Alerted to sky at @ 4:50 pm on 12/5/08 by jet enjine sound while walking pet. Jet was identified as military with naked eye,but flying very high in north direction. "Bright Star" was then noticed in north direction. I continued to watch object for 5-7 minutes with reference to the trees, and object was slowly "drifting toward the west. I took my pet inside and grabbed my binoculars to get a better view, but when I returned outside the object was gone. I went to several different vantage points and scanned the sky, but could not locate it again. It was at least as bright as Venus is currently in the eastern sky. Definitely not Venus or Jupiter, and I'd bet that the jet was scrambled specifically to get a better view!