I've been hammering away on PSK and RTTY on 20 and 30 meters for days now, making beaucoup QSO all around the world, but last night I though I'd slip down to 40 meters and see what was shaking. This was my first time on 40 and fortunately I ran into Ron, W2RIP from Gainesville, GA. In the back of my mind, I knew that in PSK, power doesn't mean the same thing as it does in SSB or that old southern favorite, AM. I tried to keep the power output to about 50 watts thinking that would solve the problem and to be quite honest, I was knocking 'em dead and filling up the log, so it must be right, huh?
Ron worked with me for 45 minutes teaching me about the linear flow of audio from the sound card to the ether. By the time we were finished, my IMD was 27-28 dB and my signal was perfectly readable at Ron's shack. I finally had to pull the plug and head off to bed. This old body doesn't do late nights like it once did!
But overall, my point is that in this hobby, hams help hams to do better in the hobby. I know that people help each other in other hobbies; I see it all the time, but for me this is special because THIS is MY hobby. Thanks Ron!
I didn't spend much time on the air yesterday; it was my older son's birthday. As I was out buying an "over the hill" balloon for him, it struck me that one of my children is now 41! There is little in the world that makes you feel older than that. I asked one of my grandsons to suggest a game for the Xbox my grandchildren and my son huddle around in the evenings; I wanted to have a special present that played to the closeness of Stan with his children. One wouldn't think a game with the title of "Gears of War" would bring family closer together, but it does. After the gifts were opened and the ooohs an ahhhs were done, my youngest grandson, Chris, tapped me on the back and said, "Thanks Opa." I knew it had hit the spot.
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