Yesterday, a packet of QSLs arrived from ARRL QSL Bureau. I really haven’t been sending out many QSLs, and since the last couple of packets, hadn’t contained anything really exciting, I wasn’t expecting much this time. Well, I got a very pleasant surprise—two QSL cards from Antarctica.
This card is from the Royal Research Ship James [...]

I can’t decide whether I’ve been so busy that I haven’t had time to blog much or whether I’m just slowing down. It’s probably a little of each. And doing so much creates so much blog fodder that it can be overwhelming. There’s so much to write about, you can’t figure out where to start.
So, [...]

Last week, I got a small pack of QSL cards from the bureau. Far and away, the most attractive was this one from Pertti, OH2PM, operating from Belize as V31PP:

The pack also included cards from CU2A in the Azores, a couple of HAs, HK3Q, and VE3NWA.
More callsigns that spell words (pronouns to be exact)
I’ve [...]

The weekend started out innocently enough. I had made arrangements with a guy to go over to his house and put up an antenna. Sounds simple enough, doesn’t it? Especially when you consider that the antenna we were going to put up was a 40m dipole.
Well, we had problems right off. I had intended on [...]

BoingBoing has an item on CB QSL cards, citing them as an example of “folk art.” I must admit that some of them are kind of interesting. Every once in a while, I’ll get a ham QSL card that looks like these, but they’re rare. I wonder what percentage of CB cards were homemade?
GNOSIS, [...]

While we’re on the subject of QSL cards, doesn’t it seem that nearly all of the QSL cards you get from European stations have a cathedral or castle or some similarly grand—and very old—structure? Unfortunately, we’re disadvantaged in that respect here in the U.S. Unless you happen to live in New York City, or [...]

I’m not sure why exactly, but lighthouses and amateur radio seem a good fit. There’s even an Amateur Radio Lighthouse Society. Founded in 2000 by Jim Weidner, K2JXW, the ARLHS claims to be the only society devoted exclusively to Maritime Communications and Ham Radio, Lighthouses and Lightships.
I comment on this because this past week, [...]

I finally confirmed Cuba with the receipt today of a card from CO6RD, via his QSL manager AD4C. I hadn’t had much luck going through the QSL bureau, so when I saw that CO6RD had a U.S. QSL manager, I shipped off a card and an SASE and received a quick reply. Thanks!
I got more [...]

A while back, I commented on a QSL I’d received from the club station of the UBA, the Belgian equivalent of the ARRL. I noted:
One factoid really struck me. The UBA says that 95% of the licensed amateurs in Belgium belong to the UBA. As a point of reference, less than 25% of licensed amateurs [...]

Pronouns? What is an item about pronouns doing in an amateur radio blog?
Well, the last two three cards that I’ve added to my collection of QSL cards from stations whose callsigns spell words are from:

AA3WE
W1HIS
W4MY