It would figure that, after nearly two months of clouds and rain and generally unsuitable-for-amateur-astronomy skies, I am presented with clear skies when otherwise occupied. Four glorious cloud-free nights while camping over the weekend, and I didn’t even bring so much as a pair of binoculars. And last night was pretty good too, once the moon approached the horizon, but at midnight I was too tired to set up the telescope.

Even from our back lane, though, with a very bright back porch light nearby, the skies were really impressive last night: magnitude 5.0 visibility (I can just barely make out Eta Ursae Minoris) and a clearly visible Sagittarius Arm. Probably even better from our observing location. Now if only the skies and my schedule could coincide.