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One advantage of the OCA's weather
station at Anza is that it can be used to remotely
view the conditions at the site and to decide whether
or not to make the drive. It seems that many of
you noticed the clouds out in the area on March
24th and decided to give it a miss this month. I
don't blame you one bit. Of course I went anyway
- as I had the duty on the Kuhn telescope along
with Star Member Mike Batchelor. When I arrived
the clouds were touching the peaks in the south
valley and moving pretty quickly. The optimist in
me did not want to let the situation get to me so
I definitely hoped the fast moving stuff would mean
that we would get some nice clear patches some time
soon. Alas it was never to be. By sunset the clouds
had really come in and the temperature was dropping
ever lower to near freezing. There were even a few
spots of wet stuff - so I never actually opened
the observatory.
I was not the only lonely soul
out at Anza that night. The photograph below shows
a number of those that braved the conditions to
see … virtually nothing.. Mostly everyone
achieved a grand score of ZERO on the Messier list
that night. Actually I saw M42 visually when I finally
gave up and drove back down to Temecula - so I technically
count that as a great score of 1 Messier object
on the Messier Marathon night.
.
The photo above was taken at the
Star Party at Anza on February 9th and shows the
hard workers at the end of their days work. This
same night I had to close the club observatory after
only an hour of use as the wind was gusting over
50 miles-per-hour (and after last months "problems"
with the roof - I did not want to risk any damage).
I heard that the legendary Stephen
Hawking was going to be presenting at CALTECH last
Friday (Mar 15) and having missed his last trip
to the area I was determined not to miss the chance
to hear him talk this time…
My wife and I took the day off
work and headed for Pasadena ready to line up with
the hoards of other Stephen Hawking groupies (mainly
CALTECH students) early on Friday morning. Unfortunately
we managed to just miss getting the tickets to the
presentation (around 1000 people can fit in the
auditorium). There was one last chance however as
we were encouraged to come back for the presentation
and line up for last minute tickets for people who
didn't turn up. We came back at 6:30pm (the lecture
began at 8pm) to find ourselves number 161 in the
line for the spare tickets. The people at the front
of the line had been there since 4pm. We decided
to stick it out anyway - ever the optimists. As
the time clicked away to 8pm it became pretty clear
we would not get in. There was one last place for
us to experience the lecture. The audio and the
presentation slides were going to be shown in an
adjacent building - and while we would not get to
see professor hawking we would at least be able
to hear his words of wisdom.
some of the die-hards waiting in line.
Anna - proudly showing our special
"standby and hope and pray that you'll get
in" tickets,
a student from Caltech and a
member from LA Astronomical Society on the far right.
As we lined up to get into the
auditorium we were all amazed as Stephen Hawking
himself - accompanied by two of his close friends
and helpers - came gliding right by us all. This
was at least a great consolation prize for all of
us! As he passed by the entire crowd (then 200)
started a spontaneous applause to welcome him to
the lecture.
His talk, titled "Brane New
World", was very interesting and I will always
remember the incredible way in which he brought
the complex concepts into clear focus for all of
us.
I feel so very lucky to live in a place where we
have access to such world renowned thinkers. Even
though I grew up in a town just a few miles away
from Cambridge, where Stephen Hawking lives and
works - I somehow feel I would have less of a chance
of meeting him in person there.
Totally amazing!
"every day we are connecting ever more photons
of light from distant galaxies to the eyes, hearts,
minds and imaginations of our members and others
in our community."
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