great american solar eclipse-anybody here see it?

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just got back from Madras OR to see the "Great American [Solar] Eclipse that was viewable there and in a 69-mile-wide band of totality reaching from a few hundred miles off the Oregon coast to South Carolina/out into the Atlantic Ocean. anybody else here see it? what were your impressions? I am curious. what I saw, after recovering from the nightmarish drive [traffic was murderously dense, bumper to bumper from south I-5 most of the way to Madras]. I chose Madras only because the weather forecast [damned inaccurate as is humanly possible to be, as the weather was totally opposite what they forecast, namely it was totally clear-sky sunny instead of the dense overcast the meteorologists predicted the day before] said it would be cloudy everywhere else. if only I could have known ahead of time I could have been saved a day's worth of hair-pulling stress and driving time in both directions. anyways, the traffic and most of the people mysteriously disappeared a few hours before the big event. the few who were left congregated on hillsides and ridges/bluffs to watch it, sitting on wildgrass among the sagebrush. at about 50% occlusion, the day got notably dimmer, resembling early evening in the summer, with the temperature dropping about 10 degrees and the wind picking up. shadows cast by my ponytail were VERY sharp, I could count the hairs in the shadow on the ground, due to the narrow aperture of sunlight cast. it was a hazy morning with smoke from forest fires all around, hanging in the sky but just before totality it seemed to evaporate for the most part. at totality, at approx. 10:15AM by my watch, it suddenly got twilight-ey, about like 9:30PM on a summer evening, with the ground still visible but most of the shadows obscured in darkness. the sky towards the horizon all around resembled about half-hour past sunset, a vague red and blue vibe was going on. the sky around the eclipsed sun was about like 9:30PM summer night also, with the brighter stars and planets visible, esp. Venus which was about 15 degrees away to the south. I did not notice the "diamond ring" effect in the beginning, prolly due to me wearing the eclipse glasses at the time, but noticed it at the end, which was dazzlingly bright. the corona extended about the width of a BB from the sun in all directions, and wavy lines of solar radiation extended outwards about 3 solar widths, in a silvery white color. the sky around was dark blue. people all around me, including TV camera crews, were going "OOOHHHH!" and "AAAHHHH!" when the second diamond ring showed up at the end of totality, people all had the same idea and hopped into their cars and suddenly the roads were jam-packed.

My family and I watched it as a partial eclipse from the backyard of our Portland home.

Saw a total eclipse from my yard. Some people from Florida came to watch with the people across the street. It was cool. I wouldn't call it life-changing like some people are calling it, but it was neat.

I'm working at an engineering company, so lots of the guys made homemade telescopes out of cardboard boxes, and there were plenty of the safe eclipse-viewing glasses that we passed around and shared. A whole bunch of us went out to see the partial eclipse. The air became a little bit cooler, calmer, and still, the atmosphere slightly pale.

It was a 71% eclipse in NYC. I didn't see the actual eclipse; I was afraid to look up directly at the sun.

The sky darkened slightly.

as the sky approached totality it took on a progressively dimmer quality much like the effect of putting on a pair of neutral density gray sunglasses, colors were less saturated, more washed-out.

Saw it through disposable cardboard framed eclipse viewing glasses.

I saw it in totality through the disposable glasses and even took a couple of pictures of it that didn't turn out. --I was expecting it to just slowly fade to darkness, not for it to go dark like somebody hit a light switch.

I saw a partial. The best thing was that the temperature cooled down for a while.

I took a walk at the height of it here which was about 70%. Mildly but noticeably dim but everything was a little different because we usually get that dark from rain or sundown/rise not when sun is out at a mid afternoon angle. Most of the weather stations in the area recorded a 3 to 4 degree drop in temperature and the wind picked up a bit also.

The coolest thing was the crescent shadow effect on the sidewalks from the leaves.

I am looking forward to the 2024 eclipse which will be 91 percent here.

i'm glad i'm not the only one here whose pics failed. anyways, they successfully captured the light levels I experienced, at least. interesting thing was that even at almost maximum occlusion [before the diamond ring] the sun appeared still round, albeit relatively dim.

Is it true Trump stared directly at it?

I stared directly at it and everything went all dark.