Eclipse luck

Last night, as mentioned in one of my previous posts, the last total lunar eclipse for the next three years took place. The weather had been predicted to be cloudy, but about an hour before totality, the clouds started breaking up. Derek and I set up our cameras on our back porch, from where we had a clear angle of view. As the eclipse progressed, the cloud holes got bigger and bigger, so that by the time of totality we got a clear view for almost the whole length of the total phase. Clouds started to roll in about six minutes before the end of totality, and we missed the partial phases which followed.

Derek's wide angle shot of the eclipse.


About four minutes before totality. The sharp edge of the earth's shadow appears at the lower right of the moon. Exposure was 3/10 of a second at f11.

Derek and I got about 100 pictures between us. I was using my tried and true Celestron C90 telescope, coupled to my Canon Rebel XT (350D), Derek his Nikon D50, with a 210 mm zoom lens. Derek's images are here.
The picture (left) shows the moon around the middle of the total eclipse. The lower edge is brighter because it is nearer the edge of the earths shadow, through which the moon was moving at the time. Exposure time was 1 second, ISO 800, the scope is a fixed f11, 1,000mm focal length. Because the Rebel XT has a CCD area smaller than that of a 24x36mm film, the effect is about like that of a 1,500mm telephoto lens.


Here's my series:

Usually, when the weather forecasters are wrong, the error leans towards bad weather. This time, they were wrong and it turned into better weather - I can live with THAT. To see the eclipse, after expecting not to, felt like serendipity.

A nice day, finally!

Those of you who live in my city know just how long we've had no sunshine. Today, things changed (it actually started yesterday). The sun is out, the snowtopped mountains are beautiful and the days are getting longer.









Mountains


We decided to take a walk in Stanley Park, took the skytrain to Waterfront and walked from there. Spring announced its coming.








The seawalk





Some flowers were blooming, and it seems that half of Vancouver had the same idea about taking a walk as we did.










































Spring is coming: some flowers and buds.


On the way back, we decided to take the seabus (the ferry across the harbour) to Lonsdale Quay for a beer and a burger (since I wasn't driving, this was a safe thing to do). Seabus is part of the skytrain system, so we bought a ticket at Waterfront, went to the quay, had our food, got back on the seabus, transferred to skytrain, and went home. The fare for each of us for all that was $1.75 each way (a total of $7.- for the whole day). I think the cost of driving would have been higher (at $1.05/l for gasoline) - and I would have had to have a coffee instead of a beer.










Lonsdale Quay

Happy Valentine!

For the ladies who read this blog - a happy Valentine's day. Now you can say that you have at least one Valentine's greeting.

Of course, the crass, commercial North American environment has tainted the meaning of the day to some degree; we ourselves are not immune. But at least we have a choice; we can make the best of it. In that spirit, we invited our immediate family to dinner yesterday (it's next to impossible to get dinner reservations for today). We had a very nice dinner at Earl's restaurant, which is located not far from our house. There were eight of us: our two granddaughters, our son, our daughter-in-law and her parents, and the two of us. Earl's had arranged a very nice (square) table for us - the food and service were excellent - and we had a good time. Even the cost was low, because we used up the gift cards which we had received as presents from my wife's sister and brother-in-law at Christmas.

An additional reason to dine out was that our older granddaughter has her 10th birthday on Valentine's day (Valentine's day is the birthday date she shares with my own sister, her great aunt). She received a present from her maternal grandparents; we expect a visit from her today at our house, because she knows that there are more presents for her here.

I'm fortunate. My wife and I like staying at home. Usually, we have a glass of wine after dinner, and during the winter at least, when the evenings are dark, we light some of the candles we have in our living room. This makes for a nice, cozy, and romantic feeling - one can say that we have a Valentine's day almost every day.

Praise family!

Enough, already, and more

It seems that we've had far more than our normal share of snow here. There has been "dump after dump" for several weeks now, and some snow has almost always been on the ground. That's quite unusual for us west-coast softies. We've done more than our normal amount of shovelling; it makes up somewhat for the missed walks my wife and I like to take. The other exercise option we have is an old excercise bike we have in the basement, which we use when the weather makes walking uncomfortable for us.

This exercise bike was given to us by a member of our extended family. When we got it, its "odometer" showed just under 300 miles of (stationary) travel - the scenery never changes - now it is showing just over 1,200 miles. This means that we have "biked" around 900 miles - 1,450km - I think that's like biking from Vancouver to Calgary.

Anyway, I'm sure hoping that the weather will be clear for the next lunar eclipse on February 20. This eclipse occurs early in the evening, it starts around sunset (and moonrise) for us here on the west coast. Look towards the eastern horizon, as the sky gets darker, the eclipse should be more easily visible. It's hard to predict, sometimes the moon gets really dark during an eclipse, and is hard to see.




This is a simulated image of how the moon might appear on an uncommonly clear evening at around 6:30pm on Feb 20 from some imagenary lake in the Vancouver, B.C., area. Click on the picture to get a slightly larger view.

Winter's back

As predicted, we had another dump of snow overnight - and it looks pretty.

The granddaughters cavorted in it before they went to school. Fun for the kids. For me it was less so. I was scheduled to do some work for the Whistler public library this morning, but road conditions this morning were such that I postponed that to tomorrow.

The ability to visually check road conditions on stretches of highway of interest is one of the wonderful aspects of the internet. If you're planning to drive in this kind of weather it sure helps.

Getting on

Yesterday, our younger granddaughter reached the ripe old age of 8 years. Of course, in honour of the day, presents had be offered, starting early. So, as grandparents, we did our duty - and, we're glad to say - our offerings were received with gratitude. The family gods are placated.


Of course, that was just the beginning. Great festivities were arranged at the temple of our kids birthdays - the local bowling alley. I got involved in a couple of 5-pin bowling games. My expertise showed immediately; I even exceeded 100 points in one of them (a good score is probably around 250 or so).

Our older niece also had her 27th birthday, and she was also there, along with her parents, her sister, her daughter (who would be our niece niece, I suppose). Many people are amazed by the "birthday coincidence" in their families, but probability theory predicts the chance is more than 50% once the number of family members exceeds 23. Our family and close friends number more than that - even among our family members at this birthday gathering we have two sets of people who share the same birthday.

Great fun was had by all.

The new dress


Marbles

Barbies









Two birthday girls (picture by Derek)

A special winter day.

Well, it's another mess outside - it snowed until about 11:30 am, but with the temperature hovering around 0 degrees Celsius (32 Fahrenheit), the streets are slushy, and slippery, and now it's raining. A good thing that it's the weekend; traffic is less problematic. This condition only exists in our immediate area here, because we're slightly elevated (90m - 250ft above sea level); it's enough to make a difference. The main thoroughfares tend be cleared by the city for the buses in any case. All that is not special in any way.

An update: the kids seem to have had some fun, though.

My wife and her two best friends are attending the Canadian figure skating championships every day (and night) and, since the todays performances started early, she got away before most of the snow came down. She is using the tickets which were originally purchased by her childhood friend (and a bridesmaid at our wedding) Sonia, the fourth in their group, who died this past November of a heart attack, and whose birthday is today. In her honour, the three girls are going out to dinner tonight - some months ago they had planned to get together with Sonia on this day and do that. Their birthday get-togethers have been a tradition for many years; no doubt there will be a tinge of sadness and nostalgia tonight. That's why today is special.