[Elecraft] Elecraft CW Net Announcement

[Kevin Rock]

Howdy Folks,
     The power finally came back on here at Buxton Lookout Ranch.  The snow 
has been falling in the quiet of a camping lantern lit evening.  Sam (the 
cat) has been bugging me for more food than usual but that's OK he needs 
it.  West Oregon Electric Cooperative informed me that we lost all 
connection to Bonneville Power about 11 PM last night.  They came very 
close to losing our local substation at Timber.  It seems there was a 
problem with the very voltage power lines coming from the dam down the 
Columbia Gorge.  Hopefully we will stay lit until I can recharge the 
battery for tomorrow's nets.  I had to drive into town to find out all 
this information since the batteries running our telephone equipment died 
some time during the nighttime hours.  Since Buxton is powered by PGE 
instead of WOEC their power comes along a diffent high voltage connection 
to the Bonneville Dam.  Pat's dad helped with wiring that dam long, long 
ago.  Thanks Spike (Wilfred, if I can get away with that).  He was a 
Golden Gloves boxer and trained his daughter very well.  I had to be 
careful she did not hurt me :)
    Tomorrow, barring incidents, I will be QRV at the appointed hours.  The 
battery is on charge so I will be ready to go at 2300z.  Hopefully the 
gale force winds predicted for the mouth of the Columbia and inland will 
not cause further outages.  We shall see.  I did get some reading done 
today and a few other chores off my list.  When I went to my nearest 
neighbor's house I found they were not home and their power meter was not 
moving.  So I went down into Buxton and got the mail.  Since their power 
was on I went visiting.  Our mechanic friend was home and his wife let me 
call WOEC.  They told me it would be several hours until the grid was lit 
up again.  That was at about 5 PM Pacific Time.  So we talked until he 
invited me to dinner.  That was nice of him since I was not sure what I 
had available to cook on our camp stove!  Then I got home to read for a 
few hours until WOEC lit the place back up a few minutes ago.  Sam and I 
were warmed by the fire I kept going and enjoying the silence of the 
evening.

     Please join us:
Sunday 2300z (Sunday 3pm PST) 14050 kHz
Monday 0200z (Sunday 6pm PST)  7045 kHz

Visit our web site: http://ecn.visionseer.com/ for further details.  Thank 
you for the web space Dan.

Until tomorrow stay warm and stay well,
     Kevin.  KD5ONS