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<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nHe hasn\u2019t had his theodolite out of its case in years because there\u2019s no work for it, except once he used it to level a brick patio. Talk about overkill. In the old days he shot the sun with it; to learn his latitude and longitude long before GPS he measured the sun\u2019s altitude at noon, looking through the darkgreen sunfilter. He\u2019s remembering the first time he screwed it to the eyepiece and wondered if he should test it first, realized what the hell could he test it on except the sun, and quickly swung the theodolite around and up and looked. And didn\u2019t burn out his retina, and saw the sun\u2019s disk moving. Except of course it wasn\u2019t actually moving, as it won\u2019t actually be moving this morning, although Venus will be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She knows that the only way to see what she, yes, sort of wants to see is to block the sun\u2019s fierceness enough to see Venus transiting. For her transit <\/em>has to do with the name of a road in the suburbs, but here\u2019s her husband with a surveying thing that is not a transit but can show her a transit. She knows the thing is very old and wonders if there\u2019s any danger. Or maybe he\u2019s the danger? If he looks first she should be OK, unless he shuts his eye, meaning to trick her into burning hers out. Be sure he looks first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He\u2019s thinking about how Captain Cook, James Cook, sailed to Tahiti to observe the transit of Venus on June 3rd, 1769 so that astronomers could work out how far it was to the sun. Other telescopes would be looking from Europe. Parallax. It was all about parallax.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the vernacular of 2004, it was a ballsy thing Cook did: sail from England into 17 degrees south counting on clear skies and a solid viewing platform. Joseph Banks drew observing plans marked with the appropriate words Zenith and Nadir. Cook and Green observed the exterior ingress to the sun\u2019s limb at 9 hours 21 minutes local time, and exterior egress at 15 hours 29 minutes, also local time.<\/p>\n\n\n This is only the third transit of Venus since then. He knows all this because he looked it up last night, pleased to encounter new usages of ingress and egress. He knew the technical usage of zenith but not of nadir, a fine coincidence considering that his nadir appears to be now, local time, and his exterior egress lies not too far in the future, also local time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He looks through the eyepiece at the sun, which is not obscured by the copper beech, and as usual does not burn out his retina. The sun\u2019s disk nearly fills the field of view and he has to turn a knob to track it, because it’s moving faster then he remembered from thirty years ago, the last time he shot the sun. At the same time he’s scanning the whole field looking for a dark spot moving, which is hard, because the sun itself is moving relative to all the dust and dirt and fungus inside the theodolite and he has to watch that it doesn’t leave the field of view before he turns that knob. So he\u2019s juggling three levels of perception and movement, four if he counts that the eyepiece is an inverting one. But since he doesn\u2019t know whether Venus is transiting the sun\u2019s top or bottom, he doesn\u2019t have to adjust. Ah, slow movement. There it is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here, he says, stepping away, Go ahead and look. It\u2019s that little dot towards the top, which is really the bottom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She says, What?<\/p>\n\n\n\n He says, It\u2019s an inverting eyepiece.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She says, What the hell is that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Upside down, he says, Nevermind, just look for the little black dot moving.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus, she says, I have to go to work. You said this would be quick and there are who knows how many little black dots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yes, but only one is moving.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I don\u2019t see it. What a waste of time. I\u2019ll catch it on TV tonight, they probably have a better whatever than this one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He picks up the theodolite and its heavy tripod and packs it down the corner where there\u2019s a better view. While he\u2019s setting up again her car hisses by. He doesn\u2019t wave.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here it\u2019s good, a clear sightline. He knows he should have come here first, but the lure of looking for Venus up the nun\u2019s passage was too great.<\/p>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n