[ILQSO] What A Day...

[Samuel Saladino]

First of all I hope everyone did great this year, and I can't wait to see the results.  For me, just about anything that could go wrong, did.  I finally decided I was going to run portable, and for the last few weeks I have been practicing out of this nice turn-around area at the dead end of a country road, with a clear view from horizon to horizon.  Well today when I arrived, someone stole the road!  I guess the State decided to put in sewer lines for a new subdivision in development at the turn-around, so they removed the road leaving numerous fifteen foot tall piles of gravel where it once was.  
 
So off to another area I went that might be ok, since there was a very low noise level there in the past, at a local park.  I wasn't sure if there'd be a problem hanging a wire antenna into one of the trees, so I thought I'd wait until one of the local Police Officers did their regular drive-through and ask them.  In the meantime I turned on the rig, attached to my 20 meter mobile whip and heard KN9T calling CQ from the Boone-Ogle-Dekalb-Winnebago county lines.  North-Central Winnebago County to South-East Winnebago County and a 4 county total, maybe it wouldn't be such a bad day after all.  But, about 2 minutes later a group of teens came over and sat at a picnic table not far away, with their boom-box blaring away.  Ok, no problem, I can move, so I did.  Unfortunately, since I had planned on operating portable, I simply had the rig sitting on top of the cooler and.... well.... yep.. it tipped over spilling the radio to the floor, ripping all of the wires out of the power plug.  A
 quick trip back to the home QTH, a lengthy search for some solder, and some head scratching trying to figure out how to get the pins out of the plug so I could repair them, and I was finally back on the air, only about 2 hours later.  
 
Of course now with only 20 meters to work, I should have known the propagation would take a dump on me about an hour later.  In the last 2 hours I worked, I had a total of 6 exchanges, and 2 of those were with Hams I'd talked to earlier so they were no good.  I was getting pretty frustrated, as well as feeling pretty down about the things that had happened during the day to ruin the plans I had made.  One more try, and just maybe the band will open back up and things would be different.  My CQ was answered by John KE5AAA who was in Crystal River Florida.  I gave him my exchange and waited to get mine in return.  John then continued on about how he was in Crystal River, which is the State of Florida's Sanctuary for Manatees.  He gave me a rundown of when they come into the river, and why, and a little history of the area's past.  The QSO went on for about 10 minutes, when the band again began to change and I lost him in the QSB.  
 
I looked at my log sheet, saw the total of 14 contacts, reached over, shut off the radio and called it a day.  It wasn't because I didn't do well and was frustrated or feeling sorry for myself.  It was because I was reminded why I became involved in Ham Radio in the first place. Communicating with people, making new friends and acquaintences, and my luck couldn't get any better than it was now.  Thanks John, and I hope to meet you again further down the log.  You just have to love Ham Radio.   As far as the QSO Party... just wait till Next Year!  
 
73s  KK7UN  Sam...