A series of recent ATELs indicates that the pros are very excited about BL Lac lately:
http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=14328 "The flaring blazar BL Lacertae observed below R=11.5, a new record for its optical brightness"
http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=14329 "Erratum to ATel #14328"
http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=14330 "Fermi-LAT gamma-ray flare in BL Lacertae contemporaneous with optical flaring activity"
http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=14334 "Multicolor-optical observation of the flaring blazar BL Lacertae"
http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=14342 "NICER follow-up observations of the flaring blazar BL Lacertae"
http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=14343 "Optical follow-up observations of the flaring blazar BL Lacertae"
I know firsthand that the weather at lest in Europe is a bit on the cloudy side but let's keep trying.
also see this one on a new blazar flare
http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=14345 "MASTER OT J104946.32+142938.5 - blazar optical flare"
Clear Skies
HBE
BL Lac is now difficult to observe for me as it is a very early in the night object.
There are signs of it dimming recently tho from it's hi state, so a few more datapoints to confirm and quantify this would be really useful.
CS
HB
FYI:
http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=14467
The name of the observer may sound familiar: Filipp Romanov has recently made some GRB afterglow observations (see e.g. https://www.aavso.org/grb-210306a ). It's always nice to see ATELs issued by amateurs! Congratulations!
CS
HB
Thank you! This is my first ATel and I'm glad to contribute to the science, but I'm an amateur astronomer - I do not have a "credential" in the ATel. So I had to ask another person to send my text.
With best regards,
Filipp.