Post Holiday Rendering

 

I took the quiet time today to work on a medieval style armillary sphere in Blender.  In an earlier version, I had difficulties punching the glyph for Gemini out of the band because Blender got a little confused by the negative space and couldn't perform a boolean difference, and instead performed a boolean addition.  

Today's agenda includes cleaning, resting, dusting, laundry, crafting some thank you notes (which I really should send out instead of looking at a stack of completed notes needing postage) and waiting for the books I ordered three weeks ago to arrive.

Raptor Tuesday

Tuesday was a partially sunny day, with some rain mixed in between parts where the clouds opened up enough to emit the sun.  This morning (Wednesday) is very foggy and grey, which, I suppose, will make it a good writing morning--epecially since Mark had to go into work instead of telecommuting and The Child was up very, very late and probably wont emerge from his bedroom until Noon. 

Yesterday, I went to the Cascades Raptor Center and got there just as they were opening.  I haven't been in a while, and the weather was mostly sunny,  although there was a ten minute sprinkle early on.  Some of the residents' aviaries have moved:  Amazon the Golden Eagle is closer to the parking lot and Uriel the Red-tailed Hawk.   

I chatted with some of the handlers throughout my visit (I know C. from a previous life).  Various residents were fed and weighed during my visit and I got to see Archemedies the Snowly Owl transform from his usual bowling-pin pose into a hungry raptor; Bohdi the Barred Owl hopped down for her food--she's usually parked up in a corner perch; Padawan the Barn Owl came out of his box to gulp a bit of rabbit fur; Parker hovered for extra treats and even caught the last one in mid-air; Jake the new Peregrine Falcon was active even before feeding time.  I visited my favorites, Atticus the Bald Eagle, Banjo the Eastern Red-Tailed Hawk, Lethe the Turkey Vulture, and Dante the Golden Eagle.   I was lucky enough to photograph Banjo and Guapo the Swainson's Hawk when they were brought out of their aviaries.  

I was speaking to C. about the possibility of shadowing handlers in order to photograph the resident birds more clearly inside their aviaries -- which it turns out would not be a Good Idea -- and it struck me how I've gotten so used to visiting the raptors (and photographing the ones that can come out to meet the public), that I was considering them somewhere between domestic pets or Lipizzan Stallions  and  stopped thinking of them as trained-but-still-wild animals being cared for because of developmental or physical injuries.   Even after Guapo gulped down a dead baby chick whole, or Padawan ripped off gobbets of meat from rabbit bones.  

Post Grand Conjunction

Tuesday night, after a rainy and grey afternoon, the clouds broke up enough so I could see the one-day-old Grand Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn.  They were already moving apart, and if I'd really really wanted to see the conjunction on Monday night, I would have hopped into the car and gone some place like Crater Lake.   Tuesday night was clear enough to also show the Half Moon inching closer to Mars near the meridian.  

Around five, I set up the tripod and camera across the street and snapped a few photographs.  Since it was shining on our rooftop anyway, with a little repositioning I was able to compose a shot of our Holiday Star and the planets.  Spencer's Humans were coming out of their house, and I called them over to see the conjunction and briefly commiserate about Monday's cloud cover.  

Later Mark and I went walking a little after six to the top of the hill and managed to catch the pair before they sunk behind the south hills (and it turned out there were some clouds coming in from the west).  Saturn was very clearly a dimmer companion to Jupiter, and we wondered how someone might confuse it with The Star of the East without throwing Venus into the mix.  

We found a spot on the hill near the place where I photographed comet NEOWISE last Summer (which seems like an eon ago) and gazed at the conjunction.  Mark seemed surprised that a planetary viewing could lead to smooching; I think he suspected supposed astrological romantic influence.  "They're just rocks, and they're actually really far apart," he said before I kissed him again.

Winter Solstice Spiral

Winter Solstice morning.  The sun is actually shining through the clouds.  I've managed to take a beeswax candle, match, and really big magnifying glass and light the candle.  Granted, 9:30 AM is probably the earliest I've focused the flame of the Solstice Sun, but here in the Pacific Northwest, you grab your clear skies when you can.  Already as I write this, a grey blanket of clouds is passing in front of the sun and softening the definitions of shadows.   Luckily, I've got the flames ensconced in some fireplace candles and under a samovar filled with rooibos tea.

It's possible there might be a window of clear sky tonight between 5 PM and 7 PM which will allow for viewing of the Great Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn, but I'm not getting my hopes too far up.

Last night's Spiral Walk at the local UU church went well.  It was raining off and on, but the storms paused long enough for me to draw out a chalk spiral.  Wow, wet pavement eats through chalk quickly; I went through four sticks before I was through -- during Saturday's practice on dryer pavement, I only used one.

Once the spiral was laid out, an army of volunteers laid down the greens.  My old landfolks procured a prodigious amount of pine and fir boughs, and everyone was so into the spiral that they laid out extra lengths of the arms.  I thought we were going to use LEDs, but blank, white Saints' candles in tall glasses appeared, and I placed them along the spiral in eight spokes -- the placement started out improvised along the north-south axis, which suggested the east-west axis and the cross-quarter axes as well.  

In consideration of COVID, we didn't want folks to congregate in large groups, so the spiral had an exit and and entrance; since it was outside, we forewent with altars at the cardinal directions.  The idea was the folks could appear, walk the spiral, and leave; so there was no formal ritual planned as there had been the last two years.

A little before 5 PM and it got dark, I made a circuit of the spiral and lit the candles, invoking the directions in my head.  Somehow, the spokes of flame running through the spiral worked as directional altars.  The landfolks had brought their old firepit -- there was a blast from the past -- and had a small fire going near the eaves of the church.

Folks appeared and walked through the spiral.  I sat a little apart and watched shadowy forms walk through the greens and candlelight.  Out of the east came the distant hinking and honking of geese.  The sound grew and several V's of geese flew overhead, like souls of the Wild Host, traveling, traveling, traveling across the dark sky while we were earth-bound shadows traveling through a spiral of light -- and I was put into mind of mist-covered ferry rides, and transformations,  and questers, and cohorts.  

A moment later, the fey mood was broken by the recollection of Mark sarcastically referring to the more unlovely honks geese make as "God's angels, singing," and a social media post about the supposed yearly ritual Canadians perform in February, where they go out at midnights and breathe all of their nastiness into sleeping flocks of geese.  My laughter rang out across the spiral.  

The experience seemed to be a positive one for folks, and people found the change of direction at the spiral's center meaningful.  In the past, the entrance and exit had been the same, and folks would light a votive candle from a central flame in the spiral's center.   The rain and COVID and having the event outside reduced the participants' number from about a hundred to maybe thirty.

I sipped some black tea from a thermos.  I missed seeing C.N., who has health issues this year, but has in the past done a titanic amount of behind-the-scenes-work to make spirals happen.  I wondered if I should have brought my harp and played it.  Later on, Saro, one of my former landfolk, asked, "What happens if I go through the spiral backwards?"

"Demons," I said, and we laughed.  "Actually, the way the spiral's built, even if you entered from the South, the direction of fire, you'd be going widdershins, symbolically banishing or releasing fire, until you reached the center, where you'd go deosil, symbolically summoning or gathering the energy of Earth.   Entering from the North, the direction of Earth (and midnight and Winter), the idea is to symbolically mirror what the sun's doing in the sky: banishing a decrease of the light, and turning toward an increase.  So South to North is sort of a statement of the moment right now, whereas North to South is more a continuation."

The rain started to fall harder and doused the candles.  Saro and I tried to relight them, but as more rain fell it got into the melted wax and the wicks and the candles sputtered out.  I wasn't wearing a waterproof jacket, and started to get cold.  This was near the 7PM end-time of the event, so we started to break things down.  I silently opened the circle as volunteers gathered rained-out candles.  The boughs were swept into a corner of the parking lot. 

When I got home, there was candle wax on my pants, my sweater was soaked, I had pitch on my hands, and my hair smelled like a campfire.  My eyebrows were not singed, but I'm pretty sure the spiral walk counts as a Real Ritual. 

And now there's a fine, silver mist falling out of a pewter and turquoise sky, which is casting a rainbow over the houses across the street.

Rainy Solstice Eve

It's raining.  Hard.  The back patio is flooded, which probably means water isn't flowing through the French drain as it should.  Neighborhood pines, firs, and oaks sway in the occasional squalls. 

It's also dark.  The morning sun is behind the clouds, and a wan, grey light comes through the back sliding glass door.  It reaches about a third of the way into the front living room, and the only light in this room comes from the steady glow of the colored lights on the Christmas tree, the small lights from a porcelain winter village, and the blue-white glare of a laptop screen.  The front window blind is broken and down -- Mark and I will fix it presently, which should admit more daylight into the room.

Next to me on the couch, the dog dreams:  paws curl and legs flex; her breath like the pull of oars deep into a strong current.  Ears, nose, and jowls twitch.  Barks, faint, seep from the dream realm into the dim room.  

I've agreed to help construct a double-spiral for a meditative walk at the local UU Church.  The last two years, I've facilitated a labyrinth spiral walk and Wicca-flavored ritual.  Inside.  This year, in consideration of COVID, the spiral will be a double-spiral, with an entrance and exit -- which technically makes it not a labyrinth --  and outside.   Without a ritual.  The plan is to have folks walking in and walking out with as little clustering as possible.  There's probably not going to be enough sunlight for Solstice Fire, and in any case, LED candles for outside use have been purchased.  

Yesterday I made a wooden anchor so I can draw circles and arcs with a length of string and some chalk.  I tested it out in the nearby intersection and the process worked surprisingly well.  And then the rains came. You could still see the chalk spiral yesterday evening, but I'm not sure how much of it remains after a night of pouring.   The plan at the UU Church is to lay out greens on top of the chalk spiral, only in the parking lot.  

With any luck, it won't be pouring buckets on us as we lay things out.

Moon and Grand Conjunction

We were lucky enough with the weather that around 4:30 or so, it looked like there would be a break in the clouds.  I didn't think it would happen; last night it rained so hard that water seeped under our back garage door, and although this morning I could see Venus, by mid-morning it was back to felt grey skies spitting rain down on us. 

However, when I glanced out the back window around four, I caught sight of the sickle moon and readied my tripod and camera.  Thick strands of cloud stretched from the west as they passed overhead.  When I went out a little before five, I could only see the moon (and the rose-tinted clouds).

I set the tripod up at the entrance to our driveway and took a few shots of the solitary moon.  Shortly, Jupiter blazed out from behind the clouds; Saturn was still hidden.  I took a few more photos, and realized that I needed to move across the street.  I was slightly disappointed that the night before hadn't cleared up, because the Moon would have been about half the distance it currently was from the planetary pair... but, a thirteen degree separation between a crescent moon and the two wouldn't be impossible to work with.

When Mark and The Child came out of the house a few moments later to retrieve the dog from doggy-daycare, there was a little grumbling that it was dark and hard to see the porch steps (I had turned off the porch light and unplugged the decorations).  

"I'll be done and turn the lights back on soon," I said.

"Ha!" Mark said.  They drove off.

By now the clouds appeared to be thinning.  I fiddled around with f-stops and exposure times (always bracket your shots).  When clouds veiled the planets, I took some artistic shots of the moon.  Before I knew it, the sky had cleared considerably, and I was able to get some clear shots of the three luminaries.

I used the camera's extreme zoom capabilities to frame just Saturn and Jupiter.  The lens is strong enough to show Jupiter's Galilean moons, but not strong enough to resolve Saturn's rings -- so Saturn looks like an almond.  I didn't realize it at the time, but I zoomed in just as one of the Galilean moons was coming out from behind Jupiter, and as I reviewed photos later, I saw it draw farther away.  

Mark, The Child, and Aoife came back.  (And the lights were still off.)  Aoife thought I was a Monster (or something) and barked like she was going to eat me when she first saw me.  Then when I spoke, after which she pulled and yammered until Mark brought her over.  

"Oh my God," Mark said.  "Why are you in the street?  You're in [the neighbor]'s parking space.  I thought you were on the sidewalk.  No one can see you, you know." 

"The view's better from here," I said.  

Mark turned to The Child, "Artists!  They don't think about safety. This is why so many people got hurt making Spider-Man, the Musical." They retreated to the house for dog-feeding.

I snapped a few more photos, then stopped to appreciate the display.  

Fingers crossed Jupiter and Saturn will be visible the night of the 21st. 

Star Of Wonder...

We're gearing up for the holidays at our house.  Mark has been stringing lights along the front, and the other day he and The Child set up the ceramic Christmas village.

I managed to charge up the solar batteries on the holiday star (there's always a question if they system will work after 48 weeks in storage) over the weekend, which was relatively sunny.

The star is made of painted lathe strips wrapped in light strings.  

I had fun putting it up.  I was on the roof when a neighbor came out to his truck, so I hailed him.  He wasn't sure where my voice was coming from.  I did shout, "I'm up here!" but I guess he didn't hear me clearly, because he looked around, pulled out his cell phone, and then checked it.  I know it was wicked, but I did have to laugh a little (behind my hands, while muttering "Oh, I shouldn't laugh...").  A minute later, I successfully hailed his wife.

"Oh, I love that star," she said, much to my relief -- I always worry that the star is a little too much Country Cute Meets DIY.  

While I was wiring the star in place, it struck me that the pitch of the northern side of our roof is nearly the angle of the the winter sun in its meridian.  

Then we all trundled off to the local-ish U-cut tree farm and murdered a small tree to decorate for the holidays.  The weather was sunny and bright, and the temperature was in the 50's, which was a pleasant change from the times we've been slogging through acres of firs, pines, and spruce in the middle of a drizzle that threatened to turn into a snow storm.  

The new twist was that this was the first time we've transported a tree with the car Mark commutes to work with, and the top rack was so aerodynamically designed that there were no real corners to anchor the tree to.  It took a little trial-and-error -- when we stopped to check the ropes in a parking lot about two miles away from the farm, I was not happy about how much slack was in the rope -- but we got the tree home in one piece without fresh lumber flying into a highway lane. 

Clouds, Mostly

Not much in the dream department, lately.  I did have one odd one the other day involving a really big blood blister on my left thumb.  I'm thinking maybe one of the cats attacked my hand in the night.  

Tuesday (last night) was writing night; I have some short story fragments I'm working on.  One started to turn into a back-story poem, and not that I'm Tolkien or anything, but I had that moment where it seems the story stops so the Elves can sing a song (in my case, it probably wasn't Elves).  It turned into a call and response poem -- which I think is called strophe and anti-strophe or something.  I suppose I should brush up on poetry parts.  It will be nice to be able to leave the house (or at least go outside) to write in the Summer.

On the working out front, I've been doing short sets of what are probably closer to Pooh's "Stoutness Exercises" than anything else -- dumbbell curls, crunches, and push-ups -- but at least they're better than nothing.  I suspect that some heavier dumbbells are in my Christmas future.  

It's been overcast the last few days, so I haven't been able to see either the morning or the evening stars.  Very occasionally I'll catch a glimpse of ruby Mars near the zenith, but not much else.  I am hoping to catch the Moon next to Jupiter and Saturn tonight (12/16), but the prospects are favoring rainy skies.  Perhaps there will be a window in the clouds.  

Dream: The Eclectic Birthday Bus Magic Cher Show

I slept a little later than usual, and woke up after a very convoluted dream.  The narrative was all over the place, and my sense is that the themes and events I can recall blended into each other.

Missing the Arcosanti Bus

I'm not sure when this sequence happened in the dream, but I think it was early on.  I was at Arcosanti.  There was a bus going into Phoenix that I was going to take to the airport.  Even though the driver knew (or should have known) that I was going, the bus left without me.  I was going to miss my plane.  Somehow, this wasn't as upsetting as I thought it would be, and I think I tried getting to the airport -- I have a vague memory of a scene with a ticketing agent, but I don't recall much afterward.

Teaching Singing

I was in a large room, like a school cafeteria or a fair exhibit hall.  There was a bank of tall windows on one side of the room, but it was dark outside.  Shelves and cubbies ran below the window.  Institutional tiles on the floor.  There were a bunch of folks there -- I don't know if they were from the SCA, a Ren Faire, or a choir, but they were all artsy-theatre folks I knew.   The room was dark, the only source of light was from a bunch of candles. 

The group was not very organized, and folks' children running around gave what was supposed to be some sort of choir practice the air of a BBQ or potluck.  They wanted to know one of the old songs they'd used to sing, and I was teaching the soprano (and later the base) part to a song, like "Jog On," or" We Three Kings," or "Gabriel John," or "Good King Wenceslas" or something old-timey.   While we were practicing I heard some china break.  I went over the song again with the choir, which was kind of scattered, but I managed to get enough people singing to go through a verse or two....

...and then we all woke up in the dark.  "Who blew out the candles?" I asked.  I was sort of annoyed as I went around turning on some more lights.  In one of the cubbies, I found the shards of a red and white (?Santa?) mug.  "Oh," I said, kind of disappointed, but also kind of glad because I'd never liked that mug anyway.

Cher

We were in a large mansion owned by Cher.  Cher was a sorceress, in full Theda Bara Cleopatra garb, complete with metal cobra brassier.  It was a nice party, there might have been some dancing, but it was more like a cocktail party.

At one point in the dream, presumably after the party, Cher had rolled up her sleeves (I'm not quite sure what happened to her Theda Bara outfit, because those normally don't have sleeves), and was standing at the kitchen sink as she washed the dishes.  As she pulled dishes out of the initial rinse, if she didn't like the way they looked (like if they'd been chipped or if they were extra dirty), she breathed on them, which transformed them into ice dishes, and she tossed them over her shoulder (where they melted away).

Still later on in the dream (possibly after the events related in the next section), Cher flew in on great big white wings.  She landed, folded her wings behind her, and they swept into her long black hair.   She had a cobra or rattlesnake familiar, I'm not sure if he was a spirit and materialized like a ghost, or if he was a bracelet or tiara that animated, or if he started out as a live snake being worn like a belt or torc.  

In any case, the cobra grew into an animated mosaic path -- Cher stood at the tail's tip.  The snake's head lifted up off of the floor and looked back down its length at Cher and said, "Cinnamon, clove, and a touch of lime / now it is the loving time!"  (It's possible the snake had Vincent Price's voice.)  His head burst into a blue-green flame, and the flame traveled down his body and engulfed it.  Cher levitated into the air, and when the flame reached the snake's tail, it jumped up an engulfed Cher, too.   They both disappeared, and the flame contracted to where Cher had floated before it, too, disappeared.  

Birthday Bus

Mark and I had rented a bus for my birthday (which in real life is in two weeks).  My sense was that we'd rented it from a bus/RV garage in Eugene.  I think I mashed together the RV retailer in Junction City, the (years defunct) Marathon custom bus manufacturers in Coberg, and some random tire place on West 11th Ave.   I think I may have pulled the staff from the Eloy Airport Parachute Drop Zone.   

The weather was sunny and warm, and not December-like at all.  I was driving what was very obviously a Lane Transit District bus.  We would pick various friends and family members up, and party on the bus as we drove to various Birthday Destinations (maybe the party at Cher's house?).  

Near the end of the dream, I was driving and the bus was pretty full of partiers.  It was dark (magic of dream setting), and I had to stop the bus at a crossroad / railway crossing.  The setting was kind of like the Pacific Express Way, or when Harlow Road crosses train tracks to get to Highway 99.  I remember doing a U-turn across the train tracks, stopping the bus, and turning on the hazard blinkers while I got out ?to retrieve or place a fist sized rock from/at the side of the road?

Then it was off to the last destination "at Berttlestein."  (This is a road on the western edge of Eugene, that cuts across 11th).  The setting had turned back into a sunny day.  I was driving ?east on 5th? near the Eugene 5th Street Market when a woman said, "Oh we're here!"

I looked up.  I had overshot Berttleestien (which in the dream was a kind of mall? possibly near the "Oregon Electric Station" restaurant) and the bus was barreling toward the open garage of the bus rental place.  I had gotten up to change the bus's marquee to read "Berttlestein".  I was trying to get back to the driver's seat and hit the breaks, but there was a bar or a seat in my way.  The bus zoomed into its bay (think "Galaxy Quest," only in reverse).   The rental staff were frozen about the bay with horrified looks as the bus careened toward the end of the bay.  I hit the breaks.  The bus was going to smack into right side wall.  I overcompensated on the wheel.  The bus was still going too fast.  The bus was going to smash into a kiosk on the left.  I turned the wheel, but too late -- the driver's side view mirror snagged the kiosk, embedded itself into it, and the whole bus stopped.

Everyone got out.  There may have been events from other sections happening here.  There was some insurance follow-up; I'm not sure how much damage there was to the bus or the rental building.  At first the rental staff boss was furious, but no one died, and I guess people started thinking it was kind of funny. 

Friday Cat Photo

 

Cicero (and Smokey, too) is slowly working toward acceptance that there is a canine living (and sleeping) in the house.  Both cats will (mostly) put up with being sniffed by Aoife, but they aren't exactly happy about it.  

I'd say Cicero is further along with the process than Smokey is.  Smokey pretty much would rather sleep in the cold garage than in the house.  

Saturn and Jupiter Draw Nigh

Saturn and Jupiter are drawing close together.  They're eleven days out from their Grand Conjunction.  I figured I should start photographing them now, as the cloud cover makes astrophotography at this time of year a crap shoot.  Actually, the more I think about it, it seems axiomatic that if it is the Winter Solstice, it's going to be pouring buckets... which... actually, thinking about it more, given the number of Winter Solstices where I've celebrated by candlelight from fire ignited by the Solstice Sun, maybe it pours buckets less than I think.

 I'm looking forward to next week, when the crescent moon will swing by Saturn and Jupiter.  

Diner Theatre Dream

 I've woken up early, with "Don't Rain On My Parade" playing in my head and the remains of a convoluted dream.  I'm going to guess that writing last night and the clips of "Glee" Mark was watching last night are the cause.

The dream started out as a musical set in a diner on top of a really tall tower.  Thinking back, the diner started out as a gas stop from earlier in the dream.  I was trying to pay for a fountain Pepsi, which involved standing in a line to feed a dollar bill into a machine's slot, moving down a bit in a line (the dream was apparently pre-COVID, because there was no mask anxiety), and then retreaving a large, soda-filled paper cup from a dispenser.  There was something about a receipt and a missing customer's food.

I wandered around the gas stop's kitchen, and the diner somehow transformed to being a tower-top dinner theatre.  I'm not sure what the play was; probably "Anything Goes" meets "Guys and Dolls" because everyone seemed to have New York accents and I was dressed in 1920's era clothing.  The dream turned into a typical, "the play's started and I'm not quite remembering my lines" dream, and then a small light blew out or something, and the other actor in the opening scene had to deal with with it, and said, "Mr. Burridge, come over here."  The orchestra vamped.  I looked around the dinner theatre, knowing that my folks were in the audience somewhere, and that I was going to have to make something up.  So I started to improvise a song.  "Follow the candle," was a repeated phrase, and in the dream I was desperately trying to rhyme a particularly difficult word that I can't recall waking (writing this it's harder not to come up with rhymes).   I picked up a lit red taper from someone's table and paraded back and forth on the stage, singing "Follow the candle," to what in waking life I'm recognizing as "Follow the Fold," from "Guys and Dolls."  

The song concluded, and the dream shifted from a dinner theatre show to a sci-fi adventure set in a old diner atop a really tall tower.  The diner transformed from a 40's New York style metallic diner to (I think) an Asian Fusion restaurant.  Or possibly an Asian couple's apartment.   Deep beneath the base of the tower, there was some kind of mystic energy source, like a ball of lightning ten feet across or something.  I have a image of a thermometer representing the tower, and the energy ball at the base is like a mercury reservoir.  We were supposed to raise the energy up to the top of the tower, I'm not sure why, it was one of those "we have to do this" dream things.      

There was something about a new owner of the tower being bad... and using the air conditioning units as a gateway for a cyber attack.  And the Asian wife being mad at the husband for something (like buying an RV or selling the silverwear or a similar sit-com dilemma)  and chasing him in a spherical capsule up the tower while he ran up the stairs.   Oh, and there was a toddler having a tantrum because she wanted her diaper changed, and she had climbed on the outside railing at the top of the tower to do so.   But the whole dream ended in the living room, where a tapestry rolled up like a curtain to show a screen with three other towers trying to contact us (or else the tapestry was like a TV screen).  "We'll send you aid," they said.  Their images on the tapestry became more blocky, like they were on a quilt made of squares and right triangles.  "Look for that which is there and not there," they said, and then faded from view.   (In waking life I took this to mean a feeling, like love, or a sense of family or community -- something there, but intangible).    

---

The thick cloud cover that hid the sky when I first woke up has cleared.  The waning crescent moon is near Spica, which I mistook for Mars for a second.  Venus is low on the horizon, shining through a rent in the clouds.  It's two outstretched hands away from the Moon, so Friday morning will the morning for a conjunction.  If the clouds allow. 

---

Yesterday afternoon, some roofing contractor rang our doorbell  (I had hoped it was a package delivery) and started his rambly, "this isn't a sales pitch" sales pitch (after retreating to the bottom of the porch stairs).    I thought he was only going to ask a few quick questions, but I finally stopped him after what I'm thinking was about a minute or two and said, "I'm going to go inside now, because I'm really uncomfortable that you're not wearing a mask."  

Mark and I couldn't believe it, considering he was polling the neighborhood asking folks how old their roofs were.  

Thanksgiving Astronomy

Over the long weekend I managed to snap some photos of the Moon as it was between Aldebaran and the Pleiades.  The moon was a few hours shy of being full, so there's a lot of moon-flare in the pictures -- I had to use a two second exposure to get the Pleiades to show up at all, so most of the shots were "artsy."  This was a full moon with a penumbral eclipse, or I might have stayed up later trying to get a good shot of a temporarily crescent moon with the stars.  

One of these days, I'm going to have to put a little star on Portable Stonehenge for where Aldebaran, Regulus, Antares, and Fomalhaut are.  4000 years ago, they used to line up with the solstices and equinoxes, but they've progressed and now they're roughly 60 degrees from where they were -- so Aldebaran is opposite the late Autumn sun now, and Antares is next to the sun right now. 

Our Thanksgiving was at home this year; just us and no other family members.  I made entirely too much stuffing.  Next year I'll need to remember to use less bread crumbs and more spices and chicken stock.  The Child cooked a (pre-cooked) chicken.  Mark made twice-baked yams.   

This season is hard on my folks, who really would like to see everyone, and who have been cooped up at their house.  We could socially distance ourselves outside their house during the summer and early autumn, but now it's too cold and wet.   We did mask up Sunday and put up their artificial tree that is too unwieldily for them to put up by themselves while they (mostly) socially distanced.  

On the plus side, their house is a large, open-plan building; so it's not like we're all crammed together into a postage-stamp-sized apartment, inhaling each other's exhalations.   On one hand I'm still a little uncomfortable seeing them and risking COVID-19; on the other hand, I'm glad we did help them, because Mark discovered the wiring on their tree was faulty when he got a shock from a string of lights he thought was unplugged (once again, Mark gets Good Husband Points because of a Christmas Tree).