Not-so-starry starry night

The first Thursday of each month, the U of T Astronomy department holds a free public lecture, followed by telescope viewings and shows in an inflatable planetarium.^* I, shockingly, have never been to one, so I signed the DC and myself up for a planetarium show and dragged him off to a fairly entertaining talk about type IA supernovae,^** which the non-scientist DC said he understood, so it really is geared for the general public.^***

Afterwards, we headed up to the 14th floor to see the telescopes. Sadly, it was too cloudy to see anything but the spectacular view of the city.


It was a bit chilly, but the grad students provided hot chocolate, with marshmallows. Our planetarium session was at 9:30, so we didn't get a chance to see the larger telescopes this time 'round.

The next talk is about why the world won't end on December 21st. Should be good!

As usual, you can see a few more photos by clicking on the name below the picture and scrolling way way down to this photo:

From Rambling Through Toronto

^*No, I am not making that up. Behold:

The air compressor makes for a bit of a noisy, but nifty, session.

^**"I'm German; we don't have a sense of humour."

^***I'm not sure how much the 9 year-olds in the Scout troupe got out of it, but they certainly enjoyed the volunteer-from-the-audience component.