Finally Jupiter

Jupiter has been calling my name, begging to be observed, for the past several nights. Tonight was cool and clear with NO WIND (amazing), so I decided to dust off my ETX-70 and setup in the front of the house, street lights and all. At least I had plenty of light to get things level and check out everything. When I finally turned on the power, the comedy of errors began. I had made a mental note to myself to be sure and change the Site setting from Rolla to GGG. Of course I forgot. I also forgot to snug up all the leveling bolts on my pedestal contraption, soooo... after guessing which way was north, I aligned on my favorite fall star: Capella. The scope was clearly way off, mainly too low. Did I say that I also set the time wrong? After noticing that the base was wobbling, I snugged up the rest of the bolts and made sure things were level. A couple more tries and I finally remembered to set the time and Site correctly. Finally got Capella with a minimum of searching. Aligned more or less, I next slewed to Jupiter, burning bright above the garage. A bit more searching and I had it in the crosshairs too. I spent probably the better part of the next hour admiring the view through various filters, my 10mm and 2x barlow. All four moons were clearly visible in the 10mm, kind of hard to make out with the 26mm. I was able to see two storm bands pretty clearly.
Next I tried for Uranus. No luck, it was behind a palm tree. On to Neptune. I thought I had it but the star field wasn't quite right. I tried lining up on Delta Cap but never was able to snag Neptune for certain. It may also be a bit dim at almost mag 8. Uranus should be ok if it comes out from behind the palm tree (or I move the scope). All in all it wasn't too bad for a first night out. Oh, and I also banged away and cursed the speed button before I realized it wasn't the Enter key! How soon we forget.
Now I'm trying to decide if it is worth hauling this thing down to the park when and if I ever get to do an astronomy outreach program there. We'll see.