Location: Marina Jacks
Time: 11 pm
I accompanied a friend who was interested in stargazing to Sarasota to view the beautiful winter sky. I used Orion as the jumping block for the constellations, as it was pretty bright and easy to pick out. From Orion, I traced down to Canis Major wherein Sirus could be seen brightly even over the city lights. I explained the story of the dog chasing the hunter and also mentioned how Sirius was -1 in magnitude, which led to a conversation and explanation of the concept of magnitude. I remembered from Friday's Sun discussion that the Sun was a -27 magnitude star, which was the very best- in my opinion- demonstration of the magnitude system. We also observed Andromeda, which I had to think for a minute if it was Pegasus or not, but I remembered! From Andromeda I could now find Cepheus. I really wish it had been dark enough to view the Pleiades, but alas, it was not. Still a very pretty clear winter sky.
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