Megabytes

I did a daytime sketch and a nighttime sketch while at the OSP. The above artwork was drawn while I was on duty at the junction of 800 and 802 spur road. This is a Newtonian reflector telescope, the type invented by Isaac Newton. It is also called a Dobsonian mount after amateur astronomer John Dobson of San Francisco. Dobson is still doing sidewalk astronomy in SF and has been since the 1970s.

Below is my sketch of a segment of the Lunar surface at the terminator. Viewed through my 8″ reflector, using 17mm eyepiece at about 70x , 8:55pm on 8/16/07. This particular segment is the middle section of the visible crescent.

What has made this trip, my tenth, to the OSP unique among the other nine, is having internet access. Nomad ISP owner, Kelly Hogan, is an astronomer and a Linux developer. He wrote a program that uses a satellite dish to bring internet access to the wilderness. He wanted it here at the OSP to support his astronomy habit. That’s how Nomad began 5 years ago.
Today, they have over two hundred networks at campgrounds, marinas, and RV parks across the United States and this year have plans to expand to Australia. Why Australia? I suspect because Kelly wants to observe under Southern skies! <grin> Good choice, Kelly.
When you are RV-ing, camping or boating around the country, bring your laptop along with your sleeping bag and stay connected to your global family and friends.

Last night, as dusk was falling, I stared with apprehension at dark, ominous clouds that stretched from the eastern to northern horizon. Fearing rain, I put away my table cloth and everything upon my campsite table and battened down the hatches as much as I could. Even with this afeared pending rain, I dressed for a night of observing as darkness fell.
Getting up to the observing area, I noticed many telescopes were still under their silver blankets. It was a partly cloudy sky after all. I eyed the thunderhead that appeared in the distant east-southeast. Many other parts of the sky were dark and star-filled. With hope for a miracle that the storm would pass us by, I sat on my stool and re-accquainted myself with the night sky.
There’s Ursa Major, Cassiopeia, Pegasus, Scorpius. Well, parts of Scorpius. Can’t see much of Sagittarius at all. The Summer Triangle and its respective constellations Cygnus, Lyra and Aquila, were looking crisp and clear at the zenith.
Oh, look! While I had been greeting the rest of the night sky, the thunderhead had either dissipated or moved away! And with this good turn of events, I uncovered my scope, adjusted the Telrad on Polaris, put in a 25mm eyepiece and observed til 3am.

The Oregon Star Party is an event for astronomers or anyone with an interest in dark, non-light-polluted skies, held once a year in the Ochoco Mountains of Eastern Oregon.

You may have noticed the bright new image at the top of my blog page. This magnificent cerulean-hued flower is Ceanothus Dark Star. Each April, our backyard is dominated by the striking color of this tall bush from its position in the southeast corner of the yard.
According to “Pigments through the Ages” website, the name “Cerulean blue” comes from Latin caelum = sky. At the Las Pilitas website, I learned that another name for this ceanothus is Small Leaf Mountain Lilac. Dark star is a showy Ceanothus with tiny leaves and round flower clusters; and grows 6 ft tall and eight ft wide.
As an astronomer, I appreciate its name, Dark Star. Though, if the stars of the night sky were truly dark, they wouldn’t be seen. On the other hand, there are many areas of the sky that are dark and worth looking at. The dark rifts of the Milky Way, for example, are enjoyable to gaze upon.
But I am off on too many tangents. Back to the image in my blog header – After experiencing how simple it was to change the image and manipulate the text, I intend to do so on a regular basis. Watch for a new header image in June. Will it be a glimpse of our cherry tree or one of our many roses?

The Portland Macintosh Users Group (PMUG) holds a MacCamp twice yearly at Silver Falls Conference Center. Last month, 43 Mac fans came together in Silver Falls State Park for a weekend conference.

We had 6 classes to choose from in three time periods: Illustrator, Portraiture Lighting, Fave Mac Apps, Photoshop photo repair, Windows on Mac, and Podcasting. In the Illustrator class, I learned how to use this program to make simple and artistic drawings without using the Bezier tool! The brush tool is powerful. Just look what I created using only the brush tool.

Saturday afternoon, I enjoyed Rob Griffith’s Favorite Mac Apps and Utilities. Rob is an entertaining speaker who gets a great deal of information across quickly. He must have demonstrated close to 50 useful and inexpensive apps that can make your work on a Mac more efficient and let’s not forget, more fun.

Sunday morning, I went to Steve Riggins‘ class on podcasting. He demonstrated how to use GarageBand to create podcasts. He has been podcasting for a little more than a year and explained his process, what tools he uses, and podcast hosting options. I recorded some of the class and hope to upload a snippet soon.

The grounds are beautiful. MacCampers experienced cool temps, few clouds, and an almost overhead pass of the International Space Staion. It was the brightest I have ever seen it!