Sunspots - Friday December 12th

 Solar flux is 146 and the SSN 123. A=26 and K=4.

Royal Ballet

It is fair to say that our granddaughter did NOT get her talent for ballet from my wife and I!! 

Last year she performed in front of UK royalty in Westminster Abbey and this year she is in the Nutcracker at the Royal Ballet in Covent Garden, London at the Royal Opera House. She makes us very proud!

10m 500mW WSPR (Thursday)

 My beacon was turned on at 1248z.

UPDATE 1318z: So far, no spots. 

UPDATE 1328z:  It helps if there is power connected. Being suspicious I noticed the power wire had become disconnected!

UPDATE 1353z:  Spots from the Canary Isles only.

UPDATE 1827z: 4 stations have spotted me including 2 in the USA. Now QRT.

Ukraine peace?

 According to this video, around 60% of people in the USA believe the USA should be standing behind (my understanding) Ukraine to counter the Russians whereas the peace plan put forward by President Trump appears to favour Russia and not what the majority in the USA want.

We all want peace, but it would appear we don't want a sell-out to President Putin. In my view simply appeasing Putin is not the answer.

From an outsider's perspective, President Trump seems more focused on making deals to make himself even richer than safeguarding democracy? This is how it appears, although I accept I may be wrong.

Micro80

This was my Micro80 transceiver  built many years ago. From this the famous Pixie transceiver was developed. It is on my main website.

Sunspots - Thursday December 11th

 Solar flux is 168 and the SSN 134. A=23 and K=4.

6m CW DX

 My best ever 2-way 6m DX was a QRP CW QSO with K1TOL when I was using 1W and a V2000 vertical omni antenna. This was Es. I think his antenna helped!!

Pure evil

In recent days I have been watching a series of programmes on the history of the British Empire. What comes across is how evil Britain was. I cannot believe how bad we were. 

The real purpose of the British Empire seems to have been exploitation.  We are in no way able to dictate how other countries should behave when we have been so bad in the past, and even quite recently.

Hair!!

 Back in the 1970s I still had hair! This is me using my 2m AM Fredbox to make contacts in Cambridge. It worked really well.

10m 500mW WSPR (Wednesday)

My stand-alone W5OLF (SK) 10m WSPR beacon has been on since about 0930z.

UPDATE 1515z:  23 stations spotting me. See WSPR Rocks map.