Up in the sky

Comet Machholz is shining in the night sky around magnitude 3.5, making it a fairly easy naked eye object over the next few moonless nights. I haven't yet tracked this thing down in my telescope, but it's on my to do list tonight or tomorrow. I don't recall observing a comet with my telescope (or my unaided eye) since Hale-Bopp so I'm excited the heavens are putting on a little show (although Machholz is nowhere near as bright as Hale-Bopp). MSNBC has a decent article with a star chart for locating the comet here.

I just realized that the picture above isn't actually a picture of Comet Machholz (I think it's Hale-Bopp instead). But because it's such a lovely picture, I don't want to replace it with an actual picture of the current comet. So below is Machholz in all its glory.

Still, a pretty picture in its own right.