Monday, May 19, 2003.  The weather in Michigan has been rather wet these past few weeks.  In addition the moon has passed through waxing crescent and is waning as I write this.  We are heading up north to Indian River to visit with some club members.  We expect to see at least a dozen avid stargazers at the party.  If you are going to be in Northern Michigan this weekend, send us a line.  We'll give you the address to the party.  The moon is heading into it's last phase this week so viewing will be fun...assuming we get clear skies.

One more note.  We are having our Sirius Stargazers annual party the weekend of May 30, 31.  We expect to have at least 150 to 200 people there.  It is a free viewing weekend.  If you want to check out our 20" Obsession scope send us a line. 

BUMMER.  WE GOT RAINED OUT!!! HOWEVER......

Do you know what we do when the weather doesn't cooperate?

WE GET A GIGANTIC TENT, TALK MOM INTO HOSTING A PARTY AND THEN WE EAT!!

June 26, 2003

Hey everybody! Did you think we forgot about you? Things have been fun lately.  I can't even begin to tell you how great the scope is.  I'm going to forgo telling you about everything except for last weekends viewing.  We took the scope up to Indian River, Michigan with some friends.  I have never seen skies so beautiful and dark since  I was in second grade.  The Milky Way galaxy was "UNBELIEVABLE"! We certainly didn't need a telescope to cruise around the heavens.  We have these chairs that allow us to recline and literally look straight up into the heavens.  Guess what? We saw a minimum of 2 and up to 4 satellites at a time.  It was so unbelievable! Let me tell you about M13.  When we view M13 in the Detroit area it's .... pretty cool, but when we viewed it up north it literally blew us away! I have never seen such a beautiful cluster.   We also used the wide angle lens and panned over to Cygnus just for fun.  All of us took turns trying to estimate just how many stars were in the field at one time.  We figured that there were at least several hundred to over a thousand stars in the field of view at one time.  It was beyond incredible!

The only problem now is that the skies here in Southern Michigan will never be enough for me.  I'm going to force myself and the club to make a long drive to dark skies.  There is no comparison between viewing.  Dark skies kick butt!

We are on our way to view this weekend in Grayling, assuming it doesn't rain!

June 29, 2003.  IT RAINED!!!!

Now we are waiting for clear skies for the 4th of July weekend! I have the mirror all cleaned up, the bearings all cleaned and waxed and the scope is ready for a long weekend of viewing.  We are crossing our fingers for clear skies.  If you've never viewed in northern Michigan you are missing out.  I can't wait for the weekend.  We expect a small crowd of followers this weekend.