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Yosemite under Orion's gaze

Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Near galactic miss

I got the call from Leslie at about ten minutes to seven. I was laying on the couch finishing my book. "Honey, you can see the comet to the west. Hurry, check it out." I looked out the window and sure enough, there it was. An asteroid streaking against the evening sky.

I ran out to the car, patting myself on the back for bringing the camera home. I didn't have the really long lens but the 135mm would have to do. I madly clicked away at the cosmic visitor with the unusual tail as it soared over my home. Then I started yelling, the neighbors need to see this baby. Once in a lifetime, right? Sadly there was no response to my excited shrieks.

I was feeling pretty smug about my lucky capture and shots. Right place at the right time. Until this morning that is, when I decided to blow them up and inspect my visual booty.

My comet was in fact just another dumb airplane. And so to my neighbors up the road, I must say, sorry about all that yelling.


4 comments:

Ken Seals said...

Didn't you hear?? That's the new twin comets Airbusenius Europeanius.
Ken

Anonymous said...

This is from beth cobb i don't know your e-mail anyway i did the same thing with the plane but with my binoculars not the camera anyway i came home with that sample and my husband says "i don't like the color it looks too gray" you men damm

beth

Anonymous said...

Pretty funny, Robert. I'm happy to say that we were in fact able to see the comet for about 30 minutes, but only with some high power binoculars. It was cool, but very short-lived.

Love to see you sometime - let us know if/when you're going out on the town...


Jeff Nichols

Blue Heron said...

We would love to, Jeff.