Day 4015 - Winter Solstice

Dawn refused to walk this morning. Did something hurt? Was she too cold? Or was she just being stubborn? Your guess is as good as mine. I suspect that she was just being stubborn and wanted to go back to bed, because when we returned from visiting the Dalmatians at the kennel this afternoon, she walked just fine. Since Dawn didn't want to go anywhere this morning, Janet and I had to walk by ourselves. We completed our five miles a lot sooner without Dawn. She loves to smell things along the way and I find myself stopping to let her investigate a new smell every thirty or forty feet. These slow walks are fine by me. I'm never in a hurry in the morning anyway.

We spent a little extra time with the kennel dogs today because we won't be able to visit them next week. The kennel is typically completely filled with boarding dogs during the week between Christmas and New Year's when their owners are doing their holiday traveling. There aren't any empty open areas to play with the Dalmatians, so we just wait until the holidays are over. I was a little surprised that there were going to be a lot of boarding dogs this year. Apparently, Covid hadn't slowed down holiday travel in Texas at all.

It was perplexing that Dawn walked so normally with us after we returned from the kennel this afternoon. It was chilly this morning, but it was actually warmer than it was yesterday when Dawn was eager to walk. She might have been sore the first day after getting her rabies vaccine, but she's been acting normally ever since. I have no idea what was going through her head this morning.

The sky was clear this evening, so we got to see the conjunction after all. The two planets did appear as one to the naked eye, but they weren't as bright as I expected. Janet and I walked to a place in he park that had a clear view of the Western horizon. Other people must have had the same idea, because there were quite a few folks looking up at the sky. Most of them didn't even know what to look for. This conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn has gotten so much media attention lately that some folks appeared to be expecting a spectacular show. Nope. It wasn't like the Fourth of July at all. If you brought a pair of binoculars, it was pretty cool to see that there were actually two planets up there near the western horizon. To the naked eye, it was a little underwhelming. You really had to watch the two planets gradually coming closer and closer together during the past month or so to fully appreciate tonight's conjunction.

I got a couple of good photos tonight, but it was still difficult to focus on these objects with the lens I was using. A lot of modern lenses don't have a focus ring on the lens barrel and I guess it is assumed that you will always use auto-focus. I made a bunch of very small manual focus adjustments and hoped that at least one of the images would be perfect. I did get several images where you could clearly see Saturn's rings, but I wasn't very impressed. I was using a camera lens instead of a telescope and Saturn was still very small. Hey, it's a learning experience. When I eventually do get a proper telescope I'll be much better at this.

I hope that Dawn feels like a walk tomorrow morning. We do these walks for her, but Janet and I need our exercise as well. It just works better when all three of us want to go in the same direction.

Willow is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day