Cool stuff!

I just watched a pass of the International Space Station, as it passed in the Northwest to Southeastern sky. It was cool to be talking a bunch of local Ham buddies on a local repeater while watching. We also saw two dimmer satellites pass over, as well. I wonder if either of those two was perhaps an OSCAR.

This afternoon, I watched the splashdown of Dragon Endeavor as it gently landed in the Gulf of Mexico, While it reminded me of Mercury/Gemini and Apollo days, it was also apparent how far we've come since those days. The live TV from the communications airplane circling the recovery area made watching the deployment of both sets of parachutes possible. And after splashdown, it wasn't the US Navy responsible for recovery, it was a private commercial operation. As the spacecraft was bobbing in the ocean, there was live, high definition TV from inside, showing the two astronauts working on their touch screens going through their checklists. In days of yore, tbe first glimpse we got of the returning astronauts was when they were maneuvered into a raft by Navy scuba divers.

On the Amateur Radio front, I got more done on the QCX today. I installed the diodes and about 75% of the resistors.

In my younger days, I'd have had this done by now - but I'm taking my time. Plus ...... there's Harold, my faithful Beagle. For some reason Harold will not come down the basement steps. When I go down the stairs to work on the QCX, he sits at the top stair, waiting for me to come back up. It may seem stupid or overly sentimental , but I don't like to leave my buddy alone for too long on days when I'm home from work. So I go for small bits of time. Maybe I'm just a sucker, but I know I won't have Harold forever, so I like to spend as much time with him as I can.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!