This past weekend, my friends Larry, N4VA, and Coleman, K4RZ came up from Virginia to visit. I guess Larry and I have known each other for 6 or 7 years now, and we chat (usually online while we're both at work) quite frequently. We try to have an "eyeball QSO" at least once a year or so, and while I'd planned to head down to visit last summer, all kinds of things kept that from happening, so I was happy that they were able to come up to visit me.
Although Coleman is pretty much a "newbie" to ham radio (like me), Larry's been licensed since 1960, and has done his share of operating around the world from places like Thailand, Guyana, Japan, and even Bangladesh. (I keep trying to encourage him to go back there; I need that one!) We spent most of the weekend just chatting, mostly about ham radio. We spent some time in the shack just making the occasional contact in the CW version of the ARRL International DX contest, though it was more for me to just pick up a new band fill here and there. I think that I only made around a dozen contacts in total, though I did submit my log as I've mentioned previously. In this case, with so few contacts, I'm pretty sure I won't win anything, but it does serve as a check log for the contest sponsors, and only takes a couple of minutes.
It was really fun to have someone "in-house" to just talk radio with, and it's great to get Larry's perspective on various things. For example, with all the talk about whether or not Kosovo will be a new DXCC entity, still officially unknown as of the time that I'm writing this, Larry's opinion was that based on the guys who were operating there, it seemed like a pretty good chance that it would be a "counter". We'll see if Larry's right or not, but my money is with him. For what it's worth, I worked a couple of stations last night using the YU8 prefix, one being YU8/OH2R and the other YU8BH, since, as they stay Work First, Worry Later (WFWL). If they only count for Serbia, well, it's cost me a couple of pennies of electricity to work them. If they do count for Kosovo as a new DXCC entity, I've got 'em in the log. I guess we'll see.
Ham radio is more than "couple of pennies of electricity"...
ReplyDeletePlease send me adress I will send cost of electricity for contact with me.
Also, if you need my qsl card, it is free for you. No Us$, no irc...
Some things can't buy with money.
yu8bh
Hello Stefan,
ReplyDeleteI think that you may have misunderstood what I was trying to say. I was only trying to say that the few pennies of electricity that it may have cost were well worth it, if even the contact with you winds up counting as Serbia, not Kosava. If I made it sounds that I was complaining that I may have worked "only" Serbia and am complaining, that was not my intent, and please accept my apologies. In fact, as it turns out, I need to have YU confirmed on CW (I have numerous contacts but have not yet confirmed them), so I would very much like to have your card to confirm the contact.
Thank you for responding to my posting, and I wish you good DX.
73,
David, K2DBK