Conquer Club

The link below should give you a good look at the night sky for mid-January for North Am and Europe (northern hemisphere):

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/mira-makes-january-nights-wonderful/

Orion is what I notice the most in the night sky this time of year. I look for the stars that are its "belt" and from their spot other stars of that constellation. The article above focuses on Mira, a star I know little about. There is a good picture of it from the Hubble ST.

JP

Now that I have triangulate your views of the heavenly bodies, I will now know approximately where you live.

Going to buy a trailer home nearby you son! Can I buy you a " happy meal "?

No news, 2dimes?

What are you seeing in your telescope?

JP

I only saw leaves across the street on the nieghbor's tree through the telescope this year. The sky has been most often obscured by clouds here, for a while.

There was one evening that finally was clear and I reported on it.

On January 18th, 2018, 2dimes wrote:I'm not going outside to look but finally there are stars outside.

https://cam01.sci.ucalgary.ca/AllSkyCam ... tImage.JPG

I just looked and it's purple, not sure what's up? I looked out the window and it is the usual light pollution here.

In sort of unrelated news I went ice fishing last Tuesday. Caught and released 3-4 suckers. My bud caught and kept two nice sized Brown trout and a typical Rainbow trout, released a small rainbow and lost a few unknown fish. I had a sore throat after. He said he was going today, I had not phoned him back, Imm taking my daughter to the RV show.

2dimes wrote:
I just looked and it's purple, not sure what's up? I looked out the window and it is the usual light pollution here.
.

Well, it could be Purple Haze.

I asked if you clicked the link presuming it was still that way. Then I checked and it was gone.

I managed to save it though. I put it up as my avatar since that is my easiest way to share a picture here.

2dimes wrote:I asked if you clicked the link presuming it was still that way. Then I checked and it was gone.

I managed to save it though. I put it up as my avatar since that is my easiest way to share a picture here.

When I click on the link it looks pale blue to me. Very different from your avatar. Probably something to do with how different systems render colour codes.

No, it went pale blue by the time I asked. That's why I deleted that post.

I suspect there was some sort of local light doing it but it might have been something to do with sunrise.

2dimes wrote:No, it went pale blue by the time I asked. That's why I deleted that post.

I suspect there was some sort of local light doing it but it might have been something to do with sunrise.

Either way, a perfectly good Hendrix joke fell flat...

Wednesday morning there is another lunar eclipse.

No the joke was ok.

I was just wondering what caused the sky to do that there. Also I am close enough it maybe should have been doing that here. I was not about to go out in a bath robe to check though. Maybe I missed it. Kind of glad I saved the image.

Wednessday is going to be kind of a triple lunar event.

2dimes wrote:No the joke was ok.

I was just wondering what caused the sky to do that there. Also I am close enough it maybe should have been doing that here. I was not about to go out in a bath robe to check though. Maybe I missed it. Kind of glad I saved the image.

Wednessday is going to be kind of a triple lunar event.

Not really. There is no such thing as a supermoon. There is no such thing as a Blue Moon and even if it were, this isn't it.

The Blue Moon controversy is one of the most notorious incidents in the history of fake news. In the astrology thread I suggested the astrologists are guilty of libel against the moon. This is one of those examples where the astronomers are acting like astrologers and pushing bullshit.

So let's start at the beginning - in the folk lore period of New England. Around the time when they were burning witches in Salem Farmer's Almanacs used to collect astrological and astronomical bits of information. One of those common bits was the superstition of a blue moon. When there are 4 full moons in one season, the fourth is called a blue moon.

What happened next is a travesty of reality. In 1946 Sky and Telescope - trusted to be an authoritative astronomical magazine - took a foray into publishing astrology. Of course, they didn't understand what they were saying and they misinterpreted the Farmer's Almanac as saying that a blue moon is the second full moon in a month. As Wikipedia recounts, the fake news radio media and even Trivial Pursuit hopped on board to rapidly spread this misinformation. Sky and Telescope has since acknowledged their mistake: http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/celestial-objects-to-watch/what-is-a-blue-moon/

However, the damage is done. The misinformation is more common than the information. But since what we're arguing over doesn't exist in the first place it probably doesn't matter. Here's the problem. Lunar eclipse is a scientific/astronomical term. Something independently observable happens that everyone can agree on. Super Moon and Blue Moon are both astrological terms that mean nothing except subjectively.

When you start meddling the scientific and the non-scientific you get fruit and vegetable debates. Are tomatoes a fruit (scientific term) or vegetable (non-scientific culinary term)? Anyone who claims to only believe in science can not believe in vegetables.

That's fine for you but I like to make believe that the Apogee and Perigee are real.



I also don't understand how you proved it won't be the second full moon of the month simply by not liking what some are calling it.

2dimes wrote:That's fine for you but I like to make believe that the Apogee and Perigee are real.



I also don't understand how you proved it won't be the second full moon of the month simply by not liking what some are calling it.

Perigee is a real thing, but it has nothing to do with the full moon. They say a supermoon is when it appears "near" a perigee but that isn't really a great definition either. From Wikipedia:

The term supermoon is astrological in origin, and has no precise astronomical definition.

It's barely an "event". It is however observable, unlike the "blue moon" phenomenon.

I am not denying that there are two full moons in the month of January 2018. I am denying that it is an "event". I had two hot dogs today. The second one is not an event. It's an interesting bit of trivia, but you can't actually observe that a moon is special in any way. I mean, if you were an alien and not familiar with the Terran calendar there is nothing about the full moon that would appear special. The only reason it's interesting that there are two full moons in a month is because it's theoretically impossible if you take a month as being the length in between the same phase of the moon. Once again though it's an astrological term, and an intrinsically inconsistent astrological term (in that there are two different definitions that don't agree with each other).

You are in the West, so you're lucky to be able to see more of the eclipse than I can. It's just that it's a single event - an eclipse (which has a prerequisite of being a full moon). All the media hype and then the subsequent letdown (lunar eclipses aren't that exciting to a lot of people when they actually watch them) will turn people off from astronomy in general I reckon. Much better to watch the Slooh webcast (don't be alarmed at Membership required, you can use the free one).

Sorry for being such a grump about it, I just don't like how easy it is for misinformation to spread.

If I were to take a side it would most likely be your's.

One problem with that, is if I start calling the second full moon of January something different from everyone else, I can't google things about it anymore.

2dimes wrote:If I were to take a side it would most likely be your's.

One problem with that, is if I start calling the second full moon of January something different from everyone else, I can't google things about it anymore.

Yea, as long as people are talking about the sky I guess it's a good thing. I think most people are still unaware of the link between moonphase and moonrise.

Of course, you can always play dumb and troll the astronomy club by saying "I thought there was supposed to be three moons tonight?"

It does not matter what you call it right now. There is too much water in the sky, it is cloud cover between me and the moon right now. I did see the bright full moon last night but now you just see the reflection of the pretty city lights. Going to look again at 04:00 local time. Bummer.

03:56, cloud watch, it's not even an interesting colour.

I got up to see, it was misty. I could just about make out a pinkish disc.

Feb 5, 2018

Deer justplay, cloudy. But it quit snowing like it did all weekend.

Feb 22, sky clear.

I noticed when I came home the sky was clear. It was too cold out for me to hang around but I did pause in the yard to take a look.

Forgot to update this blog but just noticed JP4 was about so that reminded me.

2dimes wrote:Feb 22, sky clear.

I noticed when I came home the sky was clear. It was too cold out for me to hang around but I did pause in the yard to take a look.

Forgot to update this blog but just noticed JP4 was about so that reminded me.

You boys need to exchange phone numbers.

I have always found that whenever the news tells me something interesting is happening in the sky, the sky is overcast.
I have never ever seen a nice region wide blackout during one of these events.

Star date 2/26/18,
Captains log;
Yesterday I took note of where the sirrius ("dog star") is, can now point it out. It's pretty easy to find.