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A much belated Hello!

ktdelain

By ktdelain
in Welcome

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ktdelain

ktdelain

Posted
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Hello

Well, its taken me a while to get round to finally saying Hi, hello, and especially Thank You! You folks have already been tons of help!

I have always been fascinated with I have always, since I was little, have been fascinated with space – It's all my Dad's fault for making my childhood fairy tale be Star Wars. And Star Trek. And then Alien. And Aliens. And Outland. And Last Star Fighter. And the Day the Earth Stood Still. And Transformers the movie. And Terrahawks. And The Black Hole. And Flash Gordon. and Alien Nation. And the Abyss. And...Basically if there is a ship and it flies round space it's gonna be kinda awesome. anyway, I digress. Where was I? Right, my origin story (I’ve been watching way too many comic book films lately.)

It got worse having got to go to the Science Museum and seeing the Apollo lander. And the rockets. (Every time I go anywhere near the science museum I still have to quickly pop in and say a quick hi to the all the rockets and moon lander.) So being the dutiful parents, they got me an astromony book (which I still have, its a great read, a Patrick Moore one), an awesome pack of top trumps planets cards (I wish I still had them, that's how I learnt the names of planets and their moons) and very sensibly a pair of 10x50 binoculars , in case I got bored so they would double to keep a look out for pirates, er.. I mean nature...when we holidayed on the river on our boat, and that was it, I was forever in love with the idea of space and exploration.

Ok,so despite my good intentions over the years, I have never really taken my astronomy love beyond a spot of idle star gazing. A couple of years ago, I went camping in the New Forest with my friend and his children and we were treated to a few amazing clear dark night skies. Having loved looking at the skies as a child on family holidays, I was a bit over enthusiastic and in awe of it all, which rubbed off on the 3 kids and ended up with us all sitting in a row at 10pm, past their bedtime, staring at the tops of trees, waiting for Jupiter to pop up over the horizon! However, after attempting to point out bits and pieces, and not remembering much more than Jupiter, the Bears, Cassiopeia etc, I was disappointed at how little I could remember (or ever knew!) And came home with a renewed determination to improve my knowledge and get out and about to enjoy the night skies more (and be able to explain more to the kids on subsequent camping trip!)

So I dusted off my wide angled binoculars (which also seem to have survived the years of abuse) and started brushing up on my constellations, Greek alphabet and which way north has gone to, reread my trusty old Patrick Moore astronomy intro book and started to get a bit hooked once again on staring into space.

Last year, with a promise of darker skies in Cornwall, and I decided to have an early birthday treat of new bigger binoculars that would be a bit clearer than my battered old one and help me practice some star hopping. That's when I first came across this lovely forum. I registered with every intention of asking lots of questions, but time got the better of me, and with holiday looming, I used loads of advice from reviews and questions of newbies past, I worked out which binoculars to invest in, got a couple of good books and quickly got some in the nick of time before my holiday.

Unfortunately, my holiday was a washout. Quite literally - it was one of the wettest Junes ever. Never really got to really try out my new binoculars and would've been really disappointed had it not been for my airbed collapsing in the night, waking me up at 2 in the morning, and by chance getting 30 minutes of clear dark skies complete with a few pretty amazing shooting stars, before the fog rolled in again!

And then life got in the way again, I switched jobs last autumn, added to extra evening work, and a horrible month long chest infection for Christmas, meant I didn't really organised again get out to do a spot of observing, let alone to try to get to any local astronomy meetings.

So finally, all has settled down a bit, and I got to go away again, this year with my 3 pairs of trusty binoculars and have been treated to some lovely sights so far, the triangle of planets and watching an orange moon were particularly awesome. As was showing my dad the tie fighter...I mean the ISS zipping across the sky.

Of course, as if you couldn't guess, what has finally spurned me in to a bit more action is my recent birthday present of dosh towards a new proper grown up telescope! That and another chest infection (i'm really not that unhealthy, honest) has given me the motivation and time to finally put a much over due hello on your lovely forum. So I will inevitably placing a couple of fundamental, mandatory newbie “help me choose a telescope/equipment”, “help! The thingy doesn't quite work” and “ooooh that's pretty, what is that big bright smudge in the sky?” (if you said “the pretty big one that looks like a rocket ship”, “try taking the lens cap off” and “that'd be a helicopter dear”, bonus points to you)

So thank you once again for all you help so far (and yet to come!) and for being so welcoming before I've even said hello!

Kt.

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ncjunk

ncjunk

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I liked it! It must be all the references to all the movies i grew up with....

The last star fighter! Must show that to my four year old he'll love it.

Belated welcome :D glad your having fun i must get my 30 year old binocs out..now i feel old.

Sent from my GT-I9003 using Tapatalk 2

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JamesF

JamesF

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Welcome to SGL :)

Last year was horrible in the south-west, weather-wise. Not that it was much better anywhere else in the UK. You probably couldn't have picked a worse time to come down this way :( Sounds like you've been doing rather better this year though.

James

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ktdelain

ktdelain

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I liked it! It must be all the references to all the movies i grew up with....

The last star fighter! Must show that to my four year old he'll love it.

Belated welcome :D glad your having fun i must get my 30 year old binocs out..now i feel old.

The last starfighter is totally awesome. I so want a gunstar! although be warned, show it to your little'un and he'll be wanting one too!

and thinking about it my old binoculars must be about 25 years old now....eek.

I too now feel old! :biggrin:

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jason.p

jason.p

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Welcome Kt. I think it was a nice intro. You obviously have a passion for all things sci fi and astro which is what drives most of us on here. Sorry about your health probs, hope you've got over them. Don't be afaid to ask anything however basic it might seem. everyone here has had to start somewhere.

All the best and clear skies :smiley:

Jason

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Watchman

Watchman

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Thats all the films I grew up with, though it was all self inflicted as my dad had no interest in sci-fi or science. Tbh no idea how I got the interests I did lol, my dad likes football which I hate :S

Hi and welcome :)

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ktdelain

ktdelain

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Hey folks,

thanks for all the lovely hellos and welcomes, sorry for the delayed reply back, I've been totally distracted and over excited as my Brand New TELESCOPE is now ordered and on its way (ish...it said packing last i looked....) I am so excited, that I had to put myself on a little time out yesterday!

Btw, I am thinking Last Starfighter should be mandatory educational watching for all kids from now on just incase we are needed to fight the Ko-Dan armada. besides it's historic as is one of the first CGI films!

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