Am I Going to the Dogs?

I don't know yet. Tonight is the weekly Fox Hunt on 20 meters, but I don't know if I'm going to chasing them with the rest of the hounds or not. It seems something comes up every Thursday night, grrrr.

But then, I'm not a great CW operator either. My speed at CW is limited, improving, but limited. The only hunt I've been able to run in so far was the first of the summer season. I only heard one fox near the end of the hunt, but he didn't hear me. That meant I spent and hour and half just listening to static. But was the night a failure?

In one sense, yes. I couldn't copy very well at the speeds they were sending and I had trouble figuring out how to work split. And, of course, I failed to make the contact. Thus, we can consider the night a failure.

However, in another sense, I learned something. By participating, however poorly, I got just a little better and my knowledge increased just a little bit. Because of the need to work split I was forced to experiment after the hunt with my rig. It seems my RIT knob was off center slightly, and thus I could never dial in the split because the gap was too wide. I now know you have to "zero" the knob out, and adjust from there.I didn't know this before because I've never used the RIT before. By rereading the operators manual, which isn't that helpful since it assumes you know how to operate a RIT (and it only really gives a "dictionary definition" of what the knob does), and just playing around I found out why it didn't work for me. So, I have gained more knowledge and improved my operating capabilities. Thus, I can consider the night a success.

One of the reasons for me writing about my misadventures in ham radio is to encourage other people trying to learn about Ham radio to keep at it and succeed. Like most people, I hate to look stupid in front of my peers and there is always some desire to not try and avoid ridicule and there is definitely a bit of hesitation to announce to the world my failures and ignorance such as writing about it in a blog. But I think people who scoff at the efforts of others have their own failings and their own ignorance, the only difference is that I'm trying to remedy mine. Now, really, most of the people you find in the Ham world are pretty nice and encouraging. Some are not so. I can imagine them rolling their eyes and saying, "This guy is an Extra Class operator and he doesn't know how to use  RIT on his own rig? What a moron."

What do you say to that? The answer, of course, is nothing. You keep learning, you keep building, and you keep sharing.

73 Y'all
Samuel
KC0KSV