Transit of Venus
Q: Did you see the transit of Venus?
A: Yes, I did!
Q: Was it spectacular?
A: Not exactly. There was a tiny dot on the face of
the sun for a few hours.
Q: How did you view it?
A: I aimed a pair of binoculars at the sun with one lens
covered, and focused the rays from the eyepiece onto a sheet of
paper.
Q: Why do you call it a "pair" of binoculars? It's
actually a single binocular, or perhaps a pair of monoculars or,
not to put too fine a point on it, two parallel telescopes.
A: Because that's what "they" call it, and who was I until
your Q: to quibble? I am at this very moment wearing a
pair of pants and a pair of socks.
Q: How conventional!
A: Oh yeah? Check out the hat!
Q: Did you photograph the event? It would be nice to
have a record of it since it isn't occurring again until 2117.
A:
Yes, see the photo above.
Q: I see the photo, but not the dot. Where's Venus?
A: Right where she's supposed to be. The dot is
invisible due to, I'm assuming, the camera's inability to
recover from the extreme brightness saturation. Could have
tried some other stuff, but I suspect there are plenty of
pictures of the actual transit, and few examples how things go
wrong when you don't plan ahead and/or run out of limbs.
Q: But you did see the dot, didn't you?
A: Yes. Eyes are still pretty good.
Just ask Giovanni Schiaparelli.
