My PrecISSSS

It was a rather special weekend because The Boy, our firstborn Sun & Air, carved time from his busy working / parenting schedule to come on his ownio to visit his agéd parents. We didn't have a fatted calf about the places but I did buy some rasherses and sausinges and we had breakfast for lunch à trois on Sunday. Nothing like reddit/r/FryUp, mind! Either side of our Bunter Blowfest, we planted out 3 pot-bound exotic trees . . . for posterity, like. 

In normal chat and catchup, nobody is directing the convo and quite random things pop up. Turns out we've both been spending too much time on reddit/r/Ireland and had noticed a post about the International Space Station ISS making a pass across the Irish sky at 2100hrs. That was wrong in the detail by about an hour. so we missed the event. But, in any case The Event would have been a nothing-burger because it was 10/10th cloud cover. Being reddit, some wag offered "damn it if we had prep time we could have made a huge sign that reads: if you can read this please airdrop us some Taytos " The Boy was disappointed because he'd never knowingly seen the ISS. I have - 2018 and 2013: it's not rare like an eclipse. You just have to consult an almanac and hope for clear skies.

I took The Boy to the Dublin train at teatime on Monday. Later that evening, I checked the internet for Tonight's ISS show: 

Oooo, I had 40 minutes in hand. I also checked the sky which had a half moon and romantically scudding clouds. Just before 21:00 a faint satellite coursed across the sky in the same direction as the ISS was expected. But from my previous sightings, I was not fooled by this dullard. And then thar she blowes!

I coulda shoulda just watched with gob agape, because the ISS is bright and zippy; and rather wonderful even after all these years. But I pointed my device in the right direction and logged a tuthree snaps of The Event. Amazin' !! The crap-pic above doesn't capture the ghost-story clouds. I believe the other obvs star must be Altair = α-Aquilae while γ-Aql aka Tarazed is barely visible at 1 o'clock from Altair. ISS? would do again.