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We were doing a program at our local Science center and we had a 6" refractor pointed at the Andromeda Galaxy. The Astronomer at the time was also pointing out when The Hubble Space Telescope would be able to be seen as a satelite overhead. As he finished pointing it out and given a brief talk about some of the recent things Hubble had imaged, one patron asked "what are the chances of hubble crashing into any of the objects it is looking at?

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That's a good one... in so many ways...

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We were doing a program at our local Science center and we had a 6" refractor pointed at the Andromeda Galaxy. The Astronomer at the time was also pointing out when The Hubble Space Telescope would be able to be seen as a satelite overhead. As he finished pointing it out and given a brief talk about some of the recent things Hubble had imaged, one patron asked "what are the chances of hubble crashing into any of the objects it is looking at?

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That's a good one... in so many ways...

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thats pretty good!

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with viewing Saturn is, after the "Wow!" expression, then there is the inevitable "That's not real! You stuck a picture in there!" Saturn is always a site to behold, it does look like it 'can't be real'.

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that kind of happened to me.i had a friend look at saturn and he thought it was fake but surely it was real!

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This may be slightly off topic but still funny. I shop at Sam's Club and Wal-Mart on a regular basis and they frequently have telescopes for sale. Often they are Reflectors and they ALWAYS set the display up with the OTA backwards in the mount and the eyepiece end pointing to the floor! I have spoken to them many times about it but I am sure they think I am crazy. Sometimes I re-assemble the display myself but the next time I am there it has been changed back to their concept of how it should be!

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Now that's good!!

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We are often asked.."Can you see the American flag on the Moon?"

ROLFMAO

Jerry

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We are often asked.."Can you see the American flag on the Moon?"

ROLFMAO

Jerry

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We get that one a LOT on public nights at our club.. My answer is always the same...

I'll look at my watch and tell them: "No, it's after 5... They took it down."

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nice one Jeff!

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Ohh, I thought of one many, many years ago when I started with a 60mm refractor back in college. I used to get together with another guy who was also very interested in astronomy, but we were both starting out. You know the story, wandering around Lyra looking for the ring nebula visually at about 10 power, not finding it for some reason...

Well, my friend has this 4" reflector that was kind of beat up. He yells, "I GOT IT!!!" and starts hopping around. I run over and sure enough, there is this white donut! Hmmmm..... I began moving the scope around, and... hmmm, all the other stars looked like donuts? I focused the scope, but couldn't get a pinpoint, just a larger or smaller donut, (probably the mirror cell had shifted and collimation was in the twilight zone). Anyway I said, "Jim, I don't think it's the ring nebula, everything looks like a donut?". He rushes over and takes a look... In all seriousness he says, "Maybe I've discovered a cluster of planetaries!"

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"why don't we just go at night"?

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Oh wow... why didn't I think of that?

Chris

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Well At least you dont work with a bunch of auto techs like I do who think it is hillarious to say that im always looking at Uranus.

I chuckled the first time to play along but the joke is still funny to them a year later , I shouldnt expect too much of them but am I still in 5th grade?

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You were looking at MY WHAT????

I'm sorry....I couldn't resist....

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with viewing Saturn is, after the "Wow!" expression, then there is the inevitable "That's not real! You stuck a picture in there!" Saturn is always a site to behold, it does look like it 'can't be real'.

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that kind of happened to me.i had a friend look at saturn and he thought it was fake but surely it was real!

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This may be slightly off topic but still funny. I shop at Sam's Club and Wal-Mart on a regular basis and they frequently have telescopes for sale. Often they are Reflectors and they ALWAYS set the display up with the OTA backwards in the mount and the eyepiece end pointing to the floor! I have spoken to them many times about it but I am sure they think I am crazy. Sometimes I re-assemble the display myself but the next time I am there it has been changed back to their concept of how it should be!

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Well At least you dont work with a bunch of auto techs like I do who think it is hillarious to say that im always looking at Uranus.

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Or the "moon conspirators" who always ask "why don't we point Hubble at the moon so we can see the flag or the rover". I always tell them that they are located on the opposite side of the moon where Hubble can't get to.....

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Well At least you dont work with a bunch of auto techs like I do who think it is hillarious to say that im always looking at Uranus.

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Hey, thats nothing, at least you're not a science teacher who has to put up questions such as:

"Hey Mr. Culp, how big is Uranus?"
"Hey Mr. Culp, I heard Uranus is blue, is that true?"
"Hey Mr. Culp, is Uranus full of gas?"

I hate that planet.

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Or the "moon conspirators" who always ask "why don't we point Hubble at the moon so we can see the flag or the rover". I always tell them that they are located on the opposite side of the moon where Hubble can't get to.....

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You can't see anything we left on the moon with a telescope. Anysize basically. Even the Hubble can't see anything we left.

You'd need a telescope, in space, over 100meters in size to actually see anything we left... Flags, rovers, etc, etc...

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Instead of hitting golf balls, the Apollo astronauts should have taken their time to stack/arrange lunar rocks on the moon's surface to make a huge "X" sign visible to amateur astronomers
Jason

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I pronounce it Er-in-us now. Why? When I was in college I had a classical mythology class and the professor was talking about the god that the planet was named after. She pronounced it that way, and I figured, well, she would know how to pronounce it.

And it sounds a heck of a lot better than Yer-ayn-us. Or the other pronunciation Yer-in-us, which isn't much better.

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Well At least you dont work with a bunch of auto techs like I do who think it is hillarious to say that im always looking at Uranus.

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Hey, thats nothing, at least you're not a science teacher who has to put up questions such as:

"Hey Mr. Culp, how big is Uranus?"
"Hey Mr. Culp, I heard Uranus is blue, is that true?"
"Hey Mr. Culp, is Uranus full of gas?"

I hate that planet.

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I just laughed so hard I almost fell out of my chair!

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at least you're not a science teacher who has to put up questions such as:

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I had a science teacher in high school (also the golf coach) who once pronounced Copernicus as "Copper Nickus." I corrected him after class. Not good. I was also on the golf team. Uh oh.

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I just laughed so hard I almost fell out of my chair!

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I see you live up to your tag line of "easily amused"

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Had my first "question" last night.

I was setup in the front yard last night and my neighbor came out and said "Are you looking at the sky?" I stepped back from the Ep and stared at her for a second then I looked at the scope and then back at her and said "no". She got a puzzled look on her face and walked back in her house. I started laughing so hard I had to call it quits for the night.

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You should have said you're looking for angels to shoot down.

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You should have said you're looking for angels to shoot down.

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Had my first "question" last night.

I was setup in the front yard last night and my neighbor came out and said "Are you looking at the sky?" I stepped back from the Ep and stared at her for a second then I looked at the scope and then back at her and said "no". She got a puzzled look on her face and walked back in her house. I started laughing so hard I had to call it quits for the night.

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And I thought my neighbor was clueless.... yours has mine beat!

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Regarding showing the sun: I saw a film about John Dobson, he had made an elegant solar scope with the sonotube cut at 45 degrees, and a plate of welding glass covering the front. No secondary per se, just the back of the glass. He was showing people at a state park, getting ooohs and ahhhs.

"Thank You for showing me that!" one person exclaimed.

"Oh, don't thank me," said Dobson. "It's your sun."

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Her last words on the subject where basically that "she believes that they are the same thing, but maybe she's the only one who believes that." Ummm.. yep!

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Suddenly this little guy shouts out "Holy S***, Mom, it's a g** d*** Cheerio."

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Now this gives new meaning to the "Milky Way" as well!

I'll never be able to look at either without thinking of this thread and chuckling.....

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I simply hung my head and said "No Janna, that’s not Jupiter, that's the moon."

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We can't win. There's too many DUMB people. To make it worse I think they choose to be that way.

However I choose to keep fighting.