littlestar

my parents and my sister drove up to visit this weekend. it was pretty cool.

they got along with my rabbits ok. diane was trying to chase after them and trying to get them to like her. my dad took the easy route and just slept in my room and petted stormy in the morning (she's the most receptive then). and my mom... was scolding them affectionately, all the while trying to hide that she actually does think that they are really cute.

we left for yosemite late in the morning, because we never leave on time. :) we got there around 2, decided to check in to the hotel later and wander around first. we had instant noodles by the merced river with kimchee, because where my parenets are, kimchee is not far off. we drove up to glacier point where we found that....

PAS (Peninsular Astronomical Society) was having a star party~!!

so i got to have a 30-minute constellation talk from the ranger named paul and then see things from about 14 of 33 telescopes in a really clear remarkable yosemite night sky.

some of the stuff i saw (and no, i don't know how to spell these things):
mars rising from the horizon at 815pm
~7-9 shooting stars (i don't keep count very well)
polaris (our north star) - the 51st brightest star
big dipper (ursa major)
casseopeia
cyrrus - the song that inspired a 5-year-old mozart to write the famous "twinkle, twinkle, little star"
vega - which used to be the north star, since polaris and vega change places every 13000 years (called procession of the equinox... or...the wobble of the earth)
interestingly enough, throughout the day, casseopeia and ursa major will rotate around polaris. cool, huh?
great square of pegasus
the neb
altaire
the last three are apparently considered the summer triangle (and i can't point them out to you anymore because my brain was overwhelmed that day)
signus the swan, the eye of the swan being albero (which is actually two stars close to each other - binary star)
entaris, who is the god directly opposite of mars, which comprises the "heart" of scorpio
saggitarius, the archer, who looks more like a teapot that is pouring something onto the tail of the scorpion
where the steam from that becomes the cloudy mass of the milky way
the ring nebulae
andromeda galaxy

and probably lots more that i don't remember.

it was absolutely beautiful. and i pretty much brow-beated my parenets into staying around glacier point for 2 hours so that we could go to the star party since mars was as close as it was going to be for 60000 years and it was yosemite where there isn't the permanent ambient orange glow from city lights. i just thought it was a lifetime opportunity that couldn't be missed.

basically, we were all out there until about 11pm, which is late by my parents' standards since they usually sleep at 10 or 11 and wake up at 5am.

i didn't bother asking them to stay for the clear view of uranus at 230am.

and i only looked through half the telescopes because the other ones were down all these steps and i didn't feel like breaking my neck that night, trying to walk down without a flashlight and only my night vision.

it was beautiful. and even my sister really enjoyed it and thanked me for being a butt and insisting on staying. :)

the next day we had this awesome buffet for brunch at the awhanee (sp?) hotel in yosemite valley. it was good but expensive. i feel ambivalent about going there again. my sister wanted to go to this stream behind the hotel and skip stones because she had a great time doing this with her friend's family last year.

the records were:
my dad - 6 skips
my sister - 6 skips
my mom - 3
me - 10
notable feats - me and my dad managed to skip the biggest rocks, not just the slim, flat ones. we also managed to skip rocks acaross the stream and not just on it, going futher to peg the log that was resting on the other side.

things we saw in yosemite:
el capitan
bridalveil fall
half dome
clark's mounting
nevada falls
lots of other mountains i don't know the names of
lots and lots of trees
a deer
squirrels
birds

the 3000 feet view down into yosemite valley from glacier point can be quite intimidating. especially when all you have is a rail in front of you to prevent you from falling to your gruesome death.

drove toward home and was the last order in a restaurant before it closed. and came home, ending the yosemite trip.

my family drove home today and i was sad. then i started doing my homework assignment and started to get frustrated.

just now, i found out that there was a problem at the store over the weekend and i'm worried. but i'm just hoping that it all work out. and i stayed on the phone with my sister for 30-40 minutes, helping her feel better.

too much drama in my life this past year. :T