11/07/2012 | W4AU

 I had a few goals for CW SS this year:

1. Keep up a string of unassisted sweeps 2. Make 1,000 Q's 3. Operate at 24 hours 4. Lower my best UBN report     Well, the first goal to fall by the wayside was the operating time. As you  can see, I only got in 16 hours, which was disappointing. I had a good  start and stayed in the chair from the start until ~0700Z and then grabbed  a few hours sleep. After some solid hours Sunday morning the first "issue"  arose, and I was off the air for a few hours. I got back on in the early  afternoon with some good rates, but by then I knew that it was not going to  be my best performance so I succumbed to the beautiful Fall weather and  went for a long walk with the XYL. It felt good to be in the fresh air, and  I didn't feel too guilty because I had just worked my last mult, KL2R, for  the sweep. Of course, another AK station called me later in the contest...  I put in some solid hours later in the afternoon and found the rates quite  good for that time during SS; they stayed in the 35-50 per hour range.  Working SO2R sure helps keep things interesting and more productive.     Since most of my goals seemed already missed, I agreed to going to our  neighbor's house for dinner and had a very pleasant time, getting back in  time to work the last ~40 minutes of SS on 80.     I worked all the sections at least twice except for NT, PR, and SB. Where  were all the Santa Barbara stations? I found VY1EI with the second radio on  the bottom of 20 Sunday morning and worked NP4Z Saturday evening on 40  (again on the second radio) but heard him later on numerous occasions. I  went on a serious AK hunt on 15 early Sunday afternoon for my last section  and after a careful sweep of the band found him! That's when I decided I  could go on the walk!     All the equipment in the shack worked flawlessly for the whole time. I have  found the P3 spectrum scope display to be an indispensable tool for  assessing band conditions and for finding "holes" for running quickly when  things get crowded. My Yagi was another issue. After Sandy went by the  resonance on the beam changed and the SWR on 20 and 15 went south so I had  to use my tuner to keep the amps happy. This made rapid band changes  somewhat cumbersome, to say the least!     All in all, not my best SS, but still feel good about things. Hope the  score helps PVRC to continue to hold the high club score.     TNX to all the other PVRC'ers for getting on the air and for their Q's.     73 - John, W4AU   -- W4AU