“Be Prepared” is the Scout Motto. It’s not the slogan. The slogan is, “Do A Good Turn Daily.” The difference is important. Both are important, but it’s hard to do a good turn if you aren’t prepared. I’ve done the Jamboree On The Air with my kids for the last 2 years. We never really…
The adventures with the IC-705 continue! This week, I installed the most recent release candidate for FT8. It contains a listing for the IC-705 so it doesn’t have to be spoofed. The application ran fine for me on my Windows 10 laptop. The radio did exactly what it should do and I got my first…
Working closely with technology for an extended period of time has colored my views on computing. I’ve gone from full-on, build it all myself or die to using whatever works reliably and jettisoning anything that fails. I can trace the completion of that transition to the point where I had a little baby boy to…
It’s been over a year since my last post. There are reasons for that, not limited to a move to another state and a global pandemic. It certainly isn’t because I’m not active in the radio hobby! In fact, moving has made me more available to the club that I belong to and their activities…
I’ve been struggling with the Go-Box concept for a while now. I’m trying to balance what I *might* do with what I’m *going* to do. And what I’m *going* to do probably 99% of the time when I’m out and about with HF is operate from my Jeep. That means that I will either be…
This really is a hobby made up of hobbies. And as is almost always the case, I have found ways to complicate things and tread on ground that either is seldom traveled or more easily avoided for most. See, I used to do a lot of audio editing and recording on GNU/Linux based systems back…
As is often the case, my dad sent me a text message as I was sitting around with my radio and put an idea in my head. It was a fairly simple idea and he was just trying to be helpful. But there went 90 minutes of poking at various bits of tech. I’ve been…
Not for nothing, but I assembled a sunclock with a Raspberry Pi and a touchscreen. It’s not particularly complex, but it makes for a nice piece on my desk. I also use the Pi for serving files and other odd jobs. It’s great piece of tech and I’m not sure why any self-respecting nerd would…
A few good things happened over the Thanksgiving holiday. One of them was that my dad came to visit. Not really a surprise as that’s how it goes every year. But this year, he brought his antenna analyzer and we got down to business with my 20m/40m dipole. It’s the same antenna I had some…
Ham radio really is a hobby made up of hobbies. It’s an onion and the more one peels, the more there is to peel. And there is no shortage of areas to explore. I got my license just about a year ago – I took my Technician exam on my dad’s birthday – and an…