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Hoshizora o miteta...
Tonight I went outside at 3 AM in the hopes of seeing a little of the meteor shower that actually happened last night, when I completely forgot about watching. It's been a long time since I've stood outside and looked at the stars.
I remembered to pick up my glasses before I went out. I almost never wear them anymore, since I stare at my computers all day. And when I go outside, I wear my sunglasses. So it's a shock to see the world in perfect clarity through my regular glasses. I only wear them at the movie theater (which as you know I've only been to three times this year) and when I drive at night.
So wearing sweat pants, a hooded light jacket, my muck boots, and my glasses, I ventured outside. I'm not afraid of the night or the dark, but I took my long stick with me, since I am averse to walking into nasty spider webs. I found a place in the driveway where I could stand in the shadow of a tree between me and our security light.
My oneechan is the stargazer in my family. I've never been much of an outdoors person (air conditioning and a bug-free environment FTW), but she would spend many early nights outside, staring upwards. I joined her on occasion. She liked to lay on the hood of one of our cars and watch and watch. She had one of those sliding star charts where you line up the date and time for easy star identification. She would even turn off the security light for a darker ambiance, and she has a UFO story from when she was stargazing while sleeping over a friend's house. But I'm not that dedicated to have a star chart and to bother turning off the lightsince I don't know how. So I stood in the tree's shadow and looked up.
The shower--last night, anyway-- was supposed to be in the north-eastern part of the sky. I think. Anyway, the problem is that the glare of Dallas/Fort Worth fills the horizon and a good third of the lower sky, and my hometown--which while much smaller than DFW--is also much closer, and thus blocks out the north. So I really could only see the stars from the middle of the sky to above the city glare, which is about a third of the way up from the horizon.
I noticed a few things with my novice eyes. The Milky Was was visible. I've seen it brighter, but not by much. The colors of the stars were also very clear. Particularly two bright red giants in the east. A couple of orange stars, some yellow, lots of white, and a few blue. I couldn't make out any constellations this late in the night, but I made up a few of my own. I only saw two airplnaes, which is very strange. We live in between two high traffic flight lanes (DFW's influence again), so normally you always see an airplane every couple of minutes. But for the 15 minutes I stood out there, I only saw those two. I guess the red-eye flights were headed elsewhere.
I didn't see any meteors for sure, but I did kinda catch two long streaks of light that lasted for maybe a quarter second, if that. But they could have been my imagination. I did scare some stupid bird half to death. When I shifted my weight, it exploded through a tree in a great flurry of wings and scared me half to death. The dogs in the not-so-nice neighborhood to our west would not...stop...barking. I don't know how the people over there sleep through it. I couldn't hear any coyotes howling tonight.Just annoying dogs, which isn't nearly as cool. And since all the rain stopped a month ago, the mosquitoes have pretty much died out (YAY!), so I wasn't bugged. Hallelujah!
I stood and stared up for about 15 minutes, waiting for a meteor and marveling at how clear everything looks through my glasses, and at the colors of the stars. I think that's my favorite thing, when you can see the colors of the stars. Suteki na...
So wearing sweat pants, a hooded light jacket, my muck boots, and my glasses, I ventured outside. I'm not afraid of the night or the dark, but I took my long stick with me, since I am averse to walking into nasty spider webs. I found a place in the driveway where I could stand in the shadow of a tree between me and our security light.
My oneechan is the stargazer in my family. I've never been much of an outdoors person (air conditioning and a bug-free environment FTW), but she would spend many early nights outside, staring upwards. I joined her on occasion. She liked to lay on the hood of one of our cars and watch and watch. She had one of those sliding star charts where you line up the date and time for easy star identification. She would even turn off the security light for a darker ambiance, and she has a UFO story from when she was stargazing while sleeping over a friend's house. But I'm not that dedicated to have a star chart and to bother turning off the light
The shower--last night, anyway-- was supposed to be in the north-eastern part of the sky. I think. Anyway, the problem is that the glare of Dallas/Fort Worth fills the horizon and a good third of the lower sky, and my hometown--which while much smaller than DFW--is also much closer, and thus blocks out the north. So I really could only see the stars from the middle of the sky to above the city glare, which is about a third of the way up from the horizon.
I noticed a few things with my novice eyes. The Milky Was was visible. I've seen it brighter, but not by much. The colors of the stars were also very clear. Particularly two bright red giants in the east. A couple of orange stars, some yellow, lots of white, and a few blue. I couldn't make out any constellations this late in the night, but I made up a few of my own. I only saw two airplnaes, which is very strange. We live in between two high traffic flight lanes (DFW's influence again), so normally you always see an airplane every couple of minutes. But for the 15 minutes I stood out there, I only saw those two. I guess the red-eye flights were headed elsewhere.
I didn't see any meteors for sure, but I did kinda catch two long streaks of light that lasted for maybe a quarter second, if that. But they could have been my imagination. I did scare some stupid bird half to death. When I shifted my weight, it exploded through a tree in a great flurry of wings and scared me half to death. The dogs in the not-so-nice neighborhood to our west would not...stop...barking. I don't know how the people over there sleep through it. I couldn't hear any coyotes howling tonight.
I stood and stared up for about 15 minutes, waiting for a meteor and marveling at how clear everything looks through my glasses, and at the colors of the stars. I think that's my favorite thing, when you can see the colors of the stars. Suteki na...