QRT FOR A LONG TIME

I've come back to the hobby after 24 years of radio silence! Fortunately, I kept my license renewed over those years. I got my Novice ticket, with callsign WB2LUB, when I was in middle school in 1977. I got my Extra class license and the callsign KG2B in high school.

I'm meeting a lot of hams who have had a similar "dead time" in their ham careers. It's good to be back. The hobby has changed in many ways, but mostly technical ways.

In February of 2005 I got a nice Yaesu FT-301D from a ham through ebay, and got back on the air with my dipole from my novice years, in Gainesville, Florida. This rig is over 30 years old, but it's easy to use and easy to work on! I feel lucky to remember CW as well as I have, too.

I'd like to meet other hams using the FT-301D.I've put together just about the complete FT-301 line. I'd like to hear from hams who have made the 30 Meter modification to this rig. I havethe FT-221R, an all mode2 meter rig that matches the 301. I'm looking for anyone interested in some 2 Meter CW.

NEW CW OPERATOR?

On July 6, 2005 we had a girl named Paula. As a baby, Paula was very gracious allowing me almost daily operating time. When she was two or so, I started teaching Paula Morse Code, on and off.

By the end of 2008, she actually learnt her name in Morse, and a few other words. I had hopes she might be Morse "literate" by age four, but that was not realistic. She's in kindergarten now, and she does remembers those few words, and every so often lets me teach her more.

At the end of August, 2005 we moved to the small town of Dover Plains, New York and spent about a year there. In 2007 we moved to Delmar, where we have family and where I was first licensed, too.

LIKE QRP

I enjoy QRP operations from time to time and the Rockmite rig I built for 40 meters is a lot of fun.

MOBILE CW

For a long time I wanted to try mobile CW operations. I finally made this happen in June 2010. The mobile rig is a Yaesu FT-857D with the matching Yaesu ATAS-120A screwdriver antenna. The car is a 2009 Nissan Versa hatchback. My key is a set of Kent paddles simply resting on the passenger seat; the antenna is attached to a lip mount on the hatchback.

In the last year, most of my airtime has been using the mobile rig, either early in the morning on the way to work, or in the afternoon on the way home, usually on 40 meter CW.

Tell me about your mobile setup. I'm always interested in ideas to improve the radio- and egronomic-design of mine.

The FT-857D is a good rig. I like it so much I got an FT-897D as a "modern" backup to the FT-301D at home.and for portable operation on trips, maybe?

UNION ELECTRICIAN

In 2009, after Paula was settled into a routine at daycare and now kindergarten, I started a five year apprenticeship to be a union electrician. My union is the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 236.

Around this region, there is the very unusual situation that there isa lot of work in construction! I never forget that that is NOT the case around the country and around the world, too.

WE NEED STRONG UNIONS

As we working people suffer more and worse consequences of the economic depression underway, we're going to need union organization more and more. Big-business politicians have no solutions to the current crisis, except for one rule of thumb: make the working class pay.

As I write this updated biography, a big battle is underway in Wisconsin by state workers. The state government is seeking to destroy the bargaining rights of most state workers. The workers are being made to pay for the crisis created by capitalism. Everywhere, not just in Wisconsin, working people are being cajoled into thinking we all have to sacrifice to get through the economic depression.

Are "we" really all making a sacrifice?In the case of state funding problems, for example, the very wealthy bondholders who hold the debt racked up by state governments are never never neverasked to let the state slide on some of the interest payments that are due.Why not? Couldn't these very well off billionaires afford to make a sacrifice like that? Why must a state worker sacrifice his or her health insurance or pension?

I'd like to meet other hams who would like to discuss this. Please email me if you are interested.

See you on the air!