On April 26, President Bush said, “There needs to be technical standards to make possible new broadband technologies, such as the use of high-speed communication directly over power lines. Power lines were for electricity; power lines can be used for broadband technology. So the technical standards need to be changed to encourage that.”

This should concern every amateur radio operator, no matter what political party you belong to. I would urge you to contact your Congressman or Congresswoman, both of your state’s senators, and the President himself, and tell him that he’s wrong about this.

A friend of mine recently got me interested in building the C-Pole antenna as described in the April 2004 QST. It’s a variation on the vertical dipole, and needs no radials, even though the vertical length is less than a quarter wavelength. One drawback, though, is that it needs a balun.

Stan Horzepa, WA1LOU, writes the “Surfin’” column for the ARRL website. This week’s column is on web logs, or “blogs” for short. He includes a link to Dan KB6NU’s weblog and a picture of our president.

Here’s what he has to say about the blog:

No matter what your interest, there is a lot of interesting reading to be found in ham blogs. Take the blog of KB6NU, for example: Dan Romanchik’s Blurty Entries discusses a variety of ham radio topics that interest KB6NU, but it is so well written that it is interesting and entertaining reading even if your interests are different than KB6NU’s.

Thanks, Stan!

My second contact this evening was with WN5Y, a high school teacher in Pampa, TX. Looking him up on QRZ.Com yielded the URL to his website. Take a look and you’ll see that solid state receivers can indeed glow.

I’m always yammering about how it’s a good thing to have a computer in the shack and am constantly encouraging hams to enter some information about themselves on QRZ.Com. When available, this information can make your QSOs much more interesting. Eariler this evening, I worked two guys where this was certainly the case.

Like most hams, I’m kind of a pack rat. I’ve got boxes of resistors, capacitors, and even vacuum tubes that I’ll probably never use. But you never know….

I’m kind of like that with e-mail, too.

The latest addition to my arsenal of CW-sending implements is a Vibroplex VibroKeyer. It’s used, but it works like a champ.

I am now the proud owner of an Elecraft KX1, serial #577 or #575. (The serial number kit envelope is stamped “00577,” but the label inside says “00575.”)