I had other obligations at my girlfriend's place in New Hampshire this weekend, so i knew i was only going to make a token efffort this year. After the dust had settled by early sunday afternoon, I could get on the air. Aurora's house has a back yard that slopes down dramatically over a good-sized field, so I threw a random wire off  the deck, added a counterpoise and plugged my Icom 706 in to make some QSOs.

Jonah, my girlfriend's 6-year-old, is quite fascinated  by all the radio stuff, so he settled in and I immediately put him to work; i printed out a map of all 50 states and turned the afternoon into a geography lesson. He looked up where each  state was on a big map, then colored it in on a paper US states map we'd printed off. Finally, he wanted to talk, so i gave him the mike a few times and let him call stations. He gave my call and I gavethe long exchange of info. The reaction on the other end was very gracious: "Thanks for getting the little guy on!", "Gee, that doesn't sound like you, Sean" and once after I'd taken the mike back and completed my side of the exchange, "Hey,  where'd the OTHER guy go?"

80 Meters Sunday  evening was a lot of fun. While I ahve a lot of line noise at this QTH, and my antenna wasn't great (Ok, I'll admit it, I was an alligator on 80), Jonah was amazed by all the stations on from W3. 

"Sean, where's this guy from?"

"Maryland."

"Maryland? AGAIN?"

I guess that's a testament to the PVRC group!

After it was bedtime, I hung the colored map (15 states colored in) on the wall next to his bed, where he  lay looking at it for quite some time. We could hear him saying "Kilo Xray Nine Xray, portable one!" to himself as he was trying to sleep.

I only made 34 QSOs, but this was one of the best Sweepstakes I've ever had. Thanks for all the encouragement for the lil' guy..I wonder how we'll do in the Multioperator category?

73,

Sean (and Jonah)