More Moon-gazing

We dashed out to Barnes & Nobel to pick up the copy of Art Across the Alphabet that I'd ordered. Somewhere in the process of ordering it the numbers got crossed, and the number they tried to notify me at was disconnected. Clearly not my number, as it works just fine. But I called them this afternoon and it was just in time: tomorrow it would go on the shelf. So I had to get it today. But I got this information after I told some piano students that I had no plans to go anywhere and it would be just fine if they dropped by to pick up the left-behind music just any old time. I'm going to be here. Fortunately, B&N is open until 11. So I left the house around 9:15. (I've got a point here, just wait for it.) It was a quite enjoyable trip. In addition to the book I ordered, I took a swing past the bargain books and hit the jackpot! They had poems, myths, and fables for $9.99, 50% off, members get another 10%. So they were right about $4. I got The Real Mother Goose, A Child's Garden of Verses, and some myths. Very cool. I managed to leave behind the book about gardening that lept of the shelf and begged me to take it home. But I did thumb through the part on starting seeds and learned that I've got a serious light problem. The fix is likely a grow-light, but I've gotta figure out where to plug it in.

So we got back home around 10pm. It was a beautiful night here, cool and crisp, and you could smell spring. Not too cold. So I grabbed the binoculars and my camera and took the Boy back out for some night time nature study. Anyway, I studied nature. He played with his little snow shovel. After, why else would we come outside? I took a couple of pictures, but if the weather is good (I heard rumors of rain) I may try again tomorrow night. The view through my binoculars was much better, and I think I can do a bit better if I play with my manual settings. But that's way to complicated for what I wanted to do tonight. Tonight I was moon-gazing. I also took a peek at that nebula in Orion's belt. And looked (unsuccessfully) for the Pleadies. And I contemplated learning the names of those dark sploches on the Moon. Mares, I think they're called? And I glanced at Saturn. And wondered if that other bright spot was Venus. It's in about the same spot that I last found Venus, but those planets are tricky: they move. And I don't know how much. I hadn't bothered to bring out my little glow-in-the-dark star map, or I might have had a better idea of what I was looking at. It was a good time anyway. I would have stayed longer had it been a bit warmer, but we still got about 20 minutes.