[NLRS] Business items for today

[W0ZQ at aol.com]

Good morning NLRS land.    A  potpourri of items for your review.   First, 
the calendar  ahead.

1)  Our next NLRS breakfast is Sat., March 8th, at the  Richfield Old Country 
Buffet @ 8:30 am.
2)  Midwinter Madness is Sat.,  March 29, 8:00 am to 1:30 pm, at the Buffalo 
Civic Center, Buffalo  MN.   NLRS will have a table in the Club Corral area, 
so make sure to  stop by.   Earl, I do have the NLRS banner and frame.
3)   Aurora'08 is Sat., April 26th at our usual spot in White Bear Lake.    
Our goal is to have the antenna range and junk swap in the morning, a lunch  
break, and our technical program & business meeting in the afternoon, then  be 
out of there by 5:00pm.   This is an election year and I am  encouraging ANY 
member to give strong consideration for running -drop me a note  if you are 
interested.  This is a great club, but I have been at the helm  for a while and 
its good to occasionally bring in some fresh perspectives ...  give it a thought.
4)  The SBMS 2.3 GHz & Up contest is May 10 and  11.   As last years 
champions, its our responsibility to defend the  cup !   This contest is like the 
ARRL's 10GHz & Up contest, but  its for freq of 2304 and up.   You have already 
seen a few emails from  Gary, WB0LJC, and expect to see a few more as time gets 
closer.   If  you have ever thought about giving the microwaves a try, this is 
a very fun  & easy going contest to check out.   Hilltopping is a  hoot.
5)  ARRL June VHF contest is June 14 & 15.  Always a fun  event with big 
activity on 6m and 2m.
6)  CQWW VHF Contest.    This 6m & 2m only event has gotten bigger each year. 
 July 19 and  20.  W0ZQ may think about giving it a try as a rover this year
7)   Central States VHF Society conference.   This year the conference is a  
one-day drive away in Wichita, KS.   July 24 - 27.   If you  have never been 
to a large VHF conference before, this is the one.    Check out their website 
at http://www.csvhfs.org/conference/index.html   .  NLRS is well connected with 
CSVHFS and many members will be there.   
8)  Rovermania !!   It WILL be back.   The ARRL UHF  contest, August 2 and 3 
... the BEST rover contest (no big 6m and 2m antennas  !).  W0ZQ/R will be out 
and about, how about you ?    Come  to Au'08 this spring to see the first 
ever presentation for the NLRS Limited  Rover Awards from last years UHF contest.
9)  The ARRL's 10GHz and Up  contest.   Two weekends, August 16/17 and Sept 
20/21.    
10)  Sept 13/14, the ARRL's September VHF contest.
11)  October  17 & 18 is the Microwave Update (MUD'08) Conference right here 
in the  Bloomington.  This is not like Central States as MUD is 900 MHz and up 
with  considerable focus on the higher bands and attendence is about half of 
that of  Central States.  Come to Aurora'08 to hear more about MUD'08.    
Bruce has the website up and operational, check it out at  
http://www.microwaveupdate.org/  .



If anyone is  looking for something to do, see the above !   Whew, a busy 
year to  come.   On to some other business.

A)   Last Thursday  FedEx knocked on my door and delivered a wonderful plaque 
from the San  Bernardino Microwave Society (SBMS) for our 1st place finish in 
their 2GHz &  Up contest.   It is a VERY nice plaque and I will be sending a 
letter  of thanks to the SBMS.   The plaque will be shown at MidWinter  
Madness, and I am also going to take some JPGs of both this plaque and our  previous 
3d place plaque and have W0JT post them on our NLRS  website.   

B)   As most of you may be aware, both  the September VHF and 10 GHz & Up 
contest results are out in the most recent  QST and on the Leagues website.   The 
10 GHz results on the website  were originally hosed up but its my 
understanding that they have now been fixed  ... thanks to Sean and the ARRL IT guy(s) 
for a rapid response.    Regarding the 10 GHz contest, many of you will 
remember that one of those  weekends was the weekend of the floods in SE MN and the 
weather was, well,  rather poor.  Although club members were out and about and 
having fun, our  over scores were down compared to previous years.   Gary, 
WB0LJC, was  the only member to crack the top ten in either category placing 7th 
in the 10  GHz & Up catagory, a fine feat given the hand that was dealt.   In  
September, its sometimes seem that we run out of gas as we often have intense 
 efforts in the 10 GHz, UHF, and June contest just ahead of this  event.   
Our club score was down this year with only 14 logs and a  middle of the pack 
club finish.  I think the big news of this contest was  W9FZ/R four place finish 
in the rover catagory, immediately behind the three  pack rovers and what 
would appear to me to be a first place finish in the new  Rover class (the other 
three would most likely have been Unlimited  Rovers).   Nice job Bruce !   A 
tip of the hat to our other  two rovers who kept things hopping, WA0VPJ/R and 
KC0IYT/R.  Also a tip of  the hat to our sister club to the east, the Badger 
Contester who had the most  club logs submitted, 25, and placed 4th in the club 
competition and giving us a  serious drubbing.  


73, Jon
W0ZQ  




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