A little activity

 I rang in the new year with just a little bit of activity.

New Year's Eve was of course, Straight Key Night and I got on the air after a little detective work. My W2WK straight key did not work at first. Tapping the key resulted in a big - nothing. I broke out the VOM and checked for continuity. One post to the key arm and I got the confirming "BEEP". The other post to the contact point and I also got the confirming "BEEP".  The only thing I could think of was that Bill may have silver coated the contact point, so I put a little NOXON polish on a Q-Tip and cleaned the actual contact points. Eureka! A functioning straight key! I worked W4NNF in Mobile, Alabama for my SKN QSO. After I finished with Rod, Marianne arrived home from work, so I QRT'ed and went upstairs.

This morning, after Mass, I came home and tried the QRP watering holes to see if there was any activity in the QRP-ARCI New Year Sprint.  I worked Rick NK9G in Wisconsin and Mark WB9HFK in Illinois. Other than those two, there was not much activity that I was able to hear. I did hear Gene N5GW in Mississippi working stations, but he was not calling CQ.

I'm hoping to work some POTA stations tomorrow.

My New Year resolutions for 2022 are very modest and very do-able (why set lofty goals that you have no chance of accomplishing?)

1) Get on the air more than 2021 - very do-able.

2) More relevant and timely posts here - again, very do-able.

3) Get the 2021 Skeeter Hunt soapbox published and the certificates printed and mailed by the end of January. Do-able.

4) Activate some New Jersey parks this year. Very do-able as I can incorporate that with other QRP events, such as QRPTTF, QRP Afield, FOBB and the Skeeter Hunt.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!