Field Day and the Domesticated Moose

On June 24th, I got up, cleaned frantically and made a batch a macaroons. AE and GM arrived and we watched the movie, Gates of Heaven, which was made by the same guy as Fast, Cheap and Out of Control. It was a weird, but interesting, documentary about pet cemeteries. JH arrived and watched the last few minutes with us. We played Moose in the House, which is a simple, but fun, card game by Gamewright. The cards are extremely well illustrated and are rather cute, particularly if you are fond of moose.

Finally, we all went to the annual ham radio Field Day. It was interesting exposing three new people to the annual ham radio Field Day and my friends in the Orange County Radio Amateurs club. As usual, my mom procured the food and my dad grilled it. I had a Boca burger with a slice of swiss cheese and a little ketchup. Not bad. I saw on the radar on my phone that a squall line was coming. We all headed back to my house. I was going to wait it out and then go back to operate the radios, but the rain was extremely heavy. I heard reports that the field was quite soggy, so I didn't go back. Last year I wrote a fairly good description of what Field Day is all about.

NC and I did some Blackboard testing at a little after 6am and then around 9am, I drove back over to the Field Day site, Blackwood Farm in Orange County. Dad grilled our traditional pancakes and sausage, which was served with real maple syrup. Eventually, I went down the hill and worked the 20 meter band with RN and TH. You can see in the photo where I was operating TH's radio while RN was logging. I made four or five contacts, which was fun. Then Dad stopped by let us know that another storm was on the way. That weekend all the storms were coming from the southeast, which was weird, because the normal prevailing winds come from the west. So, I went home. Here's a beautiful photo I took of the farm, next to the field where we were operating. There are plans to turn the whole property into a park.


That evening, I went over to JJ and JA's to practice guitar with JJ and EB. Strangely enough, I had a hard time getting in sync on Brown Eyed Girl, but everything else was fine. When HB arrived, we played Country Roads and that sounded the best that we'd ever played it.

For dinner, we went to Federal. I had a grilled cheese sandwich with avocado, lettuce and tomatoes on focaccia bread, for all of $6.50. That's hard to beat for dinner. Before heading over to JJ and JA's I made reservations at ACME Food & Beverage Co. for my parents, who were celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary. I asked the manager if I could go ahead and pay for it with my credit card as a surprise. That was fun. They served them some wine and gave them a free dessert, too!