Sun Spots (20221206) + a familiar(?) short story

View also: SDO satellite image by NASA from the same date / time.

The coldest nights so far, approaching this year's winter to come: -5°C in the morning, Hoarfrost covers the meadows and trees in a slight shimmering. I am facing a completely clear sky, no clouds and the sun, still low above the horizon and thus hidden behind the mountains on the east side of our valley. The snow covered ridges and summits of our southward mountain range already shine golden and bright, lit by our day star.

I am surprised because yesterday's weather forecast predicted nothing like this: Clouds and rain / snowfall instead ... like for the 10 or so past days. I check Solar Monitor to see whether and how the current sunspots have developed. They look fine, showing nice penumbras also, almost all 8 groups of them - and pretty obvious at the same time.

This day looks perfect and lets me expect good seeing also. Some live webcams from the mountains around support my impression. So I think to myself: 'What a wonderful World!' ... haha ... and ... 'I have all the time in the world, today!'.

As soon as the Sun raises higher than the big oak tree, I setup everything on the small balcony and start capturing it: Just eager to capture 'something' from the heavens above, after weeks of cloudy, foggy or otherwise unfitting weather. So the Sun with it's nice spots is very welcome! The seeing also looks quite good, despite some bumps and jiggle within every second. After finishing my first series of 1000 frames in FireCapture, I go to my desktop inside where a VNC client present the same view, my Astroberry outside sees. I start the first download over WiFi and check roughly what some single frames look like. Quite good, I'd say!

Just for fun I go outside to capture a second series of frames. For this I have to re-adjust the photo tripod manually, with the Baader Astrosolar Filter Foil on the photo lens' front. Some fiddling to get the Sun back into the 1500x1500px ROI  but I'm used to it. So I start the second sequence of 1000 frames ... but ... what's THAT!? I can't trust my own eyes ... big clouds are rushing in and extend rapidly.

I cancel the capturing session, being very happy I had started early (before 10h CET) when I actually had in mind to begin as soon as the Sun approaches the meridian. Now it's afternoon, the sky is completely covered in clouds  while the Sun already had set behind the mountains of our valley's west side.

But! ... I have! .... this one ... picture!

Hope you also enjoy this short story – you may know what I'm talking about and how that feels!

I love heaven -
and heaven loves me!