Everyday is like Sunday 12/4/20

[domstar]

Inspired by Doug @cloudsweeper 's excellent and clear report on doubles in Leo, I set up on my annoyingly cramped balcony hoping to follow in his footsteps. My wife kindly agreed to watch television in the dark in the adjacent room but I had to contend with unpredictable flashes of light from the tv and the unspoken proviso that I limit coming in and out to look at my star map and stellarium. Thus, I had to keep as much as possible in my deteriorating memory.

At first everything was frustrating. Leo was still obstructed, balcony shoes kept finding themselves under the chair legs and my nose and forehead kept bumping around the eyepiece. Last week I had a wonderful time looking at a few doubles around the Hydra's head but last night I couldn't find them again. Frustrated, I moved to Gemini and the brighter stars were easy to remember. Castor of course and Kappa and by the time I got to Wasat, the stars were tight spots. I moved over from Wasat to Sigma 1081- just beautiful and tight at 150x and then I moved over to the Eskimo Nebula. I was amazed to see a brighter middle possibly (and discussed on another thread) the central star.

Then I was ready for Leo. I love the challenge of finding new doubles but I also like to know if I'm looking at the right star and if a split is possible in my scope, so the reports of others are a great resource for me. I chased down Doug's delightful doubles and pulled Iota Leo from the memory banks of earlier research- a very rare and pleasing occurrence. By that time, my wife had gone to bed so I popped inside to re-remember two doubles just below Regulus. Regulus failed to split at 150x despite the excellent conditions.

After that it was time for the Leo Triplet. I love the way the Hamburger is possible to see but impossible to pin down. The other two almost looked like they were about to reveal some shape or detail. I went to look for the 4 (in my scope) galaxies under 52 Leo but my lack of tenacity and my now aching fleetwood meant I gave up.

Just checking inside I noticed asteroid Juno should be right near a bright star so I went back out and had a little look at that. It was half past eleven but I realized that today is a holiday anyway.

It was a lovely session after initial frustration and I was surprised that such tight stars were possible in such mild spring weather.

Thanks for reading.

Dominic

[cloudsweeper]

Nice account Dom.  Sounds like you have slightly better skies than me.  One advantage I do have is a shed where I run Stellarium, very handy!

Doug.