Although it was cold and windy that night, I observed the occultation with binoculars through my living room window. The other problem concerned the observation of periodic comet Wild 2. Even though the positional information I provided was ok, I overlooked the location of the Moon on the evening in question. It was a less than eight degrees away from the comet. But, we can try again this month.
Earth is a freebie and one of the seven.
It is astonishing that there are a few of us who have never seen Mercury. Many more have not yet seen Pluto. This Summer we can try to remedy this disturbing situation. Since Mercury orbits the Sun every 73 days, it makes several appearances in the morning and evening sky each year. On some of these visits, the inner-most planet, due to the inclination of its orbit, stays pretty close to the horizon and because of its swift motion, can only be seen for a week or so.