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[OT] Her in the Sky



 
 
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  #1  
Old July 14th 08, 10:44 PM posted to rec.pets.cats.anecdotes
Yowie
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Posts: 3,225
Default [OT] Her in the Sky

Even before I knew the word 'witch' or 'pagan' I used to talk to the moon
(and Antares, my favourite star), have always looked out for Her in the sky.
My Full Moon ritual is barely a ritual, but I've shared it with the Yowlet,
and now we both go out and howl and the moon when She's at her brightest.
I've always been innately aware of her Cycle, and would be at a loss without
Her in the sky.

Last night was the first clear and not bitterly-cold-and-howling-a-gale
night since I got my telescope. Its a crappy telescope, I admit, barely
better than binoculars, but it was free, and I've wanted but haven't been
able to afford one since, oh, I don't know, for as long as I've been talking
to Her in the Sky.

I started off trying to get a view of Jupiter, but gave up in frustration
after an hour or so. After another hour or so of cursing and muttering about
bad design, I finally got my first ever glimpse of Her under magnification.
I was astonished, astounded and more deeply in love than ever.

After fiddling with the eyepieces some more, I settled on 'medium'
magnification (and sorry, i don't know what magnification it was, I don't
know about the technical side of the telescope) - high magnification didn't
allow a stable enough image, with the wobbly tripod and worn out mounts.
But medium magnification allowed me to see the craters, and the seas,
allowed me to watch contentedly as she slowly 'sailed' past my little
viewing aperture.

Joel dragged me in at 11:30pm and told me off for staying out so late on
work night and for being out in such frigid temperatures with just t-shirt
and jeans. I had not noticed the time pass, nor the temperature drop. I am
in love all over again.

Yowie

--
If you're paddling upstream in a canoe and a wheel falls off, how many
pancakes can you fit in a doghouse? None, icecream doesn't have bones.


  #2  
Old July 14th 08, 10:54 PM posted to rec.pets.cats.anecdotes
Daniel Mahoney
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Posts: 1,027
Default [OT] Her in the Sky

On Tue, 15 Jul 2008 07:44:41 +1000, Yowie wrote:

Even before I knew the word 'witch' or 'pagan' I used to talk to the moon
(and Antares, my favourite star), have always looked out for Her in the sky.
My Full Moon ritual is barely a ritual, but I've shared it with the Yowlet,
and now we both go out and howl and the moon when She's at her brightest.
I've always been innately aware of her Cycle, and would be at a loss without
Her in the sky.


She is indeed beautiful, isn't she? My own personal rituals evolved into
much the same - Moon-centered, and frequently led to me just talking to
Her.

As for watching through the telescope - some time if you get a chance to
look at high magnification, on the lower left limb (between 7 and
8 o'clock), there are a few craters in a perfect line, appearing
larger/smaller/smaller still with the smallest one right on the edge such
that it's crater walls project beyond the edge of the Moon herself, so
that when you first view them they look like a pyramid on the moon! I
don't recall whether refracting scopes invert images; my reflector did, so
the interesting craters appeared around 2 o'clock on Her face. It's an
interesting visual effect when you first see it.


  #3  
Old July 15th 08, 01:22 AM posted to rec.pets.cats.anecdotes
Yowie
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Posts: 3,225
Default [OT] Her in the Sky

Daniel Mahoney wrote:
On Tue, 15 Jul 2008 07:44:41 +1000, Yowie wrote:

Even before I knew the word 'witch' or 'pagan' I used to talk to the
moon (and Antares, my favourite star), have always looked out for
Her in the sky. My Full Moon ritual is barely a ritual, but I've
shared it with the Yowlet, and now we both go out and howl and the
moon when She's at her brightest. I've always been innately aware of
her Cycle, and would be at a loss without Her in the sky.


She is indeed beautiful, isn't she? My own personal rituals evolved
into much the same - Moon-centered, and frequently led to me just
talking to Her.

As for watching through the telescope - some time if you get a chance
to look at high magnification, on the lower left limb (between 7 and
8 o'clock), there are a few craters in a perfect line, appearing
larger/smaller/smaller still with the smallest one right on the edge
such that it's crater walls project beyond the edge of the Moon
herself, so that when you first view them they look like a pyramid on
the moon! I don't recall whether refracting scopes invert images; my
reflector did, so the interesting craters appeared around 2 o'clock
on Her face. It's an interesting visual effect when you first see it.


The odd thing about Australia (and hte rest of hte southern hemisphere) is
our moon is upseide down, and the phases go ( 0 ) rather than ) 0 ( like
yours do. So I have no idea where '2 o'clock' might be - and whether my
telescope turns the image upseide down. Still, its something to discover for
myself, and I look forward to finding them.

Yowie


  #4  
Old July 15th 08, 01:34 AM posted to rec.pets.cats.anecdotes
Daniel Mahoney
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Posts: 1,027
Default [OT] Her in the Sky

The odd thing about Australia (and hte rest of hte southern hemisphere) is
our moon is upseide down, and the phases go ( 0 ) rather than ) 0 ( like
yours do. So I have no idea where '2 o'clock' might be - and whether my
telescope turns the image upseide down. Still, its something to discover for
myself, and I look forward to finding them.

Yowie


Hmmm, I never thought of that. When I say "2 oclock", I mean that for
me, through an inverting telescope, the crater formation is at the upper
left limb (where 2 o'clock would be on the face of a clock). Since we
don't know if your telescope inverts, it could be either 2 or 8 o'clock.
And that's just approximate, so it will give you an excuse to look all
around the visible edge of the full moon

Dan
  #5  
Old July 15th 08, 01:38 AM posted to rec.pets.cats.anecdotes
[email protected]
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Posts: 9,349
Default [OT] Her in the Sky

Daniel Mahoney wrote:

Hmmm, I never thought of that. When I say "2 oclock", I mean that for
me, through an inverting telescope, the crater formation is at the upper
left limb (where 2 o'clock would be on the face of a clock). Since we
don't know if your telescope inverts, it could be either 2 or 8 o'clock.


Wait, would that be 8 o'clock or 4 o'clock? If it just flips it over
(ie, as a mirror image across the horizontal diameter), then 2:00 would
become 4:00. But if it actually rotates the image of the moon by 180
degrees, then you're right, it would be 8:00.

Joyce - knows very little about telescopes, but does know about image
transformations!

(To email me, remove the X's from my user name.)
  #6  
Old July 15th 08, 01:53 AM posted to rec.pets.cats.anecdotes
Daniel Mahoney
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Posts: 1,027
Default [OT] Her in the Sky

Wait, would that be 8 o'clock or 4 o'clock? If it just flips it over
(ie, as a mirror image across the horizontal diameter), then 2:00 would
become 4:00. But if it actually rotates the image of the moon by 180
degrees, then you're right, it would be 8:00.

Joyce - knows very little about telescopes, but does know about image
transformations!

(To email me, remove the X's from my user name.)


Man I'm batting .1000 tonight...

2o'clock would be at the upper RIGHT, of course.
  #8  
Old July 15th 08, 01:35 AM posted to rec.pets.cats.anecdotes
[email protected]
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Posts: 9,349
Default [OT] Her in the Sky

Yowie wrote:

The odd thing about Australia (and hte rest of hte southern hemisphere) is
our moon is upseide down, and the phases go ( 0 ) rather than ) 0 ( like
yours do.


It's not the moon that's upside down, it's you guys. (Kidding )

But that's interesting, and it makes sense, since the earth's shadow would
getting larger and smaller in the opposite direction.

My education about celestial bodies was quite pitiful. Considering that
I was interested in astronomy, I didn't even know which direction the
moon waxed and waned. A friend of mine taught it to me about 5 years ago,
complete with a handy mnemonic. (It wouldn't work for most of us, since
the words are in Russian and the letters representing the orientation of
the crescent moon are Cyrillic - but for some reason I remember that better
than anything I learned in childhood!)

--
Joyce ^..^

(To email me, remove the X's from my user name.)
  #10  
Old July 15th 08, 02:29 AM posted to rec.pets.cats.anecdotes
[email protected]
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Posts: 9,349
Default [OT] Her in the Sky

Yowie wrote:

wrote:


moon waxed and waned. A friend of mine taught it to me about 5 years
ago, complete with a handy mnemonic. (It wouldn't work for most of
us, since the words are in Russian and the letters representing the
orientation of the crescent moon are Cyrillic - but for some reason I
remember that better than anything I learned in childhood!)


Please share anyway? (With translation, if possible)


It's slightly complicated and hard to do in email, especially since
I use fixed fonts and probably many of you have proportional fonts on
your newsreaders, so it will look weird. But I'll give it a shot.

If you took the letter "C" and added a vertical stem to the left of it,
you'd get something that looked a bit like a "k": |c . And if you took
a *backwards* C and put a vertical stem to the left of that, you'd get
something that looked like the letter "p".

It turns out that the Russian word for "waxing" starts with the Cyrillic
letter "p". When the moon is waxing, it's filling in on the left side,
and the shadow is shaped like a backwards C. When the moon is waning,
the shadow is getting bigger and bigger on the *right* side (as the
visible moon gets smaller), and is shaped like a regular C.

I don't remember the actual Russian words - I could ask my friend again
if you want. Or maybe someone here speaks Russian and can provide them?

Summary: You have to use the letter C, forwards and backwards, to
imitate the shape of the shadow as the moon wanes or waxes, respectively.
Then you have to add a vertical stem to the left of the appropriate
symbol (C or backwards C), to get the "P" or "K". Those are the letters
which start the Russian words meaning waning and waxing. Simple, eh?

And then on top of all that, you have to reverse it since you're in the
Southern hemisphere! Are you sure it's worth it?

--
Joyce ^..^

(To email me, remove the X's from my user name.)
 




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