[AZ-Observing] a few good nights of observing

From: "Wayne (aka Mr. Galaxy)" <mrgalaxy@xxxxxxxx>
To: haclist@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, amastro@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, az-observing@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Sat, 24 Mar 2012 15:09:05 GMT
15480 Empire Rd.
Benson, AZ 85602
hm ph: 520-586-2244 Even though I have been battling a persistent cough the 
past couple weeks, I had a few good nights of observing starting 
Wednesday/Thursday night (the day after our "big" snowstorm; it was 27 degrees 
F when I came in at about 5:30am) and continuing through Friday/Saturday night 
(which ended with a sultry 44 degrees at sunrise). Unfortunately I haven't had 
enough energy to stay out the entire evenings and take advantage of the nice 
viewing conditions, though I think my cold is finally starting to break. I 
usually observed for awhile early in the evening searching for the winter open 
clusters east of the Orion area in my 20x100 binocs, which gave great views of 
most of the clusters (for example, NGC 2477 shows very nicely, like a miniature 
M46). For the smaller, dimmer clusters I observed them first in my binocs and 
then examined them more closely in my 13-in using about 100x. The larger, 
scattered clusters are very pleasing in the binocs, but lose their appeal in 
the telescope, sort of like not being able to see the forest for the trees. In 
addition to the clusters I also have been noting how quickly Venus and Jupiter 
are starting to go their own ways. It was (and continues to be) a pretty 
apparition.  After resting my eyes (usually for too long!) I came back out 
around 3am to scan through galaxies in Virgo and Centaurus using my 25-in. The 
first couple evenings went from very humid with frost, to moderately humid and 
icy dew, to finally dry last night. I took a look at a few of the recent SNe: 
the one in M51 has faded from visibility in my 25-in, the one in M101 still 
continues to shine at around magn 14.5, the one in M95 is brightening and looks 
good despite Mars being very close, and the one in NGC 4790 is interesting in 
that it makes the host galaxy appear to have a stellar nucleus, albeit a little 
offset. The seeing was fairly good each night and I observed good detail on the 
four planets available and observed some fairly close double stars, too, but 
could not resolve the very unequal doubles Sirius, Procyon, or Antares. The 
summer Milky Way region was exquisite through my binocs and I got in some 
wonderful views of the Sagittarius and Scorpius areas. To end the nights I saw 
a nice bolide or two low in the sky while I was packing things up to add a nice 
punctuation mark to the evenings' activities. I hope everybody else's viewing 
went well, too!
Clear skies, 
Wayne (aka Mr. Galaxy)
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[AZ-Observing] a few good nights of observing

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