On Your Feet, Maggot!

I Love, and Hate, this picture.

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I Love it because, well, LOOK at that. All those worlds! All those People! All the exploring that can be done! A Trillion lifetimes wouldn’t be enough at Warp Speed. Which is why I hate it. I’m old and we haven’t even managed to make a place to live on our one Moon. The closest I’ve been to this grandeur is, what, 15-18 miles? (That was a special ride in an of itself but I was a whole generation younger.)

And, honestly, sometimes I hate having to drive the 3 miles into town for something. But I’d make this trip! To me, the perfect “Heaven” would be for my consciousness (the essential ME) to be able to travel to these distant places and observe. Just look. Forever.

Oh, Hey. It sprinkled some today. Never thought you’d hear this from me, but, Yay. We really need some rain for a couple of days. Heavy sprinkles would do. We couldn’t handle really heavy rain right now. No, that would be a bad thing for awhile.

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MCARC meeting went well this morning. They really don’t know what to think of me cause I will not let them run the meeting or BS for more than a minute or so before dragging them back on track. And I’m not afraid to call them on their “suggestions” about what the club should do; you can get lots of ideas, but no one will volunteer to actually do anything. Hell, you can’t even get most of them to do Field Day anymore.

But I did tap a couple of the younger (new) members to be the Public Information Officer(s), since that seemed to be the biggie this month. I’d love to have classes after the business meeting; but no one will volunteer to give any. So, what does one do? I just don’t know. It’s a fine balancing act between being too pushy and just letting them do what they’ve been doing these past 4-5 years. Which is a lot of talk.

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SWMBO took me to a new (to me) Teriyaki Chicken place in Bremerton (which has been there longer than I can remember). Was good. Then we spent too much money at WinCo; but the only “extra” thing I got was a cast iron cornbread pan.

Also made a short stop by the Vape Shop for some new atomizers. That’s spendy. That new Invader Mini I got has been giving me all kinds of errors for a few days. Thought changing the atomizer would help. Did, but still got the same errors. Wound up taking the thing completely apart and putting it back together one piece at a time. That seemed to help.

Say what you want about Vaping; I haven’t had a regular (analog) cigarette in over three years. And even though, cumulatively it looks expensive, I’ve saved over 2/3 of what I would have spent on smokes. And I would have.

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Anywho, picked up an old Icom 2000H for $100 to use as a base station so I can monitor our repeater (since one of the major complaints is that nobody ever uses our repeater except for our Nets). It works great and I’ve already learned how to program it and have programmed in all the repeaters I can clearly hit. Added some Fire, Sheriff, Ambulance, and even Seatac Approach. Mounted it underneath the box thingie my 857d sits on and it looks like it belongs there.

And now I can do PSK31 (or whatever) on 20-meters (or wherever) and still monitor our repeater. I’m beginning to understand why Hams have multiple radios. Now to save up for a new laptop. (Hopefully one with more than 3 USB ports!)


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Sorry About That, Chief. Would You Believe? …

Cloudy and a butt-ton cooler today than it has been. Nice in some ways. Hate to say it, but, we really could use a few days of moderate rain. You can hear how dry the trees are when the wind blows. Scary.

We Do NOT Want This Happening Here!

But I got out and ran the rider-mower around the front-lower and back yards. Hit something and bent that bell shaped thingie that encloses the blades and its making a lot of noise. Tried bending it back out but that didn’t work. So I quit for the day (mowing) and will fix it tomorrow. Instead I took the shears, and a walk, and cut blackberry bushes trying to encroach on my path. Should have worn gloves! And a long sleeved shirt. And long pants. Mostly because the mosquito’s are out in force what with the cooler weather.

Waiting on a guy to come by and buy my old tool-box from the Ranger. I want only $100 and it’s in really good condition. Well worth the price when you look online at the prices for a new one.

Although This Would Be Cool!

Mounted, well, re-mounted my 2-meter/440 antenna on the new tool-box and it’s working just fine. I saw a 100% improvement in both incoming and outgoing signals. Now I need to learn to program this “new” radio. I’ll probably wind up bringing it in and using Chirp to program the thing. With over 500 memories I should be able to program in every repeater between here and Pennsylvania! (Along the routes I’d be likely to take, that is.)

Guy came for the toolbox and paid cash (as I requested). I contacted the other guy abut buying that Icom 2100H, but it’s already been sold. So I’m going to get one of the Icom 2000H radios. It has only 63 memories but that should be more than enough for use as a base station here in my shack. I mean, how many repeaters can I reach from here? (Around 10.)

We Do NOT Want This Happening Here!

Not much else going on. Cooler than I like it mostly because the mosquito’s are taking advantage of the coolness to swarm. I already have 6 new bites! I even had to put clothes on! The Horror!

Watching “Battle Los Angeles.” Can’t help it – I still like most any movie where LA gets destroyed. (But I grew up there.)


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Goodbye, IDE Drives. You’ve Been Wonderful.

So, I just moved everything off the last IDE drive I’ve been using as a backup to the new external drive. Goodbye, IDE. Goodbye special power supply, connector, and the hassle of trying to get it to work through the USB port. Goodbye having to hunt all that crap down cause I forget where the hell I stored it until the next time I needed it. So, as of today, officially, there are no working IDE drives in my house. Hallelujah!

Now to take them apart and use the platters for that reflector I want to make.

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Made a run to O’Reilly’s and Westsound Auto to see if they had a standard, generic, radio bracket. Neither did. So I stopped by Ace Hardware and bought a couple of L-Brackets. Found some screws that fit in the sides of the radio. Used that center console thingie I got, and the Icom IC-208H is officially “mounted” in the truck. Now to redo the antenna wire and mount.

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Also made a dump run with the most stinky garbage I’ve ever had to empty. I don’t know what went over, but it gagged a guy dumping his garbage in the next bin. OMG, it was smelly! Took a shower when I got home “just in case.” Rinsed the back of the truck out. Twice. Thinking about doing it again. (The rinse; not the smelly garbage.)

Not much else going on. Watered what needed to be watered and am letting the sprinkler run on the grass for awhile. Picked a plastic bag full of peas that needed to be picked. (Meaning I picked the peas and put them in the plastic bag. Not that there was a plastic bag already full of peas and I picked that. Nevermind.) But the peas did need to be picked. Wait too long and they’re not as tasty.

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MCARC 10-meter Tuesday Rag Chew went well. I heard most everyone and they heard me. Antenna finally tuned up. Still need to rebuild it though. Although, I have enough trees around my place to make one damned big loop. Hmmm …


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I Feel Like One Big Mosquito Bite!

Cause I have 44 of them that I’ve counted so far. I expect to notice a few more before the evening is done.

Field Day went pretty good! I made only 10 contacts; but I was busy doing the “meet & greet” with visitors (of which we had a lot), helping put antenna’s up, some cooking, and a host of other things the Club’s President should be involved in. Even talked to the GOTA station we had set up at the Wal-Mart in Shelton. Talked to several prospective Hams.

Click To See 2015 Field Day Pictures

We called an early end to our portion of Field Day when I noticed Lightning (just before we heard the thunder). One strike a couple miles away (probably). The next one was closer. The next even closer. So we all decided to take our antenna’s down; and if the antenna’s are down there’s really not reason not to pack up and go home. I think we were all pretty tired anyway.

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SWMBO came out after work Friday, and after working the Genealogy Library Saturday. She fit right in talking to some of the visitors, and the rest of the Club members of course. Me? I like having her there. Even if she does almost beat me at Cribbage.

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This itching is driving me nuts! I think I have mosquito bites on my mosquito bites! Using a lot of that Aloe Vera with Lidocaine stuff SWMBO bought.

My goodness it was HOT Friday and Saturday. I enjoyed the hell out of it; but most everyone else (WaRshingtonians) were just wilted with the heat. But, I gotta admit the Caravan was just a bit too warm to stay inside it during the day.

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And that’s pretty much it. Radio is still in the Caravan so the Net will have to get along without me tonight. Aw. I’m going to take a shower and hit the rack.


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