[Fists] roundtables Glowbugs and Boatanchors

[AC5SH at aol.com]

When you are new and working SIX STATIONS AT ONCE!
 
Back when my cw skills were even poorer than they are now, there was a  group 
called the Glowbugs and Boatanchors who met around 7.148 Mcps or so.  I think 
at least a couple of the ops are Fists and I remember that at least  a couple 
of them were broadcast engineers. I remember one yl was a BC engineer.  They 
were all quite skilled and most could work from the very lowest speeds to  way 
out past 20 wpm. One day I was tuning around, looking for a station to  work 
and there was one of them calling cq, I don't remember if he added gb,ba  
(glowbugs and boatanchors) or not. He was at roughly my maximum speed and I  
answered him. I didn't know it but I had just barged into their roundtable. We  
swapped reports and the next thing I knew, he passed it to another station and  
that station said hello and passed it off and I guess I had six stations 
talking  to me at the same time. They all adjusted their speed so I could copy 
easily.  They all gave me a big welcome and a coouple sent qsl cards later. It did 
kinda  freak me out because it was the first time I had been in that situation 
on air.  I might have taken one more turn but on maybe the third time around, 
I  apologized for breaking into their "net" and signed out. The guy that 
seemed to  be NCS (yes, I now know there isn't really an NCS in a roundtable) 
asked me to  stay but I was rather frazzled and I signed out anyway.
 
These were great ops and although I'm not sure if I ever checked in again,  I 
did listen to them (they were great copy practice) when conditions and time  
permitted. Sometimes, I still go up to the high end of  the old 40mtr novice 
sub-band to see if they are there, thinking  I will pop in on them again. I 
have not heard them lately.
 
cq cq cq gb, ba de ac5sh   are you guys out there  somewhere?
 
Tim, AC5SH



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