A rather laid back week…………………………….

As always, first the chronology:

5/27/18 – Sunday – Up early, usual morning routine and out to pick up Gary for church. Home and snack, downstairs to do the blog. Kathy came home and we had lunch. Outside to work on the pool. Finished up and inside to clean up. Rested awhile then had dinner. To my room for computer updates then upstairs to bed. Reading, Big Bang and sleep.

5/28/18 – Monday – Up and usual morning routine. Kathy asked me to call Julie about new phone service. Ended up going to Mike and Julie’s to help the Spectrum guy get the phone service working. Then home and cleaned up. Kathy and I went back up for dinner on the grill. Home and desert, bed, computer updates.

5/29/18 – Tuesday – Up and usual morning routine. Over to Gary’s to retrieve the wheel chair we lent them. Helped Kathy with the pool cover, put that away. Replaced the drain on the filter housing that was leaking. Spent the rest of the day in my room checking on my prescription plan folks. Getting things together for this weekend’s contest. Did computer updates then to bed, reading, Big Bang and sleep.

5/30/18 – Wednesday – Up and usual morning routine. Down to my room and made the 10AM retiree’s net. Played radio and did research. Upstairs and took a nap then up and cleaned up and out to pick up Gary for dinner at the church. Home and desert. Bed, computer work, Big Bang and sleep.

5/31/18 – Thursday – Up and usual morning routine. Down stairs and started working on the paperwork and studying the manual to become a Volunteer Examiner for the ARRL. That will allow me to assist in giving tests for HAM radio licenses. Took a break and went outside to tend to the pool. Bad weather chased me in. Met the guys on the radio and made a contact to Slovenia. Bed, computer work, reading, TV and sleep.

6/1/18 – Friday – Up and usual morning routine. Down stairs and continued working on the paper work for being a Volunteer Examiner. Got everything together by lunch time. Kathy was up watching the grand children so I had to make myself lunch. Then back downstairs and scanned all my paperwork and emailed it to the ARRL. Kathy came home so helped unload groceries and put them away. Then we made dinner. Back downstairs and got everything ready for the contest tomorrow. Then to bed, computer updates, Big Bang and sleep.

6/2/18 – Saturday – Up an did my usual morning routine. Cleaned up and down stairs to start the radio contest at 10AM. Worked that most of the day with the exception of a few breaks and lunch. Decided contesting is not my bag but I’ll see it through this weekend. Kathy went down and helped Mike and Julie do some cleaning up and painting at the house they now own in Shepardsville. She came home around 5 and we went to Hometown pizza for dinner. I went back to the HAM shack to do more contesting. Then bed, some reading, Big Bang and sleep.

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Now the specifics:

In case you are confuse about the HAM contest this week I’ll try to explain.  Various organization have contests for different things throughout the year.  This one was the Kentucky QSO Party contest.  The objective was to contact as many stations as possible.  The scoring is rather complicated and involves points for stations from each county in Kentucky as well as stations in other states as well as Canada and outside North America.  Last year I only made 13 contacts amounting to a score of 143.  This year I had 51 contacts and a score of 1,438.  Still not a super good score as other stations in Kentucky last year scored 10 and 20 thousand points.  But, it all depends on how people worked the band conditions.  It may be I’m higher than I think.  I’ll keep you posted when the results are tabulated and published.

It is a sure sign of summer when the pool is open.  So far we have the filtering system running to capacity and the water is crystal clear.  Perhaps today we will clean up the ladder and put that in the pool and start getting the deck things out.

At one time Kathy accused me of being a collector of certifications.  I guess I did at one time.  Perhaps I am digressing to that point again.  Anyway, I got a hair up my ass and decided to do the paperwork to become a Volunteer Examiner (VE) for the ARRL.  To get a HAM license today you must go to a formal testing session that is overseen by at least 3 VEs.  They must all concur on the score you achieve before you are issued a license or an upgrade.  I guess it’s just a way to get out and meet new people and do something different.

OK, it’s rant time.  So Roseann does some less than intelligent tweets and gets her TV show cancelled.  Everybody in the world has to start talking about it as well as the show “The View”.  I admit I never watched the Roseann show but I did sit down and try watching The View.  It was the dumbest piece of shit I ever tried to watch.  A hand full of clueless females all talking shit at the same time and no one was listening.  Well, I guess some of the gullible viewers.  But I don’t see why anyone is even bothering to give it any credibility.  Don’t people understand that it’s the attention that keeps shows on the air.  The people who advertise on the show couldn’t give a rat’s ass less about the  content as long as the show gets viewers.  So by continually focusing on the show the more we are perpetuating it’s existence.  The same with the assholes that feel it’s necessary to kneel during the playing of the national anthem at sporting events.  Don’t give it credibility and it will go away.

OK, that’s enough from me this week.  Thanks for staying tuned in.  I’ll BLOG at you again next week.