Light Posting Ahead

As if I could get any "lighter" than I already am.....

We're head out to Colorado Thursday morning to see the grandbaby, hang out with the family, and do some serious house hunting.

Here's the little guy all dressed up for his first Mother's Day:

I've got about 12 items from my eBay sales to get packed and shipped today, and then have some chores around the house to do before we get out of here.

And I have to get my rolling duffle out of the garage and pack it up.

I'll be on the Iowa all day Wednesday doing some meetings and a recap of our Armed Forces Day Cross-Band test where we had the Iowa on-the-air as NEPM for the first time since 1990.

I went pretty well, with a few operator error snafus, and a few technical problems, but we had a great turn out, plenty of operators, and some great food from one of our new members whose wife owns a sandwich shop, and makes killer potato salad.

Had some "family issues" yesterday that shot the whole day (Rev. Paul knows what I'm talking about), but that seems to have settled down for now.

Pix from the Iowa NEPM ops might be posted later today, God willin' and the crick don't rise!

The Dentist Said...HOW MUCH?!!!?

Oh, boy......

I got back from the Dentist a while ago and I'm still reeling from "Sticker Shock".

I knew I need some dental work as I've been getting food trapped between my rear most molars on the bottom on both sides, and a month or so ago I had a chip break out of one on the lower right side. Plus, I need a really good cleaning as I haven't been to the Dentist since I retired 3 years ago and lost my Dental coverage at the Dentist I've been going to since 1995.

My wife's dental plan didn't cover her, and while I'd been to my wife's Dentist during my lay-off between Boeing and Energia, I just kinda-sorta "never went" back since I started retirement.

WELLLLL.....I need a bit more than I anticipated.

A LOT more, in fact.

About $18k more......

To start, I need a crown on one tooth, but at least that tooth in good enough shape that it doesn't need a root canal.

And I have three fillings that are "leaking" and need to be replaced. The X-Rays show those three teeth are in good condition except that the fillings are shot.

The real kicker is I need THREE teeth extracted, and implants placed there or the teeth above them will soon get all weirded out, and I'll lose them.

And because of a night-time problem of grinding my teeth when I sleep, my lower front teeth are worn to the point that if I don't get all of them crowned, they'll be going bye-bye in a few years....

Looks like my "Colorado Garage Fund" just took a major hit.......

Little Noah Finally Goes Home!

YAY!

The natal ICU was happy with his progress, and he hasn't had any "incidents" in a long enough time to be released, so the kids brought him home Tuesday.

Here's the happy Mom with the doggie nannies in attendance:

And here's a short video of the little guy snuggled in his car seat on the way home.

We're headed out there next week to spend a week with the kids and Noah, and do some house hunting.

My wife has TWENTY DAYS of work remaining before she retires.

President Trump Finally Says "You're FIRED!" to Comey

I was hoping he'd do it in his first 100 days, but hey...better a bit late than never!

Trump Fires Comey


Stand by for a deluge of liberal tears, and the inevitable leftist meltdown.....

Rainy Day Sunday, Moving Preps, and Other Stuff

Getting some "Spring Rains" here in SoCal. Got about .15" last night/early today, and it just cut loose again.

That's a bit unusual here for this time of year, but not unheard of.

Total as of right now is about .38", and it's slowed from a pretty good downpour (for out here) to a nice steady drizzle.

I'm sloooowly getting the Radio Room cleaned out, and I've gotten rid of about 1/3 of the stuff that was stacked up in here. A lot of it is going on eBay, some on QRZ and eHam, some has been given away, and some of it is outside on the back porch on it's way to either the eWaste place, or the recycling place for anything aluminum or copper. It kind of pains me to scrap some of it as it's older, but perfectly functional, stuff that I know somebody could make use of, but that nobody wants.

Some of it's heavy, and not too many people will bid on a good, usable $10 item if the shipping is $25!

I haven't sold much on eBay in the last year or so, and when I took my latest bunch of stuff to get shipped I got hit with "sticker shock" when I had to pay the tab to ship it. Stuff that used to cost $10~$15 to ship cost $20~$25 this time, and I wound up losing money on a couple of items. The items I put on eBay last Sunday had shipping prices that I thought were a bit high, but people have bids on them, so I guess I'm not out of line.

I don't use the eBay Shipping Calculator as I've found it to be grossly low on the actual cost of shipping, even when I "padded" the dimensions and weight, and ADDED 10% to that! I lost my 10% discount at the place I use as my friend sold the business to a nice young couple so he could go full time into the coffee roasting/selling side business he had going, so that accounts for a small cost increase, but geez.....I'm paying DOUBLE what I did just a year or so ago.

As far as The Great Colorado Move goes, we talked with a couple of handyman guys to get some things done here that I can't or won't do ( I do NOT paint! Long story there....), and one guy never called back, and one guy has a big project remodeling the bathroom at The Aerospace Corporation in El Segundo that's paying him big bucks, and he can't squeeze us in within the time frame my wife wants.

We need some wall repair/painting inside, a driveway gate replaced, and a bunch of other stuff done. This week I'm pulling some antennas down and packing them up, and then the patio area is getting taken down due to dry rot and termite damage. The top of the patio area is where I have my 33' HF vertical, so I have to get that off the "roof" of the patio, pull down my elevated radials, and remove the remote antenna coupler, coax, and a bunch of stuff so my son and I can disassemble the structure.

My wife thinks she can just take my SawzAll and chop the thing down, but I know better, although there's been a few times in the last couple of weeks when I've been tempted to get the SawzAll out, and tell her to have at it........

Thought for the Day for All Those "Special" Little Snowflakes Out There.....

Courtesy of a buddy on the FarceBook "Friends of SAC" page....

Battleship Iowa Armed Forces Day Military/Amateur Cross-Band Operation

The Battleship Iowa will be operating with her original US Navy callsign of NEPM on 11 May 2017 from 0900PDST to 1700PDST, 1600UTC to 2359UTC.

The ARRL announcement is located here, and the official MARS announcement is located here.

Frequencies used to transmit from the ship, and the frequencies we will be listening on, are shown below.

The transmit frequencies have been assigned by Army MARS for exclusive use by NEPM, so you shouldn't have any trouble hearing use as nobody else will be transmitting on these frequencies.

We'll be using our "regular" Commercial Amateur Radio gear and the Disc/Cage antenna on the bow of the Iowa, and the Trussed Monopole located on the top of the AFFF station near the helodeck on the stern of the ship.

The "Grey Radio Gang" WILL be operating the ship's "legacy" on the 75/80 Meter and/or the 40 Meter frequencies.

Grandson Update....

The little guy is rapidly approaching SIX pounds now, and is drinking around 90% of his bottle.

Bigger and bigger, stronger and stronger as they days go by. Medical advances for premies are astounding. It wasn't that long ago his chances of survival at 10 weeks early would have been pretty slim.

We'll be seeing him in about a month, and I get to hold him.

Wonder if he'll grab at my beard......

Happy Earth Day!

The USAF wishes all our terrorist friends a very Happy Earth Day!

Your gifts should be arriving shortly.....

"The X-Files" Is Coming Back Again....

According to this article over at CNET, Fox has signed up for another 10 episodes.

And that reminds me....I still haven't watched the six episodes I recorded the last time it "came back"....

Something to do this weekend while the wife is visiting her friend.

Busy Day

Spent the day on the Iowa doing radio stuff, and in meetings.

Museum Ship's Weekend is coming up, so I have a few things to tinker together for the Grey Radio Gang, namely another little adapter box so they can interface a "Red Phone" with a laptop to route some audio to the Combat Engagement Center.

But before that, we have the Armed Forces Crossband Test coming up. This is a test whereby we'll be allowed to transmit on approved DoD frequencies, and listen on the Amateur Radio frequencies.

Sometime back, one of our members was able to contact the guys that do USN ship callsign assignments. He also contacted the USCG Heron, which was using the callsign NEPM at the time.

The importance of the USN callsign NEPM is that it's the callsign originally issued to the USS Iowa when she was commissioned.

The Captain of the Heron was more than willing to release the callsign, and in exchange we helped him get NHRN, an exchange that made both sides happy.

We now have authorization to use NEPM, "In Perpetuity", from the DoD, and we'll take the Iowa on-the-air, using the 1980's ship's legacy radio gear, on May 11th this year.

This will be the first time the Iowa has been on-the-air with NEPM in 27 years.