A buddy of mine has caught the amateur radio bug and just got his technicians license. I mentioned that a long time ago dad and I talked about doing it but never got around to it. A couple of days later this shows up on my doorstep. Bombing knows no bounds :-)

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This could be trouble...
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:-)

Buh-bye! :-)
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CQ DX CQ DX. Never really got into the amateur radio part, but my whole youth growing up in Europe was spent buying better and better radios and antennas and antenna tuners and other gear. Mostly to pick up Armed Forces Radio to listen to baseball games. Once I moved to the US and got my own house with lotsa land I strung up "Beverage" antennas that were anywhere from 400- 1000 feet long "pointed" N,S,E,W- also to listen to baseball games. I actually picked up KFI LA from the house near Cincinnati. Most of this was primarily on medium wave.

I did also collect QSL cards! But now, with XM Radio, MLB.TV and the internet, I can listen/watch just about any game I want to, so my interest in DXing has waned, even though I'm still excited to see the fancy new radios that are produced- although that industry has also lost a lot of manufacturers due to the reasons mentioned above. I know that now you can become a Ham without having to learn Morse Code, so it has become quite easy to do so- to the detriment of the hobby methinks. Glorified CB is not want the hobby wants to turn into.

At any rate, I wish you luck and enjoyment with your new hobby! Is that an ICOM?
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Sounds like fun. I remember reading that Joe Walsh is a huge Ham / shortwave guy and even travels to meet and greets around the country.
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Yep, he's WB6ACU.
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No it's a Baofeng. Made in China (what isn't these days) but has a lot of good reviews from people that seem to know about these things. Like I said, I wanted to get into Ham back when I was a kid and my dad was my age but it never worked out.
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