Date:Wed, 20 Mar 2002 04:41:09 -0500
To:<tt-inc@yahoogroups.com>
Subject:[tt-inc] Shortwave Progress Report

Not too much this month. I have once again failed  to get any kind of net going, 
not having managed to contact Kraige in Vancouver. I guess in the end I just 
plain got discouraged, because nothing we did seemed to work. I think next time I 
will ask him to initiate the contact and see if that works any better. 
I was contacted by someone called Nathan Laird, who wanted to know if anyone was 
covering the Packet radio project in Oklahoma. I said we weren't, so he indicated 
he may get something going in that area. I then went into what I am beginning to 
call my "Desperate Old Maid" act, (every time I find a new guy with any kind of 
licence, I try to snare him into my net!) and asked if he wanted to try a contact 
on the radio, because I was trying to get some kind of net started. He does not 
have his Morse code, which means no international licence, so that was out. I 
told him to let me know when this occurs, so we can try for contact. I will 
probably keep an eye on this situation. He also said, though, that he is not on 
the TT lists, so he may just have been a ship, passing in the night. 
More hopeful was a contact I had from Dave, who had been on our lists before but 
had not been keeping tabs on us for quite some time. I did my "desperate old 
maid" thing again, but seem to have scared him off with this because I have not 
heard from him since! One thing I am going to do--when the time draws 
nearer, I am going to collect up call signs of every site I can, without getting 
too specific on where the sites are. For example, someone in South Western 
Alberta, Canada, will be willing to communicate with our site when the time comes, so 
that maybe info can be swapped, etc. As the time draws nearer, I will ask all TT 
members to give me a call sign so that after Crunch Time, I can try and establish 
contact. This will include sites as far away as Jan's, because you just never 
know whom you will be able to contact, and I intend to try it all when the time 
comes. We have not managed to get True TTY from the 
website yet. Two reasons: One, gotta find out which credit card will bear the 
cost; 2, there is speculation here that maybe we should put the whole radio Packet 
thing on another computer, which, of course, we can't get going! 
The one positive, of course, is that we are essentially ready. If the S. hit the 
F. now, in the shape of any emergency, the station is working, the antenna, in 
spite of high winds and inclement weather, is still standing with its head up 
high, and we are ready to spring into action, if and when needed. So I guess it 
isn't all bad! Now if I could just catch some of these guys with my "desperate 
old maid" act and persuade them to form my net, life would be peachy! 

Shirley