I read about the 4 a.m. Project yesterday but did not plan to do anything. However, thanks to a bl**dy service message from bl**dy Orange, I found myself awake at 3.45 and decided to pop out into the garden. I was unprepared and had to hand hold an exposure of 8 seconds, but at least I got an image.

And what an alarming image it is. Not the ugly house we call 'Fawlty Towers', not the vapour trails, but the BLUE stars. That is Orion in the middle there and they were not known as fixed stars for nothing. Now if I remember anything about physics, a blue Doppler shift means the object is coming TOWARDS you! I thought the Universe was expanding and now I have evidence that it is COLLAPSING. Why hasn't anyone told us? Or did it just start to collapse at 4 a.m. this morning? If so, what did those guys at the 4am Project know that we didn't?

I am beginning to feel the gentle embrace of insanity ...