Houston has been under an eternal cloud but luckily I was able to take the family out to the Del Rio lake house this past week. I had one good night and captured IC 1396, the Elephant's Trunk Nebula in Cepheus. The night was a grueling test of endurance (I was up literally until dawn lol) but I think it was worth it And yes, of course there's a story...

The night started like most nights. My wife and her mother stayed up with me for a bit and we had some fun identifying constellations. Around midnight everyone went to bed and I was left to mind the scope and the doggies. The dogs should have been looking out for me but as is customary they were conked out. I finished up my Luminance data and parked the scope so that I could take some flats before changing filters. I turned on my flat screen which as usual started to attract insects. I picked up the screen and held it in front of the scope and started the camera. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I spotted a giant, hairy, presumably blind and deaf tarantula moving slowly out of the shadows toward the light. I immediately thought to myself "never a boring moment out here" and began scraping the gravel with my feet and whistling so as to hopefully divert the beast... But it kept coming... and coming... It was about to crawl onto my shoe! Not wanting to ruin my flats sequence I gracefully (or not) maneuvered around it, assuming that it would continue on into the brush. But of course, that would be too easy. Apparently not satisfied by missing the opportunity to crawl up my leg, it made a 90 degree turn and started heading straight for my guard dogs who, despite all the clamor, were oblivious to the approaching arachnid. Now I was in a bind... I try to be respectful of all creatures but this thing was hell-bent on sinking its fangs into something! In a last-ditch effort I managed to reach over with my foot and gracefully give the hairy old codger a gentle boot. Finally it had had enough and crawled off into the sage. Talk about an adrenaline rush! I had no problem staying up the rest of the night!

Everyone will be happy to know that I only messed up 3 flat frames through the whole ordeal! #dedication haha!