I think I missed out on the best of the aurora show, but I got the Milky Way, some horizon-hugging lights, and about 30 minutes’ worth of star trails.


Part-time prevaricator
Here’s the list of kids’ costumes I saw this year.

Transcription:
5:30 PM [when I started handing out candy]
The last two, Spider-Woman and Ninja, showed up about 7:45 PM. At 8:40 PM I turned off the outside light and had a couple pieces of candy.
I took the recycling out before work this morning, and saw the moon high and bright in the western sky, so I grabbed my camera and snapped a few glamour shots.
I always prefer the moon just before or just after it’s full, because I love being able to see the shadows of its craters and peaks.
I know it’s corn, not wheat or sunflowers, but I think it works just the same.
There were some interesting clouds this morning.
I grabbed my camera and headed out into the dark again.
Continue reading “Aurora Borealis, Oct. 4, 2026”
Let’s see here:
Wednesday was rainy and cool. I did some editing on the paper printout of There’s Nothing Good at the Top, and finished reading Julian Comstock by Robert Charles Wilson and started Fearless Jones by Walter Mosley. I also discovered that Fargo is available to me on the TV, and so I watched the first few episodes of season 1.
Thursday was a better day; the sun came out and the temperature cracked the mid-teens. I wore shorts when I walked over to Poor Michael’s book emporium, where I had a mocha and picked up some books for a friend (I have enough books of my own, thanks). Back at the house I entered my edits from the paper manuscript into my document, and made a few more updates. I still need to add a few scenes and update a few dream sequences, I think; make a few things more explicit. The first draft is you telling yourself the story[1]As Sir Terry Pratchett put it., but by the time it’s a second draft (which is what I’m working on) it should be ready for others to read it too.
The sky was still clear after the sun went down, and it’s quite dark ’round these parts, so I set up my cameras in the yard, one facing north and one pointing pretty much straight up. The north-facing one got about 2½ hours worth of 5‑second exposures for star trails (above); the other one snapped a bunch of 30-second exposures of the Milky Way. I made time-lapse videos from both sets of photos.


That actually bled into Friday; all the photos were taken before I went to bed at about 1am, but all the processing happened today. I’ve also read some more, and I plowed through all of season 1 of Fargo too, which told a taut story.
And now I’m going to have some supper, and then work some more on my editing. Tomorrow I have to be up early, so it’s probably for the best that it’s cloudy and rainy—I’ll be less tempted to try and get more nighttime photos.
Footnotes
| ↑1 | As Sir Terry Pratchett put it. |
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