Lessons Learned - I bought the right Telescope

Some background for those of you who don't remember/weren't paying
attention:

I bought my first Telescope in February at the age of 40. Before
then, I'd looked through other telescopes as much as I could, looked
at the sky quite a bit (Naked Eye and with 10x50 Binoculars) and used
a Televue 3" refractor my parents had up at Lake Tahoe (they used it
for looking at birds and such, I was the only one to turn it upwards).
I came here and got lots of advice. I started off thinking I wanted
one of the 5" Orion Mak's and ended up with a Celestron C 9 1/4 SGT
(although Jon still thinks I could have found a way to strap the 10"
Reflector on top of my car).

One of the biggest pieces of advice I got was, "Get something you'll
use. A telescope doesn't do anything sitting in the garage." Key was
that I got something that wasn't such a pain to set up that I wouldn't
do it.

Well, I've had the telescope out many times in the last 4 months and
have enjoyed myself immensely. The views have been far better than I
expected and I discover new and wonderful things every time I'm out.

But it only occurred to me on Friday that I really had bought the
right scope.

It SHOULD have occurred to me about a week earlier when I was willing
to set it up for a last peek at Venus. I had just umpired for several
hours and was tired. I KNEW I wasn't going to have the telescope set
up for more than about 30-45 minutes, but I did it anyway and didn't
think twice about it.

On Friday, I was watching my younger son umpire and was looking
forward to setting up when I got home. The CSC forecast was excellent
and I was psyched. Well, the fog started rolling in but I found that
I was willing to set the telescope up for an hour or so under what
looked like they were going to be marginal conditions. It was then
that I knew, I had the right telescope. If I was going to be willing
to set it up for just a little bit and just look around, not do the
observing I had planned, I hadn't gotten "too much" telescope.

Well, the fog ended up coming in very thick and it was Opaque by the
time I got home. Nonetheless, I was still happy with my realization.

Now, if this marine layer would just go away...

Clear, Dark Skies

Mark

I think your enthusiasm is great, however......... 4 months is a bit
premature to have decided that it's the right scope.

Let us know how you feel 12-18- 24 months from now. I sincerely hope your
still as excited. If you are, you'll probably
be ready for a larger scope and you can sell me your 9.25. If, on the other
hand you've stopped using it because it's too
much trouble to set up, you can still sell it to me;-)

I wish me good luck,

Clear skies,
F Marion

I think your enthusiasm is great, however......... 4 months is a bit
premature to have decided that it's the right scope.

I disagree. Here's something to chew on:

There are two types of amateur astronomers,

Type One: Any scope is the "right" scope.

Type Two: No scope is the "right" scope.

Mark is obviously a Type One along with Rod "Never Met a Scope I didn't like"
Mollise and many others.

jon "the house is full of just the right scopes" isaacs

"Jon Isaacs" wrote in message
...

I think your enthusiasm is great, however......... 4 months is a bit
premature to have decided that it's the right scope.

I disagree. Here's something to chew on:

There are two types of amateur astronomers,

Type One: Any scope is the "right" scope.

Type Two: No scope is the "right" scope.

I agree. I'm pretty much Type 1.

I've been frustrated by the learning curve for different pieces of equipment
over the years, but in the end, any scope that can show me more than my
naked eye, is worth the trouble to set up. Including hand-holding "too
large" binoculars for quick looks.

Something else to think about... I'll never get tired of my Celestron Ultima
C8. I hold my other scopes to a different standard than this one, because
any scope (I have purchased) that isn't the Ultima, is specialized to a
task. The Ultima is my general purpose telescope, as it provides decent
planet images, has enough aperture to show globulars and emission nebulae,
and with the R/C it yields over 1 degree of field, which is sufficient for
most of what I look at.

Happiness is in properly setting your expectations.

"Jon Isaacs" wrote in message
...

I think your enthusiasm is great, however......... 4 months is a bit
premature to have decided that it's the right scope.

I disagree. Here's something to chew on:

There are two types of amateur astronomers,

Type One: Any scope is the "right" scope.

Type Two: No scope is the "right" scope.

Mark is obviously a Type One along with Rod "Never Met a Scope I didn't
like"
Mollise and many others.

jon "the house is full of just the right scopes" isaacs

Except the one the wife trips over tends to turn into the "one scope too
many." g

Except the one the wife trips over tends to turn into the "one scope too
many." g

Some folks are more fortunate that others in this regard. The other day I was
discussing clearing out the garage and cutting my bicycle collection down to
around 10 and then moving my Telescope collection into the garage so the cats
could have the room where the scopes live.

When I mentioned reducing the number of scopes, my wife said "NO", I needed to
keep all my scopes.

This is the same dear lady who said to me: "Just buy it" when I was trying to
negociate with a seller on the price of a telescope..

Bless her heart...

jon