Eclipse Pity Party of One
Aug. 21st, 2017 07:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lydamorehouse It looks like we will be rained out, alas.
On the other hand, it's so dark out there right now the sun might as well be eclipsed. :-)
A lot of my friends are eclipse chasing. I'm.... a little jealous. Of course, we could have done the same, I suppose. I certainly had the opportunity. A friend of mine invited my family to join hers in St. Louis. But, at the time, I would not have predicted rain and it seemed like an unnecessary expense, since we'll have near totality here, as well. I am, of course, feeling (currently) very bummed out. The sun is now being a tease, so who knows if we'll see anything or not. I've got some plans in case it does clear up. We bought our eclipse viewing glasses some time ago, at least. So, we will either take them up to Mirriam Park library and join the crowd there, or hop in the car and head to Roseville Library for their program. Worse case, we can always lives stream. Nasa will be live streaming the event. Gizmodo also has a good article about what can be experienced even if the sun isn't visible.
At least total eclipses aren't a once in a lifetime event. In fact, I only have to wait until April 8, 2024 for the next one. The path of totality passes pretty close to us again (if I'm reading the map right, it looks like we could go visit Shawn's mother-in-law in Indiana and see it.) And I've seen a number of partial solar eclipses before. I remember one, when I worked at the Immigration History Research Center, where we borrowed welding helmets from a nearby shop. I also did a pinhole viewing while Mason was alive at Kuk Soil Wan, our old martial arts dojo. Obviously not as impressive, I'm sure, as totality.
I'm anxious enough about missing this event that I had a very weird dream about it last night. I dreamed that I went to an event at Shoreview Library and ran into my friend Sean Murphy there. He's actually eclipse chasing IRL, so I asked him why he was in town. Apparently he burned out his eyes somehow... that part had dream logic that made no sense, but when I started to offer our eclipse glasses I realized MASON WAS STILL AT HOME ASLEEP, and so the rest of my dream was me running around while the eclipse was happening trying to get to Mason. At one point, during the darkest faze, dinosaurs came out of the sky, but they were friendly so it was fine.
Happy eclipse 2017! Hope your day is dinosaur free (or not, as you like!)
On the other hand, it's so dark out there right now the sun might as well be eclipsed. :-)
A lot of my friends are eclipse chasing. I'm.... a little jealous. Of course, we could have done the same, I suppose. I certainly had the opportunity. A friend of mine invited my family to join hers in St. Louis. But, at the time, I would not have predicted rain and it seemed like an unnecessary expense, since we'll have near totality here, as well. I am, of course, feeling (currently) very bummed out. The sun is now being a tease, so who knows if we'll see anything or not. I've got some plans in case it does clear up. We bought our eclipse viewing glasses some time ago, at least. So, we will either take them up to Mirriam Park library and join the crowd there, or hop in the car and head to Roseville Library for their program. Worse case, we can always lives stream. Nasa will be live streaming the event. Gizmodo also has a good article about what can be experienced even if the sun isn't visible.
At least total eclipses aren't a once in a lifetime event. In fact, I only have to wait until April 8, 2024 for the next one. The path of totality passes pretty close to us again (if I'm reading the map right, it looks like we could go visit Shawn's mother-in-law in Indiana and see it.) And I've seen a number of partial solar eclipses before. I remember one, when I worked at the Immigration History Research Center, where we borrowed welding helmets from a nearby shop. I also did a pinhole viewing while Mason was alive at Kuk Soil Wan, our old martial arts dojo. Obviously not as impressive, I'm sure, as totality.
I'm anxious enough about missing this event that I had a very weird dream about it last night. I dreamed that I went to an event at Shoreview Library and ran into my friend Sean Murphy there. He's actually eclipse chasing IRL, so I asked him why he was in town. Apparently he burned out his eyes somehow... that part had dream logic that made no sense, but when I started to offer our eclipse glasses I realized MASON WAS STILL AT HOME ASLEEP, and so the rest of my dream was me running around while the eclipse was happening trying to get to Mason. At one point, during the darkest faze, dinosaurs came out of the sky, but they were friendly so it was fine.
Happy eclipse 2017! Hope your day is dinosaur free (or not, as you like!)
no subject
Date: 2017-08-22 06:23 am (UTC)I insisted. I've wanted to see a total eclipse since my first partial in La Crosse in 1979.
Oh. My. God. It was amazing. Seems to take forever, at first, a few bites more everytime you look. Then the light gets weird, dim, like dusk, but not the golden color of late afternoon, still daylight white. The last moments you can see the tiny crescent sun get smaller and smaller and then... it's gone, and you take off the glasses and there's this silver halo around a charcoal grey disk, the sky is dark but not like quite like night, Venus comes out (though no stars), streetlights pop on, but the horizon all around is still light. Then, after way too short a timeless time, suddenly there's the flash of light at one o'clock, the diamond ring thing they tell you about and you pop on the Eclipse glasses again and it's a crescent, but it looked like a perfect dazzling Starburst for just a moment. And it's suddenly daylight again and as you walk to the car, you notice that all the leaf shadows under the trees frame swarms of perfect crescents.
You really need to be in Indiana in 2024.
no subject
Date: 2017-08-22 12:31 pm (UTC)Sounds super neat, by the way.