Comet 17P/Holmes

A normally inconspicuous short-period comet (it completes one orbit around the sun every 6.9 years) brightened amazingly over a few hours a couple days ago, going from magnitude 18 (visible only in very large amateur telescopes) to magnitude 2.8 (naked-eye visibility). After getting home this evening from a Yolo Audubon fundraising letter stuffing party (not to mention watching the ballgame), I had a look from out in the driveway. It was easy to spot in binoculars once I figured out I had to look up higher than I was, it appearing as a little round fuzzball against the star field in Perseus.
With the 7” telescope I could see a bright central spot in the middle of the circular fuzzball.

In mid-northern latitudes the comet is now visible in the northeast portion of the sky in the evening, around 35° high at 9 PM local time. There is a finder page linked from this page about the comet.