Venus and Moon

One could be forgiven for assuming the moon is a stationary object. When it’s “oot and aboot” as us Canucks apparently say, every time during the evening when one looks up in the sky, the moon’s in the same place. It’s one of those things that move so slowly that it appears not to move at all. Except when it’s the subject of a photo.

This afternoon as I waited for the bus, I noticed there was the slightest sliver of a moon in the dusk evening sky. Then I noticed it was already dark enough that Venus was visible. Photo op! I was already planning the photo shoot for when I got home.

The other day I came across my previous attempt at capturing Venus next to the moon. Turns out it was back in March 2009. I noticed the celestial phenomenon from the back yard after I’d let our dog out. I grabbed my point-and-shoot, steadied it on the back fence and got a pretty good shot, in my humble opinion. 

Venus and the moon; March, 2009.

 This evening I decided I’d try again. The moon was the similar crescent shape I’d seen in 2009 as well. I knew I’d have to act fairly fast as Venus descends quite rapidly, celestially speaking of course. What I didn’t realize is that the moon would also descend quickly.

I gathered up my dSLR (and my dog, of course) and headed to the darkest property in my ‘hood; the cemetery. I steadied the camera on a stone monument and experimented with shutter speeds and apertures. I’m pretty rusty with night photography; it took about a dozen shots before I got anything even remotely close to a well exposed photo. The moon and Venus continued to appear fuzzy. I think it’s due to the distance they each move across the sky just a tiny bit in the time the shutter is open during those longer than normal exposures.

And they definitely do move. In the 20 minutes or so of fiddling about that I spent, the moon actually dropped below the tree line, spoiling the planned unity of both planet and moon in one photo for this evening.

Venus and the moon; December 4, 2013. However, the long exposure nullified the effect of the "sliver" crescent.

I took a solo shot of the moon just to prove it was indeed a sliver, not altogether evident in the previous photo.

Before and After

We're getting some more work done on the house this season. At the tail end of the summer we got the deck re-done. Deck re-sloped and re-coated, new railings, new canopy, new stairs; the works. It's been on our wish list for years. We finally took the plunge.

I would have posted pics sooner except I wanted to show before and after conditions. It took me forever to find a "before" shot. Turns out I didn't have many showing the rear elevation of the house. I had many showing only the railing. The b4 shot I eventually dug up is so old...

How old?

It's so old...that it was taken with an actual film camera! Remember those?

Approximately 2002.

September 2013.

I like the "after" shot better. It was worth the wait.

And here's the b4 'n after of the stairs.

Before.

September 2013.

 Again, I'm much more drawn to the "after" effects.

Star Gazing

I'm getting to be a real sky junkie these days. A couple of nights ago I was walking Tannah and I happened to notice a really bright light in the southwest sky, not too far above the tree line. Intrigued, I headed in the direction of the local schoolyard for a more unobstructed view.

Also, I was looking for something to use as a tripod substitute to get a good night shot with my point-and-shoot. I tried a fire hydrant but by the time I bent over to place the camera on it's lid, I was too low to get a good shot; the trees were now in the way. Oh well, another night.

Once home again I fired up my computer to see what the Google that bright light actually was. Turns out it's Venus. That makes total sense. Quite a few years ago we were looking after a garden for friends that were away during the summer. I remember being fascinated by the same bright light low in the southern sky at dusk. And I do remember now that it was indeed Venus.

So now the challenge was to capture an image of that planet. I don't know why; I just wanted one. It's not that it's an especially intriguing shot either. A bright dot surrounded by black. Woo-hoo! For some reason I just wanted to photograph it. My first attempt with my trusty point-and-shoot was mediocre at best. Just try photographing something in the middle of a schoolyard playing field, at night when you can't read the dial selector on the camera, the dog is restless and is pulling on the leash ("Come on, let's go! I smell a squirrel/ raccoon/ skunk/ crow and it's real close by! Time's a'wastin'!"), and you're trying to steady the camera against your leg for a shot through the trees in a rare clear patch of sky in an otherwise showery evening. None too successful.

The next evening was clear and cold. Perfect, I thought. After walking Tannah I decided to grab my dSLR and head to Queen Elizabeth Park. There's a grass field on the south slope, one of the highest points in the whole city, actually. That's where I'd go...after dinner as it turned out. By the time I drove over there after dinner there was no sign of Venus. She'd beaten a hasty retreat. Camera-shy perhaps? Afraid I might not get her good side? Oh well; next time.

The next evening I didn't get home from work until 8 pm. Another excuse the following evening. Which brings me to tonight. I drove to the park before dinner, complete with my dSLR and handy instruction manual. Dialed up the ISO, set the camera on the roof of the car, set the self-timer for 2 seconds, propped up the lens until Venus was in the viewfinder and...

Bingo! Venus, in all her chilly November beauty, perched low in the sky amidst much smaller skydots that weren't even visible to me while I took the shot. It kinda looks like she's part of a triangle.

I love sky-gazing, even when I need my toque and gloves.

The toppling of TO

"OK people, move along now. Nothing to see here. Didn’t you hear my apology? It’s over; I apologized. Sincerely! Didn’t you hear me? And I even threw in a “God bless Toronto” for good measure. Don’t you see how hard I’m trying here? Please don’t fire me over this. Oh right, you can’t fire me. Because there’s something still before the courts. Actually no, it’s not before the courts right now, but that doesn’t matter. I’d have to step down for you to be rid of me, but you don’t want to get rid of me, do you? I’m the one that saves all you taxpayers money! And I apologized, so it’s all good now. We can move on with my mayoralty agenda. And my re-election campaign next year. Yeah, that’s it. I’m going to continue to save tax-payers money. Everyone will have forgotten all this stuff by next Fall. Because I apologized. Yeah, that’s it; it’s all good now. You can stop looking for stuff against me. I’ve come clean. Nothing left to hide. Yeah, nothing left to hide."

Until the next video surfaces…

Of course, the above is paraphrased, but I think I've learned enough in life to recognize a cry for help.

Superheros Halloween

Well, it's all over (no, I'm not talking about Rob Ford) but the fireworks.

As I type, our neighbourhood is besieged by firecrackers and all manner of fireworks. As has been mentioned in local news this week, fireworks aren't a big thing for most towns and cities in Canada. We seem to have cornered the market here in Vancouver. I must admit I threw my share of fire crackers in my youth, but I just can't seem to get into it anymore.

These days I'm more into pumpkin carving. I figure it's the least I can do. There are several impressive front yard displays in this 'hood. I don't have the drive to compete. Besides it would take one heck of a concerted effort to be considered in the same league.

But I can carve. And the Internet provides a treasure trove of carving ideas.

This year I received quite a compliment actually, in a backward sort of way. Shauna went out to move our pumpkins closer to the front sidewalk as we weren't getting many kids to the door. She was returning to the house when a little girl walked past with her parent and said, "I don't want to go there; it's too scary."

It's not that I want to scare kids away, but I mean it was only a Spiderman-themed pumpkin. But I hafta say I'm kinda proud that my selection of what to carve, and what I did carve, had that  dramatic of an effect.

This year's theme was Superheros; Spiderman and Superman.

 Another successful Halloween. Oh yeah, and a record number of trick-or-treaters; 130.

Skynomena

I’ve really got to coin a term for these things. Maybe Skynomena?  

Here’s another update on a skynomenon I experienced recently. Remember I described a bright slash though the dark ceiling of nightfall recently? Well OK; a meteor trail. (Reading so much Game of Thrones lit lately has inspired my attempt to step up my rote descriptions a notch.)

Discovery of similar accounts of lights in the sky recently prompted me to repeat the Youtube process for my recent meteor experience. And guess what? Someone else saw exactly the same thing I saw, but went a step further and was fortunate enough to have recorded the image. But interestingly, it wasn’t in Vancouver. It was in New Zealand!

According to the date on the video clip this occurred in 02/04/2012. (This date format drives me crazy. Is it Feb. 4^th or April 2^nd? I’ve seen both) The woman caller into a TV (or radio) program described it as thinking she was seeing the wreckage of a helicopter fall from the sky. But there was no sound. Just like the one I saw.

Another similarity is that both streaks were preceded by a greenish flash at the tip.

In the end, I'm no astronomer. Was it a meteor, or wasn’t it?

This Youtube screen shot looks exactly like what I saw, only the evening sky was darker.

Sky Lights (not to be confused with skylights) :-)

Youtube is quite the resource. I don’t even remember now why I accessed it recently. But I got sidetracked and ended up doing some searching for an unexplained phenomenon I experienced this past summer in Zurich. We happened to be there to coincide with Zuri Fasche, which only happens every 3 years.

A main draw to the weekend festival is the massive fireworks display that spans two evenings. On the first night we’d set up our deck chairs too early; 10 p.m. instead of 10:30. I was on the deck, and the condo we were staying in was on a hillside enabling me an elevated view. Before the fireworks began I noticed illuminated spots on the north horizon close to the direction of the airport. I blogged about these lights in July and asked then if anyone could confirm if the illuminated spots were hot air balloons participating as part of Zuri Fasche. I received no replies (not that I’m claiming a huge  readership base, mind you).

If the Youtube videos I viewed can be trusted (which I’m finding easier since I saw what I saw, and photographed it) it would seem that quite a few other people have seen a similar occurrence recently. It makes me wonder how long such lights have really been visible since it’s only been in relatively recent years that cell phone cameras have been prevalent. These days if something significant happens, you can be pretty sure someone has it stored in pixel format.

I viewed some short Youtube video segments of similar unexplained lights in the night sky in Wiltshire, UK; Quebec, California and Florida. Last summer in Zurich I chose not to use video format to capture the images of the lights I saw simply because I was confident I’d get a better still-shot, and I didn’t want to run the camera batteries down to nothing not knowing how long the lights would remain in the sky. Plus I wasn’t thinking at the time the lights would end up being inexplicable.

Posted below are some screen shots from a few videos I watched, compared with what I saw in Zurich in July. Whether you believe me or not is irrelevant (to me at least) but I know what I saw, and the friends we were staying with saw the same lights that I did. Feel free to comment if you’ve seen anything similar. 

Wiltshire, UK

 

 Apple Valley, CA

Zurich, July 6, 2013.

Breaking Bad finale

Didja watch it? Breaking Bad, I mean. It was simply the most hyped series finale since Lost. It definitely lived up to its billing, much like Lost lived up to its anticipation. My wife and I tuned in late to both series. We heard about both shows being really good for several seasons before we got hooked on them. By taking advantage of the latest method of watching series TV, we binge-watched all the seasons of both shows in one calendar year, each during the 12 months preceding each show’s finale, simply so we could watch each series finale in real time.

As for the Breaking Bad finale, Walter White died on the floor of a meth lab, amidst his beloved chemistry. How could I not have predicted that? It’s really the most obvious location. It’s kinda like that saying about not being able to see the forest for the trees.

WW (“Woodrow Wilson? Willy Wonka? Walter White?”) also got to exert his control for one final time over Jesse. Fortunately he also showed compassion by seeming to plan his assault on the compound around rescuing Jesse. Despite his “hit” on Jesse assigned to Jack’s crew, in the end we assume his conscience caught up with him and he realized he had an option to right a past wrong, i.e. the sentence of Jesse’s death.

That final shot of Jesse laughing/ crying hysterically as he raced away in the car from his imprisonment was such an emotional release. It felt like all the tension the series had created from the beginning was released right there, like the air being released from the proverbial balloon. In my opinion, it was one of the rare TV moments that left me speechless. That’s even more a triumph considering that the finale ended up being so easily predictable (despite the fact I failed to predict it).