What a beautiful night to be looking up. At 10 pm, the skies were sooooo gosh darn crystal clear, the light-polluting moon was still below the horizon, and the constellations were at the perfect rotation.
I was excited to see the Big and Little Dippers in full view for the first time since my recent interest in star gazing. I like to use these constellations as the key to finding Polaris (the North Star) when I'm away from my house. The trick is to find the two stars at the "spoon's tip" of the Big Dipper. These always point straight to Polaris. By the way, contrary to what many people think, the North Star is not a very bright star (disappointingly ordinary, really) and is often confused with Sirius (the Dog Star), which is THE brightest star in our skies next to the Sun.
My highlight of the night was being able to naked-eye spot the Orion Nebula in the cluster of three stars (Orion's Sword) just below Orion's Belt. This is a visual feast thanks to the clear skies of winter, which really is the best time of the year for star gazing. Jack Horkheimer gives an exhuberant video presentation (RealPlayer) of this nebula.
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