Perseid Meteor Shower

Perhaps you knew, but in case you didn't... the Perseid meteor shower peaked Sunday night on through dawn Monday morning. According to reports, Sunday was the perfect night: no moon, clear skies and Mars was a bright red dot marking the northeastern sky. With Kael being so interested in comets from a Little Einstein show, I decided to take him out to watch Sunday night. The problem was the best time to watch would have been between 1am to 4am. Supposedly you could start seeing some streak across the night sky starting at 10pm. If he was still awake at 10pm, then I'd bundle him up and head on out.

I was quite excited to do this - so excited that at 9:20pm, I cruised around in Truong's car for about 30 minutes looking for the perfect spot. I found it near back where our old house was, up on a hill in an exclusive community. There's a trail head there and I spoke to a couple of women who were just leaving. They told me if I walked up the trail for about two minutes, there was a perfect spot to watch the show.

I went home, flushed with excitement and told Truong about it... and got a very lukewarm response. Clearly he had better things to do. Like... watch TV. Read a Golf magazine in bed. Sleep. So it was just me and Kael.

The problem is: I'm afraid of the dark. Especially walking up a trail head. In the dark. With a flashlight and an almost 4 year old for protection.

Wait... it should be ME protecting the 4 year old. Yeah, that's right. Clearly I need some back-up. So who do I call? Who CAN I call at 10 o'clock on a Sunday night? And who would be crazy enough to actually head out with me?

Why Ethel, of course. I mean Shana. I call her up and tell her to put some pants on, I'm picking her up in 3 minutes. She says "Where are we going? Can I wear my pajamas?" God I love her! And there's Patrick, not quite understanding what we're doing, wondering why Sonya was taking his wife to make-out point at night and asking if he could come too.

I load Kael in the car with 2 flashlights and motor over to pick up Shana for another Lucy and Ethel Adventure.

We get to the trail head, walk up the trail in the dark and run across another couple (who incidentally hadn't seen any shooting stars yet). We keep on walking and looking. Kael by this time is a little nervous and keeps asking if we can go home yet. Mind you, we just left the car! It's a beautiful view of the city from the trail. On one side of the trail is the hillside where you can still see the fire damage and on the other is the city in all its glittering and twinkling glory. We look up at the sky and see... planes. Lots of planes. But no meteors.

So there we were, in the dark: me in my jeans and Tevas, Shana in her pajamas and flip flops looking up at the night sky, and Kael with his flashlight pointing up at the sky searching for meteors. But he wasn't looking UP up, he was looking across the trail up, at the horizon up, at the hill up. It was pretty funny. I actually saw one meteor - and it was very bright. I was very surprised (and disappointed) that neither Shana nor Kael saw it (well, Kael was looking nowhere near in the right direction, so that wasn't a surprise). I got the feeling that Shana was worrying the whole "make-out point" thought in her head as we walked back to the car.

At the start of the trail head where the sign posts are is a huge spider web where a black widow was spinning her catch of the night. I point it out to Kael (he's totally into spiders) so the night's not a complete wash. Shana is just as fascinated and also a little creeped out. She happens to read a large sign nailed to the post and asked me what the date was. I respond "August 12, why?" She points out the sign and there's a picture of a mountain lion on it with the words "Last spotted August 10." We both look at each other with a holy sh*t look on our faces. Then I look around towards the trail we just left and start replaying all the funny little noises we heard while out there all alone, like big packages of fresh meat, wondering if it really was a cricket that I heard and not something more sinister. I start getting a little creeped out. I continue walking to the car this time calling Kael to walk a little faster. Shana is still reading the posted signs and this time she sees pictures of ticks and snakes. She finally walks to the car, itching a bit, scratching herself.

Here's the big difference between Shana and I: I worry about the huge mountain lion pouncing out of the darkness, dragging us away to be eaten alive. She worries about the creepy crawlies, the blood sucking ticks. She hands me her flashlight, furiously scratching herself, asking me to check for the ticks she's convinced are crawling all over her back and in her hair. I reassure her that there are no ticks sucking her blood and she gets in the car. Both she and Kael are in the car and I walk around to get in myself. I SWEAR I feel eyes on me and for a horrible split second, I have a vision of a huge mountain lion running out from the darkness to drag me away. Luckily, I made it safely to the car and we drove home.

I think I read somewhere there's another meteor shower in September. This time we'll come more prepared: a blanket, insect repellent and a baseball bat.