(note from next morning… As I say at the bottom.. I dictated this post into Siri on my iPhone and it typed it.. upon reading it this morning.. it does seem more stream of consciousness than usual .. ain’t technology great ?!)
Tonight was a tradition about 10 of us met at the daily planet for an dads night out weve been meeting there for either 19 or 20 years none of us can actually remember the original thought was that we would go shopping for our wives but mostly now we just sit and eat and drink mostly drink its a great tradition and it was really great being there with the same guys knowing that we been there for nearly 2 decades weve been through a whole lot of stuff together all of us review chatter ups and downs in our kids are grown up some of gotten married some of died we have lots of stories about harassing waitresses and then going out and harassing shop clerks but its all good for tonight afterwards some of us went out and pretended to shop but were really there just for hanging out it was a great night I bought a few things but mostly just bonded with my buds the Christmas spirit was actually with me tonight and I enjoyed walking around and seeing the lights and seeing the shoppers lots of clueless guys like me I felt I felt happy it felt weird being happy but its all good we already planned for the event next year same place same time alright thats it for tonight
night all night Sam
-me
PS I dictated this note into my iPhone and it typed it how freaking cool is that?
Ok… iSurrender. I finally gave up and got an iPhone last night. I did it because I had grown tired of having to take the battery out of my old blackberry to reboot it several times a day. I also had an android phone… Which I loved for its openness.. I Learned to write code for it.. I had an app Id wired to sensors in my heights that let me turn the lights on and off.but it too gave me trouble and frequently needed rebooting . So I just needed a phone that works . So I got this iPhone (im blogging on it now) and Im sad to say that I really love it. I say sad because Ive always resisted the closed cult like software policies of apple. But my resistance is evaporating. Im beginning to love this phone like comy slippers. It anticipates my needs . It corrects my spelling. It corrects my mood even
Help… Im getting assimilated !
I was out Christmas for a bit tonight.. downtown and in Williston.. and it almost felt alright. Holidays are still very hard for us.. I’m guessing that they always will be. Christmas is particularly hard.. now.. I still think about buying stuff for three kids.. now it’s two.. The sight of decorations and music has put me in a very dark place these last five years.. but somehow.. this year is a little better. I was able to walk around shipping without ‘going there’ .. I still don’t have much stomach for shopping.. but seeing other happy folks shopping made me feel..well… happy .. and that’s a bit of a breakthrough. I’m going out again on Wed night with a bunch of freinds.. I’m hoping that I again find it ok being immersed in the Christmas spirit.. I’ll let you know..
Very peaceful day.. beautiful outside.. cold and clear.. got me motivated to get out my telescope to see if I could get a shot of Jupiter which is bright in the sky now.. it’s really amazing how big Jupiter’s moons appear even under low magnification. I was telling Gabe at dinner about how folks used to use the transits of Janitors moons as a universal time reference which allowed them to calculate Longitude.The transit times were carefully recorded and a fixed place (ie. Greenwich England) and published in books called Ephimeris.. Someone in a different part of the world could use those transit times., star positions and a little geometry to figure out how how far east or west they were from the original measurment point. That’s the best folks had until good accurate clocks became available in the late 18th century.. Dava Sobel wrote a great book about it called ‘Longitude’ ..Check it out..
Jupiter looked great through my scope.. unfortunately this is the best picture I could grab by putting my blogging camera up to the eyepiece.. .. still.. ti’s clear enough to see three of the four ‘Gallelian’ moons Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto.. .. I’m not certain. but by their orbits , I think Ganymeade is the one missing here.. it must be behind the planet.
Our moon was unsurprisingly easier to spot 🙂 .. You can tell by the fuzzy outlines here that the air wasn’t that stable tonight.. but I always like looking at the moon !
I can tell by the positions of the moon that it was dinner time … Diane made homemade chille rellenos.. using Kale she pulled fromthe garden..
It’s funny how kale lasts into the winter.. (note the snow !)
