My son currently serving in the Navy told me in our last conversation that all the glasses sold in stores were all bought up weeks ago. They had been surfacing on facebook, craigslist , ect for outrageous prices in his area.

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Whiskey Alfa Lima Tango

Our school's bulk purchase came in last Thursday.

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I love sanding.

So, did any rocket clubs hold a night launch during the day today?

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Rich Holmes
Camillus, NY
Secretary / newsletter editor
Syracuse Rocket Club

http://richsrockets.wordpress.com

If not for today's ridiculous attitudes, you--and the kids--could ^all^ have enjoyed the solar eclipse as it was in its full glory, out in nature (with suddenly-cooler air around you, darkness upon the land save for the dimmer-than-the-full-Moon glow from the solar corona, the daytime stars and planets, naturally-projected "crescent Sun" images everywhere thanks to tiny holes in the leaves and grass, etc.), instead of on a television screen, cut off from those phenomena indoors... Also:

That whole concept (going back to the suing in the first place, for something that, if it had happened, wouldn't have been due to malice or negligence, but just an accident [or the "injuree" not listening to the safety warnings]) is just so *alien* to me, even though I've recently had a perfectly legal cause to file a lawsuit, which I didn't do because it would have been wrong, by the laws by which I live my life:

Late last year one of the wound care center nurses at my local hospital--the only one in town--had an accident that harmed me greatly (his hand slipped while he was doing debridement of one of my leg wounds with a sharp debridement tool). That jab with the blade triggered weeks of lymphorrhea, which--despite my twice-weekly treatments there--came close to ending my life in February, when the leg became horribly infected with MRSA (flesh-eating bacteria) and pseudomonas. BUT:

I didn't even *think* of suing him or the hospital, because it was just an accident, and because he (and the other wound care center nurses) bent over backwards to help me all during my treatments there (both before and after the accident), and because losing so much money in a lawsuit would have harmed the hospital--which would also have harmed the many other people (both here in Fairbanks and for hundreds of miles around) who depend on our hospital for both routine and emergency medical care. (Besides, what good would a large sum of money have done for me? Being able to buy a fancy grave headstone to mark my ashes-urn burial spot [I've specified in my Will that my body is to be used for medical research, with the ashes to be scattered when they're done with my remains] would have been a pyrrhically pointless "victory.")

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Black Shire--Draft horse in human form, model rocketeer, occasional mystic, and writer, see:
http://www.lulu.com/content/paperba...an-form/8075185
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6122050
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6126511
All of my book proceeds go to the Northcote Heavy Horse Centre www.northcotehorses.com.
NAR #54895 SR

For those of you like me who weren't fortunate enough to be within the belt of the total eclipse, this is a good representation of what we missed.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/next/s...clipse-roundup/

Check you local listings for dates and times of the replays.

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macklinmissileworks@gmail.com

Wonderful--thank you for posting these! There weren't many sunspots on the solar disc, and the view from the ISS showed faint, cloudy "smudging" that covered much more of the disc than the handful of sunspots.

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Black Shire--Draft horse in human form, model rocketeer, occasional mystic, and writer, see:
http://www.lulu.com/content/paperba...an-form/8075185
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6122050
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6126511
All of my book proceeds go to the Northcote Heavy Horse Centre www.northcotehorses.com.
NAR #54895 SR

I set up a live NASA feed in the gym today for students that didn't get permission slips signed by parents. I don't know if any of the links posted above show it, but they had a shot of the ISS passing in front of the sun while the eclipse was ongoing. I've seen shots of it crossing before, but not during an eclipse. I'm sure it's on youtube somewhere if someone wants to look for it.

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I love sanding.

I gave away about 30 pairs of eclipse glasses yesterday at work, at the office of the vet caring for our cat, and at the place I went for lunch. Then, when watching coverage of the eclipse on TV, I heard that the glasses were selling for up to $20 a pair!

If anyone wants a pair now, I still have some. :-)

We had a terrific thunderstorm move through yesterday afternoon. High winds, heavy rain, and lightning. Then ... it stopped. The clouds thinned out. And we had a great view of the partial eclipse.

-- Roger

You must have a local unicorn who also wished to see the eclipse... :-) Your leftover eclipse glasses are far from useless; they can be used on any clear day to view the Sun and observe sunspots, and even--in principle, at least--to see Mercury and/or NEOs (Near-Earth Objects) transit the solar disc (due to even Mercury's small angular size, though, an enlarged projected image is usually necessary for watching transits, unless a passing asteroid is quite close to the Earth).

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Black Shire--Draft horse in human form, model rocketeer, occasional mystic, and writer, see:
http://www.lulu.com/content/paperba...an-form/8075185
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6122050
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6126511
All of my book proceeds go to the Northcote Heavy Horse Centre www.northcotehorses.com.
NAR #54895 SR

There's a charity asking for donations of eclipse glasses. They'll ship them to schools in poor countries due to have an eclipse in 2019.

* * *

Oregon Rocketry was invited to hold a demonstration launch at a private school as part of its Eclipse Day science event. They had a great viewing area, a grassy slope facing south over a lovely valley.

There was an invited NASA speaker who talked through the eclipse; also, a sound track ("Moon Shadow," "Bad Moon Rising," and as totality approached "Thus Spoke Zarathustra," among others.)

Totality was totally freaking amazing. I've seen lots of good pictures of the black disk and corona, but NOTHING compares to actually seeing this bizarre thing in the sky.

The rocket launch went fine, too.

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NAR #27085 - Oregon Rocketry - SAM