SUPERMOONING

It's here at last, the previous one in 1948 just after the Second Great War, and the next one scheduled for 2034 (the supermoon, not another Great War), assuming we humans are still present on the Earth to view it. Taking its photo, however, was a bit trickier than I'd imagined. 

First, I had trouble catching it rising just above the horizon, as the Koolau Mountains were in the way, meaning that our first view in Honolulu would be at least 45 degrees above horizon, causing Supermoon to optically lose much of its 14% inflationary rate. Brighter, yes, but bigger, well maybe slightly so. Somewhat like Mr. Trump's blustering during the elections. '

Second, it always rains over the Koolau's at night, this one being no exception. I tried my best to tease Supermoon to peek out of the clouds when moonrise over the mountains finally occurred, and, as you can see, it did. That's what I call real mooning. 

And finally: I wanted to take a photo of it using my telescope later in the night after it traversed the sky and repositioned itself beautifully over Honolulu, but, frankly, it was, as promised, very large. Too large, in fact, to view in entirety in my telescope even at lowest power, and by the time I got out my whale spotter binoculars, the late night shore clouds had begun creeping in. 

So here's a supermoon from paradise!