Didn't open the observatory due to weather and humidity

SO THE OBSERVATORY WAS CLOSED - Instead I observed from the Possum Platform at home.

There were reports of storms possibly occurring on the radio. It was very humid and hazy last night, especially around 11PM. While running a late night errand I looked up and saw it might be worth taking a look to test the atmosphere (bowl like clearing conditions). The clear sky chart report stated it would be cloudy and transparency would not be good.

I was too tired to open up the observatory. I didn't want to throw out a late night post and then have someone arrive late to be disappointed by poor seeing and humid conditions. The humidity we had last night might rival a Panama rain forest.

I pulled out a couple of small telescopes and observed at home (for a "quick" look). It's funny how a quick look can turn into a long look and then you're falling asleep outside instead of being inside.

Transparency was better than I expected from the clear sky chart, with little "flickering" noticable, but the consistant view was somewhat bubbling from the humidity. I don't know if there's a good way to say transparency seemed okay, but humidity hampered the view. I was able to see the great red spot or at last something that looked like it, through the binocular telescope with 15mm eyepieces.
(about 46 power.)

There was some dew as well. The heat and humidity seemed pretty oppressive. My glasses would fog up or dew up when I would set them down. It was like being in an unpleasant sauna, with a few bugs buzzing around. I sprayed myself with enough insect repellant to perhaps keep stray pit bulls away.

Memerized or perhaps just to tired to pick up and go back inside, I felt myself drifting into Rem sleep, well perhaps more like REM observing.

Nothing of major interest to report, just gazed at the moon and Jupiter for a long time. I was trying to see how many details I could spot on Jupiter. I get this perception or feeling that some of the moons are closer and coming around this side of Jupiter and others are further back when viewing Jupiter through the binocular telescope. I think this is more of an imagined than something that can be proved, maybe it's actually some kind of optical illusion.

THE WANING MOON
The moon was wonderful, a better view than the night before. The sky was clear and not showing a glow or colored effect from pollution in the sky. I could stare at the terminator line most of the night. Some of the craters and mountains shinied brightly out of the shadows due to their height. One large crater(sorry I didn't look up the name) had a rim that was bright and lit up but darkness surrounded the rim. Darkness was inside the crater walls. That crater looked like half a mirror test on a test stand, where the edge of the mirror is brightly lit up and the rest of the mirror is dark. While watching a star suddenly appeared next to the dark side of the moon. It was covered (occulted) by the moon. The moon had past over the star and it suddenly appeared and flickered in the night sky. it appeared near the top dark side of the moon. (Remember I was using a binocular telescope, so this would look like it was near the botton of the moon in most telescopes or photos.)

The moon had an orange tint the night before, but last night it was more cold and white looking. The image bubbled a bit near the outer fringe. Not a bad view for 36 power.

I searched for the ring nebula and could not find it. This is a small target. Perhaps to small for the small telescope I was using.(magnitude 9.5) If I had the 10 inch Newtonian out I'd have likely found it, but I only used two small telescopes and didn't want to drive to the observatory to use the C-14 or a goto mount.

I also tried to take a handheld photo of the area where the ring Nebula would be. It was to hot to play with the telescope and pull it off the camera tripod so I just flopped down on the wood deck to shoot handheld. I pressed the camera against my face trying to hold perfectly still while the 10 second exposure went off. I'm not even sure I had a good focus, it wasn't bad, but it was far from perfect.

While I was laying perfectly still on the deck;, taking a few photos, I imagined being attacked by a local possum who took up residence under our deck.

I tried to remain calm while imagining that the possum would attack -- perhaps defending her "nest" of little possum offspring. (Possums have 13 little ones in their litter or swarm or whatever we are supposed to call them.) The possum family of course bothers the neighbors. The possums have been eating our neighbors corn before our neighbors could harvest any of it. And one little possum has been poisoned and crawled and died in another neighbors garage ("stinking it up to high heaven".) I told my neighbor (who removed the dead body) the possums want to live on our property, eat at the other neighbors garden, and die on his property.

Possums have 50 sharp teeth but probably won't fight, or be aggressive unless cornered and they'd rather play possum/dead than fight most of the time. They are like a cute, big ugly rat. They are actually marsupials and can climb like a fat squirrel. They have hands and feet that grasp like our hands and carry their kids in a pouch. Also they rarely get rabies, but they are pests and love to eat out of gardens and local garbage cans.

They have an odor kind of like a skunk that they give off and reportedly leave dropping that are kind of like dog droppings, but smell worse. I don't know for sure what possum droppings smell like, hopefully I'm not rolling around on them on my deck late at night enough to start smelling like a possum.

DISCLAIMER: (I hope that I don't smell like a possum, but sometimes may play possum at work.)

Well the possum never showed up, maybe poisoned by eaten some rat poisoning. My handhel photos don't rate a posting here.. I could get a faily clear shot at 10 or 13 seconds exposure. A 20 seconds exposure was to blurred with obvious camera movement.

Reviewing the photos I thought, maybe I should be looking for the Hercules Cluster instead as it was obviously nearby. I focused on using the binocular telescope most of the time, and the mount would not supply a steady view while looking up near the zenith (straight up).

This morning thinking about how tired I've been lately a part of a line came into my mind and I tried to write a short poem around it. So here it is. . . kind of old fashioned sounding.

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My eyes are moon burned from looking last night,

with cold dark circles beneath.

The hot humid air, bubbling atmosphere,

drove my observing to grief.

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