Should the house ever sell, we will be moving to a more rural area and I’ve made my counterpart promise we will use some of the profit (assuming there is one) to buy a nice telescope. I’ve noticed lately that I can barely see the stars at night and it’s very disappointing to not be able to pick Cassiopeia out of the sky anymore. She was always dim, but I could find her when I was young and now I can’t and I’d like to be able to show at least the major constellations to my kids.

If you also miss the stars and are in the Florida area on April 5th, you can attend the Dark Sky Festival at the Town Square of Harmony, Florida. They will be promoting the idea of having nights free of excessive artificial lighting and, to that end, will have speakers to talk about responsible lighting and ways to reduce light pollution, telescopes for people to use and a free concert by Rare Earth.

The area has a Class 4 rating on the Bortle Light Pollution Scale (which I had to look up the meaning of). This means that those constellations I can’t see here in my urban center, you’ll be able to see when you go to the festival.