One of my favourite books (never saw the movie) from one of my favourite scientists. The place looks awesome too, wish I could visit someday.

As we say in Portuguese, here at home, "it makes up for what bad it does to you by how well it tastes".

Two hooded figures with lamps approach a moonlit, isolated cottage. A woman answers the door. We have come for the child, says the hooded figure So soon? she asks It is time, says the hooded figure. The woman is distraught. We should never have got him a library card! What is done cannot be undone, says the hooded figure We couldn’t see the harm! We just wanted him to enjoy reading! For most, it ends there, says the hooded figure, turning away and walking into the wilderness Oh lord, What have I done! says the woman, the child walks past her and out into the darkness with them. Do not cry mother. I am a writer now.

my latest books cartoon for @theguardian.com

The central part of the Cat's eye nebula, too small to see clearly in the resized full image. An oval, like an egg of snow-ish blue, with an internal structure like several ellipses on top of each other. This would be the Cat's pupil.

Also, the inner section of the Nebula, barely resolved by my small telescope. In order to see both clearly, I'd have to integrate for longer, get a longer focal length telescope, or separate the image in sections to process differently and then merge them back together (but that feels wrong to me).

Tim Curry in The Rocky Horror Picture Show

Tim Curry in Clue

Tim Curry in The Three Musketeers

Tim Curry in Muppet Treasure Island

Happy 80th birthday to Tim Curry who has always, *always* understood the assignment.

This has also been the first time I tried using Alt text in the images. Let me know what you think. I tried using alternate descriptors for stuff like colours, by using temperature, but not sure how successful I was.

It's starting to get very high at the beginning of the night so it won't remain on my side of the meridian for much longer and my free nights are limited (also the weather is still very unstable). Looking forward to better weather so I can also reassemble the Trident and test it with the Newtonian.

So I could not safely control the mini-PC and the equipment. So I grabbed my phone, fumbled around with the tiny screen until I managed some flats, and called it a night. Overall I am pretty happy with the results. I'd like to add more time to M51 too, but don't know how easy it'll be.

By the end of the second session, it was around 3 AM. I considered trying for the Triffid Nebula, but ended up having that decision made for me: my laptop's Ubuntu installation suddenly decided the WIFI card it had been using up until then was no longer in the computer.

A central small circular patch of cold blue light light, surrounded by very, very faint fresh green coloured nebulosity that expands outwards to a circular edge slightly more prominent. The faint structures resembles taunt strings in a spiderweb or a cat's eyes, leading to the name. All around the nebula, stars from our galaxy can be seen, sprinkling the screen.

So I did another 2h on it. It clearly needs much more integration time to really bring it out from the background, but it's such and amazing object. Really looks like an iris. Hopefully I can target it again in the coming months, as it rises earlier and earlier.

By the end of the session it was around 1 AM, so I swung the scope to a target I always wanted to try and catch: the Cat's Eye Nebula. It is extremely faint, by far the hardest object to see I ever targetted, but it also gave me an excuse to use 2min exposures and test the presence of haloes.

An extremely blown-up version of the previous image. Blown-up here means the image has been manipulated to have the brightest regions be as bright as possible, without completely overloading the senses.

It is only two hours, as my sky is restricted to the eastern celestial hemisphere, due to the houses in my street so, past the meridian, it becomes obscured by my roof. I also did not use a filter, and I think it is the better choice: no haloes, even when I blow up the image to kingdom come.

This is possibly my best photograph to date. I was extra careful with the focus of the guide cam, something I am finding critical in Ritchey-Chretien telescopes, as bad focus dramatically alters the shape of stars on the edge of the field of view and PHD2 is unable to properly follow the star.

Messier 51, the Whirlpool galaxy. From a bright yellow/warm circular bulge at the centre, two blue/cold arms of young stars and gas arch around the bulge in a spiral pattern. At the end of the lower arm, another, smaller yellow bulge is seen. All around this secondary bulge, a cloud of yellow cloud can be seen, like dust kicked up by wind. This reveals the truth of M51: it is not one but rather two galaxies, which collided with one another millions of years ago and started merging together. The peculiar shape and surrounding cloud are gas, stars and dust from these galaxies, expelled by the tidal forces of the merger. We cannot see the individual stars of these galaxies, they are too far away. But all around the image, stars from our own galaxy adorn the view, like holes on a dark background, or hot concentrated spots in a cold surface.

Last night was the first clear night in the past month or so that I was able to catch (all others were either work days, or had full moon). So it was time for some photos.
My sister had expressed disappointment that I had not captured the "one with the little one on the side", so I started with M51.

@monel76.bsky.social
I know I am failing to do the test I myself requested of you. But in my defence, my sister asked for M51.
I am however imaging without a filter so curious what will result.

We're in.

Finally: I am afraid all telescopes are a pain in the ass one way or another :-)

*dew

Also, keep in mind SCTs and MCs have a lens in front. It will take longer to acclimatise and you may have to break warranty to clean it (at least for me, sending in to the factory is too expensive). You will also need a corrector for deep space. But they are great telescopes.

Regarding SCTs: Be careful with due and humidity. Always make sure to let the telescope rest after a session with the focuser side open in a dry place, so it can let out any humidity that might have gotten inside. You DO NOT want mould in there.

If the FL is long enough, it is good enough, is my belief. It's just that SCTs and RCs (and MCs for that matter), have those FL for a reduced space. But I have used my 1200mm newtonian for planets, there's nothing wrong with a 2, 3 or 5x barlow.

lol

Substitute the granola cereal with caramel. triple-chocolate and caramel and white chocolate milkshake.

I am not on the Moon. I also have no wife.

Schmidt-Cassegrain. Or RitcheyChretien. With the proper flatteners one is as good as the other for deep sky and their type of scope is the king of planetary, due to being able to cram gigantic focal lengths with equally large apertures without getting meter long telescopes.

I am not familiar with the test you are referring to. But generally when something suggests a speed faster than light, it means we made a mistake in the measurements somewhere along the way :-P

And I understand that this is oversimplification - but it also really, really isn't.

I understand the _idea_ of age restricted content. But I think a much more effective solution is for parents to just parent their children and control what they have access to instead of just throwing an iPad to the kids hands and call it a day.

It makes a certain sense: it started during COVID so isolation protocols stopped people going there, mostly, and with observations run by staff it reduces the probability of operating mistakes.

Yes. The Residencia is where we stay. We sleep during the day and then go up to the observatories at night. Depending on the observing run you can stay there for one or two days to several weeks. Very cool, but hell on the internal clock :-P