Showing posts with label astronomy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label astronomy. Show all posts
Saturday, July 4, 2015
Day 397: 1 Second Party
So today, June 30th, is kind of a special day. Today, there is a leap second added onto the day to counter balance the Earth as it's rotation slows down ever so slightly. Kind of like a leap year, where we get an extra day, a leap second just makes sure that our calendars and our cosmic orientation are both aligned as the Earth slows. This was all explained to me by Ryan, so if I'm incorrect in any way, blame him.
Since it's such a special day, and more importantly, such a special second, we decided to celebrate. We wanted to express our excitement for the extra second with a party...a one second party! We got silly string and little TNT poppers and drove to Danny's house to commemorate the occasion. We were never totally sure which second we should be celebrating, so we figured that any second would do. Check out our video of the party, sorry you missed the invite!
Tuesday, June 9, 2015
Day 374: Star Gazing (For The Moon I Own)
That's right, I own a moon. Not the moon, but a moon at least. If you don't believe me (for whatever weird reason) you can read all about it right here, or read the brief blurb about it belowww.
For those of you that didn't click that link and read about how I acquired a lunar satellite; I'll bring you up to speed. Through a series of articles and online videos I stumbled upon some guy who claimed ownership of the moon...Our moon. His name was Dennis Hope and he found a loophole in the paperwork governing the celestial body put in place by the United States and Russia. Basically, The countries agreed that no corporation/nation/country/whatever can claim to own the moon. Dennis saw that and assessed that he in fact, did not fall into any of those categories. Being just some guy, he claimed to own the moon, and no government or country has really minded.
I decided that I'd do sort of the same thing. Our moon wasn't up for grabs, but that's cool cause I didn't really want it anyway. Instead, I set my sights on a moon that I had learned about in astronomy class. IO, the innermost moon of the planet Jupiter.
-There you go, you're all caught up to speed.
I had been planning this challenge for a couple nights now, but I kept having to push it back due to cloudy weather and such. But tonight was clear and mild and perfect for star gazing. Plus, it would be a perfect excuse to finally bust out the sweet telescope Stef got me for our anniversary months ago. I did a little bit of research about what I wanted to try to spot through the telescope. I downloaded a nifty app on my phone that would display the constellations in the night sky wherever I pointed my phone (pure genius). I got my equipment and headed out to try and find a dark corner in the parking lot of my apartment complex. Everything was all set up, and aside from feeling like a total weirdo every time a person with a dog walked by, I was feeling good. I could see some stars without the telescope, so I only assumed that I'd be seeing all the things with it.
Unfortunately, I couldn't seem to get my sights on anything, even with my fancy star map app. I fumbled with the knobs and the twisty thangs, but I couldn't get a single star in my scope. I did manage to get a faint star in the little guide viewer, but I didn't come here to brag about that.
Was it a failure? Yeah probably.
Will I try it again? Totally, In fact, I'm going camping this weekend and there won't be any light pollution there so maybe I'll give it another go.
For those of you that didn't click that link and read about how I acquired a lunar satellite; I'll bring you up to speed. Through a series of articles and online videos I stumbled upon some guy who claimed ownership of the moon...Our moon. His name was Dennis Hope and he found a loophole in the paperwork governing the celestial body put in place by the United States and Russia. Basically, The countries agreed that no corporation/nation/country/whatever can claim to own the moon. Dennis saw that and assessed that he in fact, did not fall into any of those categories. Being just some guy, he claimed to own the moon, and no government or country has really minded.
I decided that I'd do sort of the same thing. Our moon wasn't up for grabs, but that's cool cause I didn't really want it anyway. Instead, I set my sights on a moon that I had learned about in astronomy class. IO, the innermost moon of the planet Jupiter.
-There you go, you're all caught up to speed.
I had been planning this challenge for a couple nights now, but I kept having to push it back due to cloudy weather and such. But tonight was clear and mild and perfect for star gazing. Plus, it would be a perfect excuse to finally bust out the sweet telescope Stef got me for our anniversary months ago. I did a little bit of research about what I wanted to try to spot through the telescope. I downloaded a nifty app on my phone that would display the constellations in the night sky wherever I pointed my phone (pure genius). I got my equipment and headed out to try and find a dark corner in the parking lot of my apartment complex. Everything was all set up, and aside from feeling like a total weirdo every time a person with a dog walked by, I was feeling good. I could see some stars without the telescope, so I only assumed that I'd be seeing all the things with it.
Unfortunately, I couldn't seem to get my sights on anything, even with my fancy star map app. I fumbled with the knobs and the twisty thangs, but I couldn't get a single star in my scope. I did manage to get a faint star in the little guide viewer, but I didn't come here to brag about that.
Was it a failure? Yeah probably.
Will I try it again? Totally, In fact, I'm going camping this weekend and there won't be any light pollution there so maybe I'll give it another go.
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| What I expected to see... |
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| ...What I saw |
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