Astronomy

SS Cygni, a cataclysmic variable star, is one of my favorite variables. I love it because it was the first cataclysmic variable I ever observed. I love it because my observations of it were some of the very first I submitted to the AAVSO (back in the late 1970's). I love it because it is so easy to find. I love it because its brightness can change so quickly. I love it because I can follow it through its entire magnitude range.  Here's a light curve from the current outburst that includes my estimates. Learn more about SS Cygni at  http://www.aavso.org/vsots_sscyg .

On the afternoon of August 13, Venus was occulted by the waning crescent moon. The disappearance, on the moon's bright limb, was visible across the entire United States. Observing the event from my home in Minnesota was difficult, however, because the sun was high in the sky and the moon, approximately 45 degrees away, was rather low in the west. I had spotted the moon without much trouble when it was high in the south earlier in the day, but had a much harder time finding it later in the afternoon. A slightly hazy background sky added to the difficulty. After finding it in binoculars, I could just barely see it with the naked eye. I then used a 127mm Maksutov-Cassagrain telescope to watch the moon slowly overtake Venus. A magnification of approximately 60 seemed to work best. At higher magnifications, the contrast between the moon and background sky was so poor that the moon became almost invisible. Venus, on the other hand, was extremely bright, in approximately a half full phase...