Who is 'J'

Mystery Oil painting by 'J'

Toot and I were 'trolling' around the British Heart Foundation  Charity Shop in Lowestoft and came across a lone canvas leaning against a wall.

Uncustomarily, we both liked the painting and decided there and then to buy it.  There was no price on it, so the Manager was sent for to give us a 'spot price'.

Time passed, tension mounted and then got off again.

" How about £4.99 ?" said the Manager.

"Done" said Toot and off we went carrying our new aquisition back to the car.

 A £3.99 frame from the QD value store completed our fine art acquisition and now said oil painting adorns our living room wall.  An original artwork for less than £10!

Now both Toot and I really like the picture but alas its author remains anonymous.  It is simply signed 'J' in the bottom right hand corner.  We think it is a painting of farm buildings near a school and somewhere in Suffolk or Norfolk but otherwise its location is unknown.  We also believe it is early morning light so the painter was looking South across a field with a stream or pond to his or her left.

Can you tell us who is or was 'J' or where this scene is located.  If someone can provide these details and leave them as comments on my blog, we will donate £25 to the British Heart Foundation.   I do like a bit of mystery and provenance with my art!

What Amateur Astronomers do in Daylight

Sunspot 1754 imaged from my backyard in white light using my thirteen year old ETX 90Ra
Credit: White light whole Solar disc image NASA SOHO

The 28th May 2013 was a nice sunny day in Oulton Broad.  So whilst Toot sat in the garden with her crochet hook and wool, I dusted off my old ETX 90Ra catadioptric scope and set about imaging a big sunspot that was moving slowly across the photosphere of the solar disc.

Sunspot 1754 is so big it could more or less swallow the Earth!  Good job its 93 million miles away.

As the Sun is at solar maximum, it is quite surprising that there are so few spots to be seen.  Last night, I was reading an old astronomy book and came across some plates showing the Sun's disc in 1957.  Back then, when I was a boy, it was covered in spots.  So what's up with our Sun now?

No need to panic, the end of the world is not nigh, but clearly something different is going on deep within the Sun.

The Solar Photosphere on the 21st December 1957
approaching solar maximum

Please remember not to stare at the Sun or look at it through binoculars or a telescope as such acts will at best damage your eyesight and at worst cause blindness.  I used specialist filters and equipment to create the above images.

My ETX 90Ra in my Backyard
just after I took the Sunspot images

Bank Holiday Weekend

Images from our walk

Spring arrived in Suffolk just in time for the May Bank Holiday Weekend.

As the Sun was shining, Toot and I decided to go for a walk along Fisher Row and  the River.

The slightly warmer weather had brought out the wildflowers and the water meadows were enlivened with blooms and butterflies.

Whilst we strolled, hand in hand, along the river bank, in the sky above swallows were catching insects.

Sadly and contrary to perchance we did not encounter Mr. Darcy, Elizabeth Bennet or even Gordon Bennet.

When we returned home, Toot  made dinner ; Chicken in Stilton, apple and pecan sauce for her and Smoked Haddock Dauphinoise for me. 'Mmmm stuffed crust'!

The 'Angle of Dangle' in the Outer Solar System

Images of Saturn taken from
our Backyard 12 months apart

As you can see from these superimposed images of Saturn, taken a year apart, the angle of our view has changed quite significantly.

In 2013 our view of the rings is less oblique and as a consequence they appear to have opened up.  In the 2012 image, you can see that sunlight illuminated Saturn obliquely from one side creating a shadow of the main body of the planet on the rings to one side only (to the left on my image).  In April 2013, with the planet at opposition, the Sun  illuminated Saturn 'face-on' and therefore a shadow of the planet's main body can be seen in my image on both sides of the rings.

It is also quite clear that the contrast between the bright 'B' ring and the main body of the planet is much greater in April 2013 than May 2012.  This brightening of the rings occurs at opposition and is known as the 'Seeliger Effect'.

see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opposition_surge

Silver Darlings

Soft herring roe on sourdough toast

For my readers that haven't experienced the delights of herring roes on home baked sourdough toast, get yourself to a fishmongers right now and purchase either fresh or frozen soft herring roes.  We obtained our roes from the 'World of Fish' and Toot made the bread for the toast.


Technically, soft herring roe should be referred to as 'Milts' and is often labelled as such in fishmongers and supermarkets.  'Roe' are the female eggs, which are granular and 'hard' whereas 'Milts' are male sperm and 'soft'.  To my mind and taste, 'Milts' or 'soft herring roe are the best to eat on toast.





Cooking the 'soft roe' could not be easier, wash the roe in running water, pat dry with kitchen towel, roll in seasoned plain (general purpose) flour, heat some butter in a frying pan and shallow fry until they curl up and are just golden. Serve on hot buttered toast with a little chopped parsley and lemon juice (also nice with a sprinkling of Tabasco sauce).


For some unknown reason herrings and herring roes remain remarkably inexpensive.  They taste fantastic and are extremely good for you.


Toot and I live ten miles from Great Yarmouth in Norfolk which, in the early 1900s, was the centre of Great Britain's herring fishing industry.  It was said that in those days, the estuary was so crowded with steam drifters, that you could walk across the River Yare, passing from one boat to another.  Our home town of Lowestoft was home to a similar large fishing fleet.  Lowestoft still boasts a number of smoke-houses where herrings are cured, smoked and transformed into kippers.

The Lydia Eva. Last Steam Drifter on the River Yare at Great Yarmouth

Norfolk Fishermen called the herrings -  'The Silver Darlings' as they were the backbone of the local economy.


The Lydia Eva is the last surviving steam drifter from the days of the herring fleets that worked out of Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft Harbours.  She was recently refurbished in Lowestoft and is now a floating museum.

A kipper
An integral part of the Great British Breakfast.
A split, gutted, brined and cold smoked herring.

Credits: Wikipedia

The European Southern Observatory ESO

The European Southern Observatory
La Silla Observatory, Atacama Desert, Chile
This photograph was taken by José Francisco Salgado, an ESO Photo Ambassador.

The European Southern Observatory is located at an altitude of 2400 metres, far from light pollution and usually above the clouds that often plague my observatory (aka 'my backyard').

Apart from undertaking cutting edge astronomy, ESO makes data files, captured by cameras attached to mighty telescopes, freely available to amateurs who register their interest.

I have downloaded data files from ESO and through the application of a number of freeware software packages have created some detailed images of astronomical showpieces.  The quality of data available from these huge scopes located under pristine skies and captured by state of the art megapixel CCD cameras, comprehensively exceeds what I can achieve with my astro-kit from my 'Suffolk Backyard'.   Not only is the data better, but scopes located at La Silla can capture objects that are only visible in the Southern Hemisphere and therefore unattainable from UK based observatories.

Thank you ESO for this outreach data sharing service!

Part of the Orion Molecular Cloud
my image based on ESO data

The Trapezium star cluster at the heart of the Orion Molecular Cloud
my image based on ESO data

The Trapezium is a relatively young cluster that has formed directly out of the parent nebula.  The five brightest stars are on the order of 15-30 solar masses in size. They are within a diameter of 1.5 light-years of each other and are responsible for much of the illumination of the surrounding nebula. The Trapezium may be a sub-component of the larger Orion Nebula Cluster, a grouping of about 2,000 stars within a diameter of 20 light-years.  There is some thought that an intermediate mass (over 100 times larger than our Sun) black hole lurks within the Trapezium Cluster.

Credits: European Southern Observatory and Wikipedia

Misplaced Architecture No 17

Stone Hinge

"No ifs or butts on Salisbury Plain"

Credits: base image from English Heritage