Eagle = Dolphin? No, no topology involved.

I borrowed the binoculars back from Samir today. They’re mine to use for the next three days, which makes me deliriously happy.

I think I solved the Cygnus mystery; I was looking at Cygnus all right, but thanks to the heavy light pollution, I couldn’t see some of the other stars in the constellation, which made me think that Cygnus was “flying” at right angles to the direction it should’ve been headed.

The clouds went away today. So did the binoculars – Samir wanted them back to take a look at the skies himself :). I’m getting them back by Friday, and I can keep them over the weekend. So I’m keeping my fingers crossed for clear skies over the long weekend. Perhaps I should plan a short trip to some nearby dark location.

Anyway, since the skies were reasonably clear, I decided to shield my eyes with my hands and take a look upwards. I looked westwards, and immediately located the three stooges – Deneb, Altair and Vega. For the first time, I was able to make out the parallelogram shape that gives Delphinus its name. I thought I had successfully traced out Cygnus, but I am not so sure. What I thought was Cygnus seemed to be “flying” in a South-Westerly direction. Later, Kstars told me that Cygnus ought to be flying in a North-Westerly direction. So I don’t know what I saw.

I also located Hercules with a little difficulty. Pity that there are a couple of huge apartment complex towers that obscure the south – I would have loved to see Aquarius. The make-vs-buy debate has reared its ugly head again. Within my head, that is. A few folks I know are visiting yankeeland, and I need to quickly find out if mirror kits are cheaper there. If that is indeed the case, I’m going to request them to get back a mirror kit for me.

It’s been an odd sort of day. I managed to get some work done, I’m not sure that I’d want to call it useful work, though – which isn’t so great.

First Light

Borrowed Samir’s binoculars today. Went to the rooftop of N’s apartment, to try and look at the moons of Jupiter, my having read in my pocket star atlas that it’s possible to do this with a pair of 10x binocs. Samir’s pair is a variable zoom 8x-24x (50mm) Dakota, with the left tube kaput. Which effectively makes it a monocular :) There were three of us present there, me, N and The Great Man.

More random crap

Sigh… have been busy at work, and at home.

Started running. Can now run 4K at 8.5Kmph, with difficulty. Can run 3K at 8Kmph with less difficulty. Don’t know if this has made any impact on my frame, though people tell me so. Am happy about the running, for the first time in my life, I can run without wheezing my lungs off at the end of it. End of my asthma? I don’t know, but will be happy if that is indeed the case.

Shut down comments on my Semmangudi posts. They seem to be attracting too much flak, and I’m sick and tired of explaining myself to people who don’t take the trouble to read the posts in their entirety.

Don’t know when I’ll blog next. Probably take a couple of weeks’ time.