I didn't even know that the eclipse was happening until Robin sent me a text message earlier in the day telling me about it. Following her message the eclipse was all I heard about for the rest of the day! I'm not sure how it managed to not be on my radar earlier in the week - where have I been?
Before I went to bed I wavered back and forth about whether I was going to watch it, or not. It was a "school night", after all. I finally decided to set my alarm for 1 a.m. and went to bed. When the alarm went off I laid there for a while and thought about how crazy I was for doing this. Robin had to be at work at 7 a.m. so she did the responsible thing and stayed in bed.
After hitting the snooze button a couple of times I finally dragged my butt out of bed around 1:20 a.m. I'm really glad it was dark outside and that no one was with me, because I looked like a hot mess in my blue sweat pants, blue cable knit sweater, red Croc slippers and black Magic Scarf. I looked a lot like this lady! Sexy!
After grabbing my camera and tripod I set up shop on our pool-less deck in the back yard. My initial idea was to go down to Bushy Park because it's right on the river and there are hardly any lights out there but there was no way I was going down there by myself that late at night.
I turned off all the lights in the house because I didn't want any outside lights interfering with the photos. The moon was so bright that it lit up the entire back yard. It almost looked as if the backyard light was on!
After getting situated I zoomed in on the moon and started shooting. I was actually surprised at how fast the eclipse happened. I think I was out there (off and on) for a little over an hour. Being allergic to the cold, I had to come inside every 10 minutes or so to run my hands under hot water to thaw them out. They were so red, swollen and in a lot of pain. I eventually found a pair of gloves which helped a little.
A lot of my friends up North were complaining on Facebook that they couldn't see the moon because of cloud coverage so I posted one of my photos on Facebook for them to see while on one of my breaks inside. On my next break Robin came out of the bedroom and handed my my phone and walked away. I guess since posting that photo my phone was blowing up with facebook messages and emails. Oops! Sorry Robin!!
Every time I went outside there was a dog about two houses away that barked and barked and barked. It was so annoying. Where were the owners and why was that dog outside for that long? It's freezing outside! If my dogs were barking outside like that we would most definitely be having a special "no bark zone" conversation!
When the moon finally disappeared and turned that beautiful shade of orange I couldn't take anymore so I packed it up and went inside. I was a Pamsicle! Brrr! Before going to bed I quickly posted several untouched photos that showed the progression of the eclipse for my friends that couldn't see it. They missed such a spectacular and beautiful show!
My friend Edna and I made a promise to check on each other at work to make sure the other wasn't falling asleep at the desk. About 3:30 p.m. is when the fatigue set in - luckily I only had another hour to go!
Since viewing the eclipse I keep thinking about that scene from the movie Dolores Claiborne where the town gathered to view the total solar eclipse. Out of curiosity I Googled "solar eclipse" and the last one happened on July 11, 2010. Where the hell was I? I really need to keep up with these solar system happenings.
The 12/21/10 Lunar Eclipse from my backyard!
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