viewed solar system objects (Blue Mountains)

Lora messaged me early this evening. Reported that Kiron booked for the CAO and was going to bring 4 family members. But he was ambiguous about when they'd arrive, Friday or Saturday. Which one, I wondered.

Opened the GBO. Overall, it was OK. Found the UPS plugged in. A little risky. On the other hand the power surge bar in the Warm Room was not connected. Opened the roof. Set up the Dell Paramount computer. Powered everything up. Watched the focuser move as it booted up. Found the missing mouse pad inside the laptop bag. The ME found home.

Justin had installed the replacement Linksys in the GBO observatory at the work party. It was working fine. Wondered if we should use clips to tidy up the cords with the new wifi, to prevent snags.

Tried to view the young Moon. But could not see it.

Before firing everything up, I opened the APC unit to inspect and photograph the battery. Familiar common type, 12 volts, 7 amp-hours.

Wanted to try deploying the "welcome station" computer for my "welcome to the CAO" presentation. Last edited by in April, April 16. Downloaded it. Checked it in Open Office Impress.

Thu 29 May 2014, 8:45 PM. Adjusted the Sony ICD voice recorder to save files into the astronomy folder.

Could not change the computer's date and time, given the guest account restrictions. Tried to transfer via stick from John Phil to the old Dell 2650. Slow! Hard disk churning. Put a chair near the cord trip hazard. The USB key did not come up right away. After several minutes it came up.

Noticed it was starting to get dark. Bit of a Sun pillar going on. Skies looked kind of off, the whole day. Wispy stuff.

Switched the house into red light mode. House. Pergola.

The peepers woke up!

Decided to stop staring at the slow computer in the kitchen. Covered it with a towel.

Remembered I had turned the Sony VOR off earlier, so to record the mocking bird call in the front yard. Made a mental note to turn it back on.

Hadn't prepared my bed yet. Decided to worry about it later.

Readied to go back to the GBO. Psion. iPod cable. Netbook case. Headed out. Mockingbird still mocking. It seems to like deciduous trees.

The software update on the Dell GBO computer had finished. It wanted to reboot. I cancelled it.

Slewed to the Moon. Still some high cloud. Hard to focus. Went to Mercury. Focused on the crescent. Oh. Nice view, in the C14, of the inner planet, while small. Then headed to Jupiter.

Changed the SX750 settings on the fly. VOR back on.

9:06 PM. Jupiter was swimming. Even at low power. The seeing was really bad. Slewed to the Moon. Oh, low, just above the horizon. Very low. Gotta hurry. Spotted it in the Tele Vue. Thin. Really thin! Barely detectable. Grabbed the camera. Returned to Jupiter to focus. Then back to our neighbour. Got it!