I went to Dayton, Ohio this spring to the annual Hamvention, one of the largest Amateur Radio events in North America. This venerable event takes place at the Hara Arena, a venue that is looking particularly venerable at this point in the 21st century. When it hasn't been done over like a silk-covered sow's ear, replete with banners, advertisements ( Read more... )

The Ides of March

Today, many centuries ago “Big Julie” bought the farm.  In high school I played his corpse in a comedy skit put on by a bunch of upper classmen based on the famous Canadian comedians, Wayne and Shuster.  I loved this skit when I first saw it as a 10 year old in grade three.  I recall going to school the morning after I had seen ( Read more... )

(I apologize to the non-technical amongst you reading this.  But amateur radio is my hobby/passion and like any technical endeavour, be it medicine, law, sailing or baking, there is a specific technical patois that one must use to best communicate the concepts being discussed. If I use a term you don’t understand, keep in mind that in many browsers ( Read more... )

I survived the month of January.  It turned out not to be quite as bad as last year. I do see the sun once in a while, which is of great benefit. Of course, trudging down Graham Street towards downtown Woodstock through snow piles and ice is tolerable when the sun is out and warm on your face. I find it to be a most enjoyable way to get one’s ( Read more... )

August 30, 2012

Robbie and I had a good time in Newfoundland. The weather was only mildly crappy. There was rain for a few days, but then we actually saw the sun for several days as well, so no complaints!

On top of the pleasure of hanging out with Robbie's parents, Anne and Bob, we actually did a couple of things that were aimed at pleasing me ( Read more... )

This weekend is the American Radio Relay League’s VHF contest, or “QSO Party” as it is known. Basically another radio contest that involves making as many contacts as possible and collection “grid square” numbers in the process. The whole world is divided into grid squares for purposes of measuring distances, primarily for stations using Very ( Read more... )

I have tried off and on for months to get my FT-857D to talk to my iMac running Windows in emulation mode using VMWare. The problem has been getting the communications ports sorted out. I FINALLY got it all to come together today ( Read more... )

OK, it has been a month since my last entry and I feel I should soldier on with this blog even though I suspect precious few people ever read it. Hell! Even Robbie doesn’t read it! But he is not much of a reader anyway ( Read more... )

The ARRL DX Phone Contest has been in full swing all weekend. Translation: The American Radio Relay League Long Distance (i.e., foreign country) voice contest has been running this weekend. The ARRL is the national organization of radio amateurs for the US, although there are many Canadian members, including myself, as well. They sponsor a ( Read more... )

I finally got tired enough of trying to use the poor excuse for an antenna I had been using for shortwave listening and decided the time was perfect to do something different ( Read more... )