by Albert Highe
About 10 of us showed up at Dino. Conditions were moist (RH in the 90's), but generally clear with good seeing. Transparency was off, but the moist air really made the laser pointer look fantastically bright. I had a great time, mostly with other people's scopes.
Hubble's Variable Nebula was a good target from Dino. Even in Heidi's 6" (person and scope shown on p.122 of December Sky & Tel) it was rather easy to see the little triangular-shaped nebula. I don't know the magnification since we were using a zoom, but it was less than 100X. In Isaac's 12.5" (clone of my 12.5") at 200X it was very nice. It showed a brighter tip which fanned out into a short, wide triangular tail. Definitely looks like a comet. It looked brighter than I remembered it. It was a short hop (1.25 degree SSW) from the Christmas Tree Cluster, NGC2264, an appropriate object for this time of year.