I mentioned the books I was purging, but I want to reiterate that I liked most of those authors. Some of them were fun reads, some had a little more substance, etc.
The books by the following authors I will keep - at least until I decide I should get rid of them all! Then it will be library books or e-books here on out!
Actually, some of these probably won't ever go away as they have my notes from high school or college in the margins. I've re-read some of them and it's interesting to see what I thought was important 20+ years ago. For some of the "fun" books, I remember, during my youth, I would stay up until the wee hours of the morning to read just a few more pages.
Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman
J.R.R. Tolkien
Robert Asprin
R.A. Salvatore
William Gibson
Neal Stephenson
Gene Wolfe
Tom Robbins
Issac Asimov
William Faulkner
Richard Wright
Orson Scott Card
Robert Jordan
Terry Goodkind
Huston Smith
William James
Richard Matheson
Ernest Hemingway
J.D. Salinger
C.S. Lewis
Robert Heinlein
William Golding
Eugene O'Neill
Wednesday, January 7, 2015
METERS Knoxville Marathon Support
In the latest newsletter from the Knoxville Track Club, there is an article about a woman who cheated during a marathon by not running the full distance. One of the local ham radio clubs gets an acknowledgement for their part in ensuring the integrity of the results:
...
"At our Knoxville Marathon, we have a somewhat similar course layout. Our full and half marathons start simultaneously, and both finish on the 50 yard line of Neyland Stadium. They run together for 12.5 miles before the half splits off toward the finish line. Every year, we get folks who have signed up for the full and for some reason (bad day, cramps, underestimation of the hills), opt for the half when the split comes. One of two things has always happened."
"We get novices that don’t know better. They finish the half, grab some food and drink, and then they head home. They assume that we’ll know that they only did the half. Do we?
Yes. We use METERS (Middle East Tennessee Emergency Radio Service) to spot participants running the half wearing the full bib. They radio in the bib numbers so we can switch them in the results. Our timing crew also checks the top finishers to make sure that they have a 10k split, a half marathon split, and a 20 mile split that correlate to their marathon time. If someone only has a split at 10k and it is for a 10 minute mile, there is no way that they finished the marathon averaging 7 minutes a mile.
Never, have I ever, seen one of these folks stick around for the full marathon award ceremony and attempt to claim an overall or age group award."
Tuesday, January 6, 2015
PMI Renewal
I rejoined PMI and all I got was this lousy t-shirt. Seems a clumsy bit of marketing to me. Although, they did get me to post about it.
Cord Cutting
ESPN has been one of the main reasons I've not considered cutting the cord and dumping cable TV. Things are starting to get interesting as Dish announces a streaming service that includes ESPN for $20/month:
"But what is Sling TV? For $20 a month — yes, twenty dollars — you get access to a lineup of cable networks that includes TNT, TBS, CNN, Food Network, HGTV, Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, the Disney Channel, ESPN, and ESPN2. ESPN is obviously a huge get for Dish and could earn Sling TV plenty of customers all on its own."Via lifehacker
Monday, January 5, 2015
Squelch Threshold Adjustments
Jim (KC9HI) writes on the Baofeng UV-5R Yahoo Group about making squelch threshold adjustments through a software change to the image file:
"This capability isn't available in CHIRP (yet).
I am working on it and wouldn't mind a few testers.
The oldest radios must get the settings from firmware and can't be adjusted. My UV-5R with BFB231 firmware can't be adjusted.
I first tried this out on a UV-82L with success. Then later on a GT-3. Earlier this week, I got to try it on my own UV-82 and BF-F8HP radios. The difference is amazing. I don't know why Baofeng ships these radios with the squelch so "broken"."And continues:
"Here is your .img file back with the updated squelch settings. Make sure you have a backup image before you get started. I now have a backup here. ;-)
I believe that you will now find that Squelch 9 can really squelch out stronger stations and you will have to reduce squelch to 6 or maybe 5 for normal operation.
If you like these settings, don't upload any other image file into your radio or they will be reset to the values in that image file. If you don't like these settings, or that don't appear to do anything, then just upload your original image file and everything will be as is was before."I'll be following this to see how it develops.
Buy VV-898, Get Free BF-F8+
Get a #free Baofeng BF-F8+ #amateurradio when you buy a Leixen VV-898 mobile! http://t.co/JHqtQDXxuM @amatradio @brickolore #hamradio #hamr
— BuyTwoWayRadios.com (@2wayradios) January 5, 2015
Iowahawk 2016
The campaign promises are starting already...
I would be horrible at managing the US economy. So I won't. #Iowahawk2016
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) January 4, 2015
Instead of worrying about what other countries think about us, I will make them worry about what we think of them. #Iowahawk2016
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) January 4, 2015
Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms: the theme of my inauguration party. #Iowahawk2016
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) January 4, 2015
I promise to create an economic depression and confine it to a 40 mile radius of the US capitol. #Iowahawk2016
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) January 4, 2015
Sunday, January 4, 2015
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