Stars tonight over Lowestoft. ? Realised that Saturn is too low for my big refractor on its pier. Only way to get a snap will be with my mobile rig from another site. My old 90mm. ETX RA to the rescue - now mounted on a Star Adventurer.

George hoping for another clear night this week in Lowestoft.

Started preparatory work on my fixed pier and spectrometer mark3. I like a nice 'slow burn' project or two.  Night sky over Lowestoft not conducive to observational astronomy other than in radio frequencies. If all else fails I've lots of meteor radar ping data to analyse from last year.

And so off to bed and dream land.

Terrible night in Lowestoft. In the short time it takes me to walk from my kitchen to the shed I became fully immersed by rain in stair-rod formation. Checked that the LVST was still monitoring meteor activity over southern France. All OK but not much radar on  plasma action. The sky over the Jodrell Plank Observatory was coal black and robbed of all light.   I wasn't expecting to encounter a Balrog in Suffolk - thought they were native to Moria. 

George the Grey now at his bed in  a moist and soggy East Anglia.

Terrible night, rain and gale force winds. In bed as I've got a dose of 'man flu'. Off to sleep in a Vick micro environment of self pity.

George 'snotty' in Lowestoft.

The closest conjunction has been and gone whilst the cloud, rain and wind held sway over Lowestoft. Perhaps tomorrow will be still, dry and clear.

George slightly sad on the East Coast.

The Observatory is looking good Jim! Nice kit too!

George

The pier is just about complete, fitted cork and rubber vibration dampers today.  Have only to attach counter-weights to the NEQ6Pro and polar align and I'm ready to go.  Come on jet stream clear off and take the clouds with you.  Jupiter and comet C/2015 V2 Johnson await my attention.

The weather was not kind so imaging Quadrantids wasn't an option. I did however wander into 'Mission Control' (my shed) at lunchtime today and noticed that my 'software defined radio' (The LVST) was pinging like mad as radar reflections from meteors over the South of France were being picked up by my Yagi aerial. I leave the LVST running 24 -7 - 365 days a year. I must download all the data from 2020 and get on with some data analysis.  Unfortunately, like Mr. Toad,  I am a backsliding animal!

George 'data-rich' near Sole Bay.

Today  Suffolk County Council swapped an all new LED lamp for the old high pressure sodium lamp outside our house. Looks very bright but luckily our house is in between the lamp and our backyard from which I stargaze. Let's hope in my lifetime, the Council continues to turn the street lights off at midnight.  I will let you know how I and the new lamp get on!

George from Lumenstoft.

Today I started building my 3d printer in kit form. Bewildering number of parts! Thank goodness they are well labelled. This will not be a fast process - after all I'm a 'simple country architect not an engineer Jim'! ? My partner is already getting twitchy with all the parts laid out in the 'clean room' or kitchen as she prefers to call it. Not sure how long she will be 'comfortable' with the kitchen table out of action?

George in his slumber chariot considering 3 dimensional possibilities.

Today, I completed my last 'dew zapper' and fitted it to my 127mm. Meade 500. I'm awaiting some bell wire and a 1 amp-9 volt transformer from the 'bay'. When all connected up I shall be ready for 'astro fun and games' throughout a cold and moist winter on the East Coast. 

I currently have a few stars outside but Metcheck doesn't look encouraging. Think I will stick with binoculars tonight.

Night all

Today, without any intention or plan and purely at random, I chose to walk along a road in Florence on which was located the house from which Galileo Galilei first observed the Medicean Stars or Galilean Moons as we know them. How lucky am I and how brilliant is this?

George currently not in Lowestoft.

Tonight I polar aligned my NEQ 6 Pro mount on top of my new pillar. All went well and I was really pleased to use my big refractor for the first time in 2017. For once the BBC weather forecast for Lowestoft did turn out to be more or less correct and the clouds did part a little from about 21.00 until 23.00.  Also everything worked, camera, laptop and software . Jupiter was big and bright and above my backyard horizon SSE.  GRS was on view and I got to watch/image one of the Galilean moons go behind the jovian disc.  Lots of video to play with this week.  Must say a permanent pier makes life a lot easier, particularly a tall one when you have a bad back and a refractor. No bending over to look through the eyepiece whoopee!! 

A tired but happy old man now in bed in Lowestoft. Sleep tight stargazers wherever you are!

Tonight In between the clouds I had my first go at Mars. Small but still bright and now above the houses at the rear of our house. Wobblin' about like a jellyfish in the surf, but having been inspired by Reggie and his excellent October Mars post, I thought I would give it a go whilst the Moon was out of the way.  Haven't processed the AVIs yet but fingers crossed I might have one recognisable image to post sometime soon. I also tried taking a few stills of Uranus hoping to capture some moons but the the combination of too much murk, light pollution and high ISO probably will have ensured noise overwhelmed signal. Weather tonight very mixed and out of sink with Metcheck forecast.

Nighty night all.

Tonight the sky is clear and velvet black here on the East Coast. Haven't set up the gear tonight as I have a long car journey tomorrow and I need some sleep. 

Just went outside and looked up. Pegasus and M31 visible to the naked eye and almost straight overhead. The Milky Way stretched clear across the sky and disappeared with Cygnus to the west. 

As I turned to look towards the Pleiades, a really bright and red coloured Orionid meteor flamed across the sky below the square of Pegasus. What a beautiful and wonderful thing to witness on a cool autumnal night!

Nighty night stargazers

Took the formwork of my reinforced concrete pier today. Not to shabby so quite pleased with the result. Lovely sunny afternoon.  Also watched as an almost full Moon appeared creamy white within the branches of my neighbour's tree. Very beautiful so took a quick snap with my Canon compact camera - all a bit shakey!

George back in Lowestoft

Two consecutive nights under the stars with my telescope and could have gone for three in a row but needed a bit more sleep as grandchildren will arrive tomorrow.  

Night night stargazers.

George 'tired but happy' in Lowestoft.

Very windy here on the East Coast tonight. Lots of clouds scudding about. Jupiter and Saturn are accompanying the full Moon in its low course across my southern horizon. I have been hanging out of our back bedroom window taking a few pictures. I'm sure this sort of eccentric behaviour will result in my acquisition of a dubious neighbourhood reputation.🙃

Nighty night stargazers

Wall to all cloud in Lowestoft tonight. Brought about by Mrs Hawksmoor who kindly trimmed back the honeysuckle on our southern fence in order that I might capture some video clips of Saturn and Jupiter with my pier mounted 5 inch refractor as the gas giants transit the small patch of sky between my two neighbours' roofs.  Sigh!

Also acquired some Nikon 8x40 bins which probably put the tin lid on clear skies of any sort within the forseeable future. GRRRR! 

"Does buying new kit make you feel happier" I'll let you know!

George in murky Lowestoft.

Wall to wall cloud last night in less than sunny Lowestoft, so no chance of imaging the NEO whizzing past Polaris.......... GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

Spent some time today in the shed  - nice ! -  getting on with Spectrometer Mark2,  Going to have a coffee then back in 'Shedland' to do a bit of non cloud dependant, oil painting.  Having said that, its a landscape and guess what are in the sky- Ironic or what?

Was going to image the Comet last night. My 'astro-mini-rig' was up and running by midnight and Metcheck for Lowestoft was showing 'clear all night'.?  Looked up at a sky predominantly cloudy but with an occasional blurry star just to engender that "if I stay up it just might clear" sort of feeling. I finally gave up and went to bed just after I tripped over a large hedgehog.?

George feeling prickly in Lowestoft (no hedgehogs were hurt in the making of this post)

Watched the ISS  go over Lowestoft followed by the much fainter Crew Dragon capsule. Could just see the latter and might have got a handheld image or two whilst hanging out the bedroom window.

Last night I set up my big refractor and captured some video clips of the Moon at first quarter (at f=2250mm and f=2700mm). Some time consuming processing awaits!

Lovely clear night this evening after a really beautiful sunny day. Nighty night stargazers.

George still socially isolated on the East Coast.

Watched the ISS go over my backyard tonight. It almost occulted Vega. Never tire of watching it free falling it's way silently across my patch of sky.

Night night stargazers.

Weather currently a bit mixed here on the edge of the North Sea.  Just got back from the Lowestoft Seagull Theatre - really enjoyed the Liane Carroll Jazz Band/Trio - brilliant!  Now trying to capture a few images between the clouds with my mini widefield rig whilst awaiting earth spin to enable the comet now in Gemini to climb above our hedge. George out in the dark in Lowestoft.?

Weather has actually managed to deteriorate today. Didn't think this was possible but I was wrong!