Larry G. wrote:
I had the FOV zoomed out to see an entire hemisphere at a time.
I could rotate the FOV and the clumpy/disc-band pattern
remained consistent.

Perhaps the Virgo cluster is aligned along a more-or-less
linear boundary between two or three different void-bubbles
in the cosmic foam.

Sorry Larry, but you can't see the "cosmic foam" in looking at only the
brighter galaxies. The bright galaxies are the ones nearby, and it just
isn't a sufficient sample. Even with my SkyTools, which can plot over a
million galaxies on a single chart, such structure is only at best
hinted at. The other problem is that once you have enough galaxies in
your sample the close ones overlap the far ones, and unless you have a
means of separating them by distance you aren't really going to see the
structure. That is why this structure was only first revealed by deep
redshift surveys.

Also, any orientation with respect you the Milky way for your small
sample of comets is just coincidence. The orbits of comets have been
studied statistically and except for the periodic comets (which have had
their orbits perturbed by planets) their orientations are random.

Clear skies,
Greg

--
Greg Crinklaw
Astronomical Software Developer
Cloudcroft, New Mexico, USA (33N, 106W, 2700m)

SkyTools: http://www.skyhound.com/cs.html
Observing: http://www.skyhound.com/sh/skyhound.html
Comets: http://www.skyhound.com/sh/comets.html

To reply take out your eye