Do snowflakes count as celestial bodies?

Not much use for a clock out here tonight.

A really bright Venus has migrated to the western horizon and will set in a few minutes.
Mars will set in the west right behind her about a half hour later just before 10pm.
Big orange Jupiter will arrive precisely at midnight in the east when Uranus will set in the west. I might need binoculars for Uranus.
Saturn will tell me when it’s a little after 4am from the ESE.
The sun will tell me it’s 0630.
It’s a pretty clear night out here with no light pollution except for the moon which is still under 45 degrees off the ENE horizon.

I’m presently about 40 miles NE of Grenada at Lat 12°4’N and Long 61°5’.

Capella, one of the brightest stars in the sky will be front and center tonight.

Ann Margaret.
She’s taking her bows into the heavens.

^^Bummer. She eventually became a pretty good actress. A far cry from her Elvis days.

Moon

NYC light pollution blocks most things. :( Will update if something pops up from my terrace though.

Yeah, dis the dead, @Espiritus_Corvus. Ann Margaret was a gorgeous woman that parlayed her bimbo status into stardom. Then she fell from a swing in her show and broke nearly all the bones in her face. Recovered, and continued a show that brought happiness to endless people.

Ann Margaret was inspiration.

Easy, stu. I wasn’t dissing her. I was merely stating my opinion. She turned out to be a fine actress. Turn down your radar just a bit.

…aaaand there’s Jupiter. Right on time.

oops!

As @Espiritus_Corvus wrote, it’s been moon, Venus, and Mars outshining everything else lately.

My avatar is of an image I just took tonight about 90 minutes ago with my telescope and camera.

@Rarebear Amazing and incredible picture. To fun to be able to do that! Can you identify what you took a pic of?

@Cruiser That’s just a scrappy single 15 minute exposure put on autostretch. I plan on getting several hours. It’ll be MUCH better when I’m done. Unfortunately the clouds rolled in before I could get more than 45 minutes.

But yes, it’s the Horsehead and Flame Nebulae. Here is an image I recently completed of the Cocoon Nebula. This was about 20 total hours of exposure time and about the same in processing time. Ultimately my Horsehead and Flame will hopefully look something like that. May not be for a year or two the way clouds have been treating me.

@Rarebear That is really impressive. What are you using for a telescope, Mt. Palomar?

Thanks. No. I have a 140 mm f7 refractor although the horse head shot is at about f5.5

Very nice work.

I am not seeing anything in the media about Ann-Margrett. I suspect she still walks the Earth.
We have a full moon tonight, I’m told, but it’s too cold to go outside for even a moment.

The moon is up and doing it’s mighty best to illuminate the glisten of the frozen tops of the waves on the lake through a slight cloudy mist. Almost has the feel of a Mummy that will suddenly appear from around the nearest tree. Spooky, eerie…beautiful

Thanks all, esp.@Espiritus_Corvus and @Rarebear
What’s a good website for that, I wonder. What’s visible (without binoculars I should have added) tonight in the sky tonight?

Thanks @Espiritus_Corvus (to make up for the last post.)
Thanks @YARNLADY. I’m so sorry.

i use heavens-above.com to quickly tell me what is going on in the night sky. Look under the heading “Astronomy” and click “Interactive Sky Chart.”
Make sure to enter your location.

This site offers much more than just the night sky. You can follow satellites, predict Iridium flares, learn about current and past space missions, etc, and it is all free.

@LuckyGuy Hey, thanks for the chart. It’s the best I’ve ever seen. Now I actually know what I’ve been guessing at.

Port Elizabeth, Bequia:
13°00′40″N 061°14′04″W
13.011561°N -61.238807W
0435 Atlantic Standard Time

Jupiter is at my twelve o’clock, just north of Spica at the tail of the kite, Virgo.

Mercury is trailing close behind Saturn, both rising at about 10° off my E horizon

The moon is bight silver at one o’clock, just E of my twelve,botting out Regulus in in Leo. Looks like a hole you can get sucked into. Strange sensation. Like levitating.

I can identify Gemini setting in the E. Castor and Pollux are nearly bumping heads.

Polaris, Vega to it’s W, and Arcturus to the south and the three of them are forming a nearly perfect isosolese triangle covering the northern sky.

This is really cool. Thanks, Lucky.

Hey, why is the compass on the interactive chart backwards? West should be at 270° and East at 90°. The chart has them vice versa.

@Espiritus_Corvus Good catch. The directions on the chart are perfect IF you think of the chart as the sky and hold it up over your head. Try it. It’s perfect! ;-)