No, we have not given up our WFBP way of eating in favor of “pigging out.” Today was almost entirely about ham (amateur) radio for me, and partly so or Linda.
One of the things that some hams like to do is attend “hamfests”, also known as swaps or swap meets, although mostly stuff is bought and sold rather than traded. Like any hobby, amateur radio has many aspects, and hamfests are one of them. Today was the Findlay, Ohio hamfest, which has been held each September for many years. Six of us from the South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club (SLAARC) car-pooled, and another member followed with his family (dad and both kids are hams). Steve (N8AR) drove and picked me (K8BRF) up at an agreed rendezvous point at 5:50 AM. We met the other four passengers (Russ, N8EEA; Chris, K8VJ; Jim, N8HAM; and Marty, KB8JIU) at a ‘park-n-ride’ on US-23 at 6:10 AM and headed on to Findlay, arriving around 8:00 AM.
Public service and emergency communications are two of the reasons amateur radio exists at all. Goodwill is another; ham radio is a worldwide activity and many hams simply enjoy making friendly “contacts” with other hams using nothing but the radio waves they are able to generate and receive. Some hams make contacts in pursuit of specific awards offered by various organizations. The American Radio Relay League (ARRL), for instance, offers the DXCC award for making verified contact with hams in 100 different countries (technically “entities”) as internationally recognized. (DX is ham shorthand for “distant” and CC stands for “Century Club”.). Some hams are into “contesting” where they compete with other hams to try and make the most contacts during a specific date/time window using particular methods on specified frequency bands.
Other hams are into making “QRP” contacts (low power of not more than 5 watts and often quite a bit less). They typically use CW (Morse code) or other “digital modes”. QRPers often design/build their own equipment, and this ability to experiment is another reason ham radio continues to exist. Amateur radio has been around for over 100 years, and has made significant contributions to the art and science of wireless communications. Rebuilding ham radio equipment and related gear, like shortwave receivers, is another aspect of the hobby and rebuilding/using vintage equipment is a specialized aspect of that branch of the hobby.
This brings me back to hamfests and swap meets. Much of what is available at these events is used equipment, parts, and materials, and they tend to draw hams involved in repairing, rebuilding, and experimenting in addition to those looking for deals on used radios or components for their ham shack. The older radios were all tube based, for instance, and there are always folks with large assortments of tubes for sale. There is usually a fair amount of computer and network technology as well, albeit prior generation stuff. Today I picked up 100 foot lengths of both category 6 and category 7 network cable, with connectors, for very little cost ($10 each), and a 35 foot length of 50 ohm “superflex” co-axial cable with “N” connectors on each end for less than $1/ft, a “super” good deal compared to retail.
We left the Findlay hamfest around 12:30 PM and were back at the Park-n-Ride by 2:30 PM. Linda had gone to the Tanger outlet mall at the west end of Howell, but didn’t find the things she was looking for. She had taken some additional photos of the front of the house in better light than the ones we had and we settled on one to use in the invitation for an open house/warming we planned to have.
To complete our ham radio day, we attended the SLAARC monthly meeting after dinner. For the program portion of the evening Russ (N8EEA) showed photos from the summer the trip he and Emily (his XYL) made to the Yukon and Alaska. The main purpose of their trip was to attend the 50th wedding anniversary of a close friend and fellow ham, but they also took an HF transceiver and antenna and made contacts with members of the club along the way at scheduled times. Following the slide presentation there was a discussion of the technical aspects of these “scheds” and how this concept might be improved should any club members make similar trips in the future. For some reason a number of members thought this might be particularly applicable to members who had bus conversions RVs.