4 am in the neighborhood

Update: I did get up at 4 am, and spent a half an hour trying to find an ideal lookout site. The city lights (see prior post) are pretty bright, there was a crescent moon, and Neighborhood Watch has had great success at encouraging everyone to have a glaringly bright light turning on outside all night long.

I travel up Mill Creek Canyon; it didn't take long for me to realize that an East-West canyon floor means the North-South views are blocked.

Since I was traveling in my pajamas, I was hesitant about parking where a helpful soul or "LEO" might pull up and ask if I needed help. (LEO: that's shorthand for Law Enforcement Officer, I picked that up from watching NCIS. Who says you can't learn anything from prime time television?)

Anyway, it was a lovely early morning for a little drive. No, not a bit of green or red Northern Light to be seen. I really stared hard to the north before finally deciding that even if I did see a faint hue, I really want the National Geographic/Weather Channel/Google Picture kind of Northern Lights display to be the kind that gets seeing Northern Lights checked off my bucket list. Plus I think they probably are even more amazing when seen hovering over a snow field.

Back to saving for a once in a life time trip someday!

Unless, of course, NASA is right and the sun is going to be burping up some hum-dingers solar flares in 2011-2013. If they are right about that happening, then quite possibly Northern Lights may become so common that people will be ignoring them like they so often ignore sunsets nowadays.