[Utah-astronomy] Defeat

Last night was a great one for observing or astrophotography from SPOC. Unfortunately, I struggled all night without success. At one point near dawn Patrick found M51 for me and I got a crappy picture. I then went to a bright star to focus, and when I tried, I couldn't find M51 again. I didn't have the knack of my new RoboFocuser; also, everything kept drifting. In the morning I checked whether my gear had lost its level, but it was still level. Then I checked the balance and found it was far out of balance, which must have caused the distressing failure to track correctly. Thanks, your discouraged pal, Joe