Let's see, this was my second event in 3 weeks.
The last one was the VHF contest.
Both trips were at least 65 miles one way.
The VHF trip, I lost a wheel bearing in the truck.
The three beam antenna array fell down when I released the wrong paracord, thinking I was just dropping my 6 meter dipole.
The new Kenwood TS 590 got its first dent in the case.
Its power output dropped from 65 watts to 40.
I had to use two toroids as weight to get the paracord in the tree.
Lost both toroids.
Field Days, the power in the Kenwood dropped again from 40 to 35 watts. I had to back it down to 15 watts peak, just to make sure not to loose the finals.
I didn't have the time between contests to send the radio back to Kenwood..
My sugar peaked 180, and I came home with a urinary tract infection. Spent yesterday in the hospital and will spend the next 9 days taking antibiotics.
I discovered a intermitted connection problem between the PL connectors and the SO connector on port 1 of the transceiver - after I got home. Another thing for Kenwood to fix...
I think what hit me the hardest is that these people have been licensed 10 / 20 / 30 + years, and yet I am teaching them what they should be doing.
I've been involved in radio since 1969 / 70 and have been listening to shortwave and ham since about '74, but have only been licensed 5 1/2 years.
I never knew where to go to take the exam, there were no local exams, and no one in the local area ever advertised that there was even a club in the local area.
2 meters FM - unless you knew that there was a net Sunday or Monday night, you wouldn't even know that the repeaters were there unless you heard one ID while your scanner just happened to hit the frequency at the same time. Most of the repeaters don't even ID unless someone kerchunks it!
99% of these people got a license because they knew someone else that had a license. They wanted to use the radio so they could talk to their friends on the repeater. They wanted to use the repeater in case of an emergency - before there were cell phones. Now that they have a cell phone, no one uses the repeaters anymore.
People like that, and people that has a camp, where there is towers and trailers and permanent antennas - set up and left year round, just for Field Days, to me - has nothing at all to do with emergency communications or presenting amateur radio in a positive light. Nor does it do anything to get old hams on the air, when your club leaders do not operate. Nor does it attract new members - when their only exposure is a bunch of old people sitting around in a tent bs'ing with each other and empty radios sitting there, not being used!
The Vice President was so dumb, she actually thought that people would be interested in talking to Boy Scouts on Field Days weekend, during the contest. Their damn call sign was so long, by the time you said it, the operator already picked someone else with a shorter call. And the Boy Scouts wouldn't stand in the trailer long enough to learn how to call CQ or operate a QRP transceiver.. Needless to say, they weren't too bright!
