Much agianst her will (though she denies it now) I dragged Rebecca and Kevin Z up to Coe on Saturday night. I had just gotten a copy of Sky Tools and had made a printed chart customized to my scope and EP for a certain quasi-stellar object much beloved by Jamie and Mr. Burnham.
Damn it was cold. I'll be eternally grateful to "three Dob" Bob C. for the Grabber Mycoals he gave to Rebecca. I had only one in my accessory bag, which I used later.
We had an OK hour or two, during which the charts allowed me to unambiguously locate 3C 273 for the first time ever. This was in Monty the C9.25 w/ 9 mm Nagler EP. Since there wasn't much else going on a lot of people checked it out.
Rebecca had a great time, though I was a little surprised to learn that Liam and Mimi were at the Peak. We need to coordinate the kids a little better because I know they like to see one another.
Rebecca, an only child who is used to adults and their weird ways, was more than happy with James T. and Rich N. (and Art Bell) as company. I was a little worried that Rich and Rebecca's political views, which are not the same, might come up but Rich simply told her that he respectfully disagreed.
I also got to play with the scope of ny dreams, the 15" Obsession, since Rich had his there. Now Rebecca wants one!
Other good sights for me were M104 and M49. M64 just seemed to disappear all of a sudden. I looked up and saw a Palo Alto sky at Coe -- time to go home. It was about that time that we all heard James bragging about the Mag 7 sky and naked eye view of M51 on the cell phone. I was proud that my kid knows enough about astronomy to have good laugh over that.
I'm glad I went.