Thursday 12 May 2016

My Mercury Transit

Teeny weeny little dot on the left ... the smudge is sunspots
I was ready, I'd been ready for weeks ... just like the Venus transit.

I'd bought an even zoomier camera for the job and made another solar filter, and now I just had to rely on the weather.

I originally thought ... "I know, I'll set the camera up on my tripod, attach the intervalometer and let it take a photo every 10 minutes".
My next - much more sensible - thought was ... "no you won't, you tw*t, the sun - and indeed Earth - will be moving and you'll be taking photos of empty sky".

So I had to get up early, do my chores - and some work - so I could sit out for an hour to start with ... as I couldn't contain my excitement long enough to go in and do boring stuff. Then I set a 15 min timer on my smartarse phone to remind me to keep tootling off outside once the novelty wore off.

And I managed to acquire a crispy forehead and red chest ... and kept my fitbitty doodah happy with all the steps ... more about that acquisition another day.

A few hours after first contact
No idea what all the tin hut neighbours thought I was up to - running outside, lobbing one leg over my sun-lounger in a non-ladylike fashion, pointing my camera at the sun, screwing up my face and sticking my tongue out in concentration, then running back in again - but they're used to me being a bit strange...