Hi everyone!

I've gotten a lot of emails from folks regarding their enjoyment of this blog (who would've guessed?) so I'm back by popular demand! hihi

I've received some terrific emails from former staffers that had the pleasure of working with Laird Campbell, W1HQ. I honestly have much more reverance walking into our club station, feeling as though a piece of this generous, kind, humorous and all around good guy, is there with us. I received an email yesterday which i'm posting here, it says is all:

"Good afternoon Katie,

I enjoyed reading about the W1HQ station and the info on my friend Laird.
It was my great pleasure to stop in Amarillo about 6 months before Laird died and have an eye-ball QSO with him. I had known Laird from the time I was Dakota Division Director in 1970. As a staffer in the 80's, I enjoyed our lunch bunch get together with the old timers who stopped in.

When I left visiting with Laird, he fired up his two meter rig and we had an on the air QSO also. I always remember him and his great love of ham radio. His positive impact on the hobby was immeasurable.

73,
Larry Shima W0PAN
Founding Director
The ARRL Foundation, Inc."

Fortunately it seems that Laird did have a terrific sense of humor, so it's likely that he would have been okay with our 7' green stuffed snake as the club mascot. Speaking of the snake - any more ideas out there? We do need to get ourselves organized and some more on air practice for our newer operators. I need to pick a date for our on air operating event too - that's when we'll announce the winner of the contest! Would you believe that it seems to be a general consensus out there that I should bring the snake to Dayton with me?! I'm sorry, but I need space in my luggage for the important things (yes, shoes). Hey, I may be a ham, but I am trying to be another Immelda Marcos some day (just ask any of my co-workers, they'll agree!).

So since my last entry, I've added some more to my log. I talked to Yuli VP8DLG and Mohammed in Algeria, 7X4AN. Then Paul, G0KHK/M decided to fire up his rig for the commute home for work (my lunch time) when he was running 100w from his car near Birmingham, England. Again - I mean, how cool is ham radio? Last Wednesday, I finally was able to get a Q with TX5C DXpedition!

I'll wrap up with a hint of the next entry. I was asked not too long ago to share a bit in more detail WHAT i'm learning. I know in the blog during the DX Contest I said I was learning a ton, but I didn't really say what - excellent point! I will get to that in another blog. I like to think of myself as a guinea pig for all the elmers out there. Hopefully by seeing, hearing, and listening to what us new hams are going through to get on the air and become good operators, you'll be able to help!

For now, I'm going to sign off and get ready for the week! Thank you to all of you who are reading this and keeping up with my stories. I really appreciate all the feedback.

For now, 73 one and all!

Katie W1KRB

It's Monday and we're back in work-mode. I'm still pretty jazzed about the weekend. I learned SOOOOO much! Thank you Sean for mentoring me this weekend! I think this is one aspect of ham radio that is very fascinating - that there is always something to learn. When you learn you grow. And when you have a mentor to help you, it's all that much better. I am excited at learning a new method of operating, and my mentor is excited to watch the light go on in my head!

The issue of mentoring really is critical. There were over 26,000 people that earned their Technician license last year. Now it's my job, your job, your club's job, our job here at HQ - to help these people to Get On the Air. That's not just a slogan or a tagline! It's critical to our future. Embrace the new hams and help them. I am coming up on my 2 year anniversary of having a license and I still feel like a newbie. I really am, I've only been operating on my own for about 2 months now!

I'd like to think of myself as a relatively intelligent woman, but sometimes it is hard to ask for help - we all know that! So if you are an experienced operator - don't wait for that new person to ask for help - offer yourself and your time! Your time and knowledge are truly a gift!!! It all starts in the shack!

Well apparently there's no sleeping this weekend for some folks! When I arrived this morning, Sean was running a pileup as W1HQ and the bands were hoppin! I decided to work on the blog, aggravate him with snake pictures, and just generally wait for my coffee to kick in before getting on the air.

So far it's just the two of us. We're hopin Jodi, KP1JPA is going to stop in. We'll see how the day goes. I've been having fun in the meantime, digging through the QRM and diggin out calls - i love that challenge! I'm excited because I finally got to talk to my friend Chris, MI0JZZ on the air! That was very cool.

Ok, time to go QRT for a bit...pizza just arrived!!

73 for now!

Wow are the bands a buzzin' or what?!!!! WOW!!!!

After asking around this week, we decided to deviate from our S.O.P of operating W1AW for the DX Contest, and activate W1HQ instead. We've been having such a positive experience this week with our newer operators excited to get on the air, that we wanted to provide a DX opportunity. Well of course, as fate would have it in New England, it snowed. It started Friday night and finished up in the morning. It actually wasn't that bad of a storm, about 4-5 inches here in Newington - so for Sean and I who both live no more than 2 miles away each, it wasn't a problem for us to get here. The roads were actually nice and clear by 10am. So Sean got here before I did and got the station up and running and I took care of the important stuff of the day - snacks for the shack! After all, we were expecting visitors!!

At the beginner's station, we now have the Kenwood TS-480 all set up and running, which we could use on a different band than the HF station, an Icom 765 (which will be replaced soon with an Icom 756 ProIII - woo hoo, yipppeeeee!!!! THANK YOU ICOM!!!!). Sorry, I digress....I think I really have turned into a ham now, I totally get excited about new rigs, antennas, software for logging, you name it, it makes me happy! :o)

Ok, so I started working 20m and HOLY COW - the bands are PACKED! This is SOOOO exciting!!! Bottom of the sunspot cycle??? Now granted, I don't know what it's like when it's not the bottom, so this just gets me salivating for about 3 years from now! So I'm cooking on 20m and Sean is over here at the Kenwood working 15m and cooking away as well. Finally our first visitors of the day show up! It's our very own - Penny N1NAG with her grandson Tyrique - a brand new ham and who's call is completely escaping me at the moment (sorry T). He is like most other 12 years olds - a BUNDLE of energy and it was hard to keep him still for a bit, but I showed him my log and who I talked to and then had him find that country on our giant map (I knew that map would end up being more than just a wicked awesome map on the wall!). Penny had many errands to run, but wanted to check in on us and let Tyreke see the station (and me...he's my new best bud!)

Around 1pm or so, Steve, WV1X stopped in! He didn't want to move anyone off the radio, so I took a break and let him get on the air! After all, the contest goes till 7PM on Sunday! So Steve was making some QSOs, then Sean returned with lunch so they went and ate in the conference room. I got back on the air since I had a breakfast sandwich just a couple hours before that and I wanted to play some more! While doing some S&P on 20m, Dave, N1NAS stopped in. Perhaps we piqued his interest a bit this week during our session? He sat down with the Kenwood and listened to 15m and was rather content there.

Well, as supper time rolled around Sean and I decided to go QRT a bit and get out of the station and get some food. Our first idea didn't pan out due to a lack of parking. Second idea didn't pan due to the boarded up windows! Third idea got killed as we drove by our ultimate destination and pulled a u-turn to go back to the Vietnamese restaurant...Chicken Lemongrass and Chicken Curry - Yum. Ok, now we've revitalized our energy and back to the station!

I had an amazing evening. Last night, I was the student and Sean was the Elmer. He taught me the fine art of listening and working split on 40m. Not let me preface this - I'm not allowed to use packet when I'm doing this. I'm only listening. I found sometimes would hear the transmit frequency before their call, so I'd at least get that set up, then go back and listen. Using the VFO split feature is such an amazing tool. Well, we decided to wrap it up around 11pm...Time for us all to get some sleep and resume on Sunday!