Ham Radio

One of my favorite things to do when I'm not teaching is ham radio.  Amateur Radio, or ham radio, as it is referred to, is a radio service set up by the government.  Originally, it was to have a pool of radio communications specialists who could be used in emergency situations.  Believe it or not, that still is a need these days, however, usually the need is much more localized in scale.  However, there is much more that we do than emergencies.  Lots of times, I like to build and tinker with antennas, and talk to different countries, meet new people over the air, and try new things.  My favorite mode, or means of communication, is CW, which stands for continuous wave.  Using one RF wave, the operator keys the wave in old Morse Code.  Morse is still alive and well after nearly 170 years, but these days, mostly used by just hams.  I enjoy it as it's very unique.  And, we can and do talk back and forth with mircrophones, and even computer keyboards.  We can even send each other pictures over the air, which is fun.  I can also control my radio with a computer remotely, and have done so.  What was fun last year was running my radio remotely from South Dakota over the Internet, transmitting on it, and talking to a guy in California.  What's even more fun is transmitting on my radio, and hearing my own signal while being logged onto someone else's receiver thousands of miles away.  So, after a long day of working in the fine arts, and all of the human ups and downs in performing and being artistic, it's fun to come home and do some things that are logical, sequential, and non-artistic.   It balances me out, and feeds the other side of my brain. All good stuff.    I'll explain more about ham radio in future entries, but today's post was just to get that topic started.