Honesty - NOT amateur radio

After my U3AC course in Cambridge I decided to have a coffee at Pret a Manger in Market Street. About 5 minutes after someone dropped some change on the floor a shop assistant just picked it up and put it in the charity box. Excellent. At 99p filter coffee here is good value and the service is very good.

Q900 QRP rig

The IC-705 already has a Chinese competitor at about one third of the price according to DXzone.com. Pretty sure this is genuine.

It surprises me that we have not seen many more Chinese radios yet. Once they get the quality right, they will undercut the Japanese big time.

See https://www.dxzone.com/q900-sdr-transceiver

UPDATE 2100z: You get the feeling this is a "test the market" prototype. At least one YouTube review is raising questions. For now, I have sufficient doubts not to buy one. In time, the Chinese could become a big threat to the Japanese manufacturers, but not yet.

Almost spring - NOT amateur radio

Flowers on sale on Cambridge Market earlier.

What is reality? - NOT amateur radio

As many know, I had a stroke in 2013. In many ways I recovered, but I am still left with some quite severe impairments. It is hard to know if some of these are just me getting older or are due to the stroke.

Poor balance and giddiness are with me most of the time. My voice is poor and I get very frustrated when some people treat me as being a simpleton. Also frustrating is being unable to speak, as I used to, to put over my point of view.  Just joining in casual chats is hard. Often it would be hard to get my point across, so I say nothing.  When speaking to others I often have to repeat myself.

My comprehension of time and speed are different. When driving at a certain speed it feels, to me, as if I am driving much faster: the dial says 45mph whereas it feels like 60mph! Likewise my perception of time is different: time seems to pass more quickly. The bus ride to Cambridge takes an hour, but to me it seems much faster.

Now, it is hard to know if these are just old age or artifacts of my stroke.

What it has told me is that what we perceive as individuals is different. On the BBC radio today someone said that our perception of colour is in the mind: how one person sees the world differs from others.

All this brings me to one thought. What is reality?

Time and space we take for granted, but these could be illusions. Likewise, we assume past memories are real. One thing is certain: how we see the world is limited by our brains.

South Devon again - NOT amateur radio

Yesterday I mentioned that I come from South Devon. The photo shows another view of where I come from.

10m FT8 RX

At the moment I am on 10m FT8 RX using the tiny indoor loop antenna.

UPDATE 0950z: Nothing yet spotted on 10m FT8 RX.

UPDATE 2035z: No spots all day. Maybe tomorrow I shall try 17m FT8 RX with the tiny indoor loop?

Disappointment on 160m FT8 RX overnight

Last night was the poorest one this season with no transatlantic DX at all overnight. I checked that things were working as I thought something was wrong!

Sunspots - Tuesday February 25th 2020

Solar flux is 70 and the SSN 0. A=4 and K=0.

160m FT8

So far today in the last few hours 63 stations spotted. See map.

160m FT8 spots
 so far this evening 

With a granddaughter - NOT amateur radio

The photo shows one of our granddaughters with me at the weekend. She went home with her brother yesterday.