January was pretty much a wash out as far as railfanning. My job moved, so now the commute takes me under the CN's former Wisconsin Central line into the Twin Cities, specifically under the east end of the small yard they own in New Brighton. I have seen trains parked there a few times early in the morning. As the sun rises earlier, there'll be opportunities to explore this on the way to work. The other sightings I have had have been auditory vs visual. The new office is about a mile and a half east of the Minnesota Commercial line that works it's way from Minneapolis up to New Brighton and points north. I have heard a few train horns, but not enough to determine any kind of pattern.
With the long winter nights, there's been a little more opportunity for backyard astronomy. Or in my case, front yard as the back yard is still covered in copious amounts of snow. On the clear mornings, with my earlier start time, Venus has been the standout object in the morning sky. However, it has been gradually sinking as it prepares for the transition to an evening object later this summer and fall.
I've been able to give my scopes a little TLC in January to. On my reflector, I was able to clean the grease out of the focuser mechanism. The stuff seemed to be slippery, yet very sticky. If some got on your hand, it had a sticky consistency to it even at room temperature. Take this stuff outside in a northern winter, and it became nearly rock hard. After getting some advice from the friendly folks at the cloudynights forum, I cracked it open and attacked the grease with a combination of Goof Off, dish soap, and veg oil. After cleaning, I relubed it with white lithium grease.
Tonight I had a chance to see if this made a difference in the cold weather. Tonights temps were around -1, plenty cold enough to torture test the old grease. I brought the scope out to cool off, and came back about 1/2 an hour later. I worked the focuser and found that it moved just like it did indoors. The true comparison was when I went to move the scope to line up the Pleiades. Turns out the mount must be full of the same grease/glue. The mount felt like the focuser did before I cleaned it out. This may be the next project for March, when we usually get a good chunk of cloudy nights. In the end, I was ready to head back in because the cold was bugging me much more than it was the scope, and the morning alarm is not to far off here.
