Rules are made to be broken, right?

The old saw is that "rules are made to be broken" and last night I enjoyed myself with a little piece of observing that broke every rule in the book. I report it here, simply because rules can become such a mantra with us, that we cheat ourselves of perfectly legitimate observing experiences.

What I did was observe the moon with binoculars for about 20 minutes, entertaining myself by trying to see just how much of its surface I could identify using only my old and failing memory. That's fun and games, but here are the rules I broke to do it.

1. I observed from inside my house, at one point enjoying the comfort of a couch. Yes, i was in a "sun room" - at that moment a "moon room" so I could look up, but:

- the room was comfortably heated and outside it was near freezing and there was a nasty wind making it feel a lot colder. Observing from a heated room is a no-no because the different air temperatures deteriorate the image

- I was looking through thick panels of insulating glass, set at an angle, and none too celan. There were reflections off some of them from lights on in nearby rooms. You never observe through any glass except optical glass made for the purpose. If you could do this, we would observe every winter in comfort. For that matter, observing for glass would also avoid the summer bugs and dew on a telescope lens or mirror.

2. I always advise people not to bother with observing the full moon because the lighting is flat and so it's not nearly as interesting as when the lighting is coming from an angle and the mountains and craters cast huge shadows giving hints of how tall or deep they are. Last night the moon was less than a day from full - for all practical purposes it was full.

3. Finally, while my session had started with binoculars, my curiosity was raised and later used a small telescope on an alt-az mount, increasing the power I used to 44X. Although I have long since abandoned this "rule," when starting out as an amateur astronomer I was taught to turn up my nose at alt-az mounts. They were for terrestrial viewing, Real amateur astronomers used an equatorial mount.

OK - the easy rule that was first torn to shred by the wonderfully simple and useful Dobsonian mount - an alt-az mount of wood with teflon bearing surfaces - it has over the past decades become the dominant mount in amateur astronomy. First, as noted,t he Dobsonian replaced it for large reflector use, though Some people now put such Dobsonian scopes onto special equatorial platforms, tilted ta an angle and motorized to make it each for them to track stars. Then in the 1990s the uniquitous, squat, SCT-style telescopes began to dominate the market, not only providing tracking on alt-az mounts (without tilting them) , but also provided computer-driven "go to" accessibility - meaning you didn't have to learn the night sky, you could let the computer find stuff for you. And finally, more and more beautifully, smooth, alt-az mounts are available and primarily used with small refractors as what are dubbed "grab-and-go" scopes - and that's exactly what I was using last night, a 66mm refractor on a Vixen Mini-Porta mount that was designed for grab and go, but I had grabbed and gone only five feet fro my living room to the "moon room."

What did I see and identify on a full moon sprawled comfortably on my couch , my head propped by a pillow, my 12X36IS Canon binoculars at my eyes? Plenty. All the major "maria" - the seas - of course. The Latin name sof some of the smaller ones still escape my memory, and although I've toured it many times, I can't seem to recall the "Sea of Vapors." But another favorite haunt, "the Marsh of Sleep" near Mare Crisium stood out wonderfully, with it beautifully bright "spotlight" creater, - hmmm, what is that called? The crater was easily identifiable to me, but my mind had misplaced its name.

But other things you can notice at full moon is the different reflectivity - what astronomers call the "albedo" - of different seas, as well as the extremely bright example sof locations such as Aristarchus, sometimes call the "lighthouse of the moon." Then there are, of course, the terrific ray systems of Tycho, which always makes the moon look like an unpealed orange to me - , and "Copernicus" - when I see it I want to "shout" bulls eye to complement whichever god was throwing the rocks that day, and the smaller, but still beautiful, Kepler. Other dark spots like Plato and Grimaldi, also jumped out at you, and many areas that are less well known = familiar to me from observations under more dramatic lighting, but without convenient name tags. ( I proved to myself that my memory is nothing to brag about ;-)

None of this felt like you were looking through the bottom of a Coke bottle. It was a bit soft, of course, but I found it quite enjoyable observing - especially since I wasn't battling the wind and cold.

When I got up to 44X on the 66mm scope the view was softer still and started to fall apart more frequently - after all, outside under those conditions the astronomical seeing was horrendous that night.

All I'm saying is I broke several cardinal observing rules and enjoyed myself despite it. Does the mean I'll always observe from the comfort of the sun room? Of course not. Beeing outside gives significantly better view and allows much higher powers. All i'm saying, is that we should automatically assume that because the rule say not to observe this way, observing through ordinary glass windows si hopeless. It usn't. As matter of fact, just the other monring, wanting to test things before going out, I was able to split the familiar double star Albireo with my 12X36 IS glasses while holding them against - but at an angle - the sliding glass doors to the deck.

I guess what it comes down to is rules need not be broken, but they sure as heck should be relaxed. Breathe thought your nose, as my old mentor Don Walker used to say, and enjoy what's offered.