I'm glad you've always had a positive experience. I'm going to assume that you didn't start doing this decades years ago, setting-up your telescope as a ten, eleven-year-old kid, driving up the canyon when you first got your driver's license with your 8-inch Newtonian in your mothers station-wagon, setting-up on side roads, only to have "kegger" parties unload on the road, blocking your only way back onto the highway? Or drunken, stoned groups stumble onto your set-up in the dark? Or neighborhood bullies try to intimidate you early in the morning in the back alley, away from the streetlight? Or just plain neighbors who thought your time would be better spent playing football or chasing girls (well they may have been right on that one...) Or the pointed-ear crowd insisting you show them a UFO in the eyepiece? Never happened to you? I can see where you probably wouldn't get accosted as an adult with the word "weapons" on the back of your truck. Life is different before one takes self-defense classes, gets some body mass, gains the confidence of years. I haven't been out as often in recent years due to the responsibilities of job and family, but I do intend to get back to regular observing and ATMing one day- I'm guessing I won't have as many problems as I did in my early days. It sounds like things are a lot less mean these days, so I'm really looking forward to emulating your experiences! How many of you would have stuck with it, had these same things happended to you early-on? Too, thanks to people who started about the time I did, (and earlier!), your hobby is more mainstream today. People don't raise an eyebrow as much when you tell them you enjoy astronomy as a hobby. The hobby is no longer an activity in which you must make most of your own equipment if you wish to take it to the next level beyond "entry". There are thousands of consumer products available now- and there were not, when I started in the sixties. All one has to do is plop down the cash, and you're instantly takig nice photos, using a huge telescope. It's become a "me, too" activity, accessible to just about anyone thanks to those who dreamed of a different future 20, 30 years ago. Who asked, wouldn't it be neat if...? Enjoy it, but never take it for granted. It hasn't always been so dang marvelous. --- diveboss@xmission.com wrote:
I have yet to be accosted by anything when I'm out by myself.
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