder scope, my friend, who has now become a really dab hand at keeping the scope in line with what we're looking at is moving various bits keeping the star in view, I look up and I just see the Orion formation, I look in the view finder of the telescope, and I see it again, stars, formations that ive never seen before with my humble naked eye is as clear as crystal. This was my first "wow!" moment, I look again, its all moving, its alive everysingle bit of it is alive, my friend has a look, this is his first time, and I think the same "wow!" thing happened. Staying with the Orion constellation we move the telescope around slightly, by this time Orion had moved on, we werent quite south anymore and more southwest, we aimed to the bottom part of Orion. (Below Orions Belt.) We were seeing things for the first time, and I think we were unprepared to be completely honest, because we pulled a bright star into view, but it looked different, my friend clamed he could see four points around a brighter middle star, whereas I couldnt see this, but what I thought was possibly a binary star, or at least, two stars close to each other. Checking out Stellarium when I got home, I do believe what I saw was possibly the bright star Ori, HP26199 and HP26197. Ori is quite a bright star, but very close to the other two, and im pondering on what it really was. Another possibility was M43, however this just reinforces the fact I need to have better research with me before I go spotting.

We then decide, lets try another constellation, first night and all, you know, lets looks at lots of stuff...:)

The 2nd most obvious choice was Ursa Major. The Bear, or as some people know it, The Plough or Big Dipper, but lets just call it Judith... I mean Ursa Major for now.

Again, not our picture :( But this image shows the "Big Dipper" of Ursa Major quite nicely.

We set the scope to be pointing at Ursa Major, which was East of our location, and this is where we found our biggest issue of using my friends mums back garden. Roughly Northeast, directly opposite the garden, theres like a communal parking lot that the residents use. Being an already dark area, and I can only imagine for the safty of the users of the parking lot, theres a collection of quite bright street lamps. Basically, this "bleached out" most of the eastern night sky, until now, I never would have known that light can play havoc like this to a telescope. We never got to see any of Ursa Major this evening.

Pondering on what to do, and not knowing too much of the night sky (Again, research and lack off, this being my own fault.) I remembered something off Stellarium, Saturn was in the Southeast of the night sky.

This raised the issue of lighting, more importantly, the streetlighting that will be behind us. We had an idea of using the darkest corner of the garden and lowering the telescope, so it will be as dark as possible where we were and where the light couldnt effect us, hopefully. And be jove, it worked! We didnt find Saturn straight away of course, all we had was a rough direction the ringed gas giant might be, some luck was to be on our side. Checking the book we had (and only book I brought, silly me) we were looking for a yellow star, this is everything we had to go on, yellowstar, possibly Southeast. We had about 3 or 4 possible contenders, this was by the naked eye, I was thinking that simply looking using the telescope could open up a whole new can of worms, where 3 -4 yellowish stars suddenly become several thousand.

We didnt let it bother us that much, the first star, wasnt the gas giant we were looking for, but we struck gold on only our 2nd attempt. My friend, now very good at the whole pointing and finding things on the telescope was making alot of "urm" and "Err" sounds. Then very quietly he said, almost a whisper, "Ive found her."

Excitedly we use the view finder, and he was right, I was looking at the yellow giant and I could make out the ring formation either side, we brought it into better focus, but it was moving accross the view finder quite quickly, but undetered we kept Saturn in view, thats when I had a brainwave. When I purchased the telescope, it came with some free lenses etc, one of which was a Barlow lense, so straight away we put the Barlow into the the scope re-attach our lens, we both using scope and viewfinder find the planet once again, this time in even better detail, we can see the formation of the rings and the shadow of the rings cast on the planet itself. It was perhaps, the most awe-inspired humberling moments ive had in recent years, I was, if you forgive the pun (which isnt intended) star-struck. Straight away, im texting friends as if my partner has given birth to our second child. For one moment, I felt I was part of the universe, its hard to explain just how much of an effect Saturn had, afterall, this is the first time I had seen it, with my own eyes and, proudly my telescope and to take in the fact that Saturn is roughly 886 million miles away I was simply blown away. Its now I really wished I had camera equipment for the scope I wanted, not only to publish, to be honest, that wasnt foremost idea if I had a picture, but it would be my picture of Saturn, my keepsake of the 21st Feb 2009 where I set my telescope for the first time in my mates mums backgarden and we saw Saturn.

We kept Saturn in view for roughly just under an hour, we were just simply amazed by it, first night out and this is whats on offer, I cant wait for more! We would have looked on for longer, however it started to get very cold, and just getting over quite a bad illness I didnt want to get ill again, plus that and the fact my back is hurting something awful brought me back down to Earth, we pack up for the evening, however for next time we plan to get some proper notes of the sky that night and set up some proper viewing "goals" if you will, basically we are going to be prepared next time, plus that and looking for other locations to spot from. But I reckon, Saturn from a backgarden isnt bad, isnt bad at all.

Dave