Into the Woods – Page 189 – Watching a bewildering world from the middle of nowhere

Powering up the radio room

I’ve had very little access to the ham radio bands since I left San Francisco in February 2008. Though I have a VHF/UHF transceiver on the Jeep, and though I had a crummy VHF/UHF antenna installed outside the trailer, VHF and UHF serve only for local line-of-sight communication. For longer-haul communication, one needs longer antennas and the longer wavelength HF bands (1.8 Mhz to 30 Mhz or so, with wavelengths from 160 meters to 10 meters). Now that I have a house, I can bring my radios out of storage and put up longer antennas.

I installed a wire loop antenna of modest length in my attic yesterday (60 feet or so). The length of it makes it good for communications on the HF bands from around 14Mhz up. By golly it works. In no time, I’d made two-way voice contact with CO8TY in Cuba on the 21 Mhz band, YV1JGT in Venezuela on the 14 Mhz band, and LU8EOT in Argentina on the 14 Mhz band. I never use more than 100 watts to transmit. The antenna and its feed line still need some tweaking, but I’m encouraged that attic antennas here are going to work for me. Attic antennas are limited in length, but they aren’t out in the weather, they aren’t exposed to lightning, and no one can see them.

Propagation on the HF bands varies from minute to minute based on time of day, geomagnetic conditions, solar emissions, etc. Clearly propagation was good to South America this evening. I should be able to hear Europe earlier in the day when there’s daylight over Europe. Getting to Europe was tough from California. It should be much easier from here on the East Coast.

There are many who consider radio communications on the HF bands quaint and obsolete. But we’ll see about that if there’s ever a widespread power outage or widespread failure of the Internet pipes.

I installed wiring in my house so that I can power the HF radios, which are on the second floor, from a battery array (probably golf cart batteries) in the basement. But it will be a while before I can spend money on batteries and big chargers.

Hymns in strange places

Frédéric Chopin, nocturne in G minor, Opus 37, No. 11

Some years ago, a friend who is a professional pianist (and not a very nice person), hearing what I was playing at the piano, made the rude comment, “Hymns are the lowest form of music, you know.” Instantly angry, I threw an insult back at him: “No. Jazz is the lowest form of music.”

I was listening to the Chopin nocturnes tonight, partly because, at last, I can. The speakers and stereo amplifier are in a more or less permanent place in the newly painted radio room, and the iMac (and therefore iTunes) is now connected to the sound system.

Again and again in the nocturnes, Chopin gently slips away from the wild rubato rhythm and falls into a strictly timed four-part hymn, or anthem. The four measures above are just one example. If you’d like to find and listen to this example, the hymn starts about three minutes into Claudio Arrau’s seven-minute recording of this nocturne. Adjust the times for whatever recording you may have.

Anyone who thinks hymns are the lowest form of music knows nothing about human voices singing in chorus in four-part harmony. In the nocturnes, I would say that these hymn-like sections were a form of musical contrast for Chopin, a way of anchoring and grounding the wildness of the nocturnes.

Done! (Except for…)

The downstairs bedroom, painting and woodwork finish by yours truly. This is the guest room, so, all of you houseguests to be, this is where you’ll stay.

I got the certificate of occupancy on Monday, which means that I passed the final inspection and, as far as the county is concerned, the house is complete. What remains, though, is quite a lot of painting and finishing of woodwork. That’s a lot of work, on which I got started this week. One room, the downstair bedroom, is done. Next: the radio room upstairs.

I’ve been busy and distracted, and I’m reluctant to post a lot of photos until all the painting and interior finish work is done. I’ll post updates each time I come up for air.

Garden

I was too busy to check the garden for a few days, and suddenly the zucchini were a foot long. I hope they’ve not turned to seed. The oversize cucumbers are great, though. Some of the zucchini will go into a curry for supper.

The last ditch

I have often complained that ditches and mud have been the most irritating part of the building process. Today the electric company dug the last ditch to bury my power cable. The house now has power. If it doesn’t rain this evening, I hope to get an exterior photo of the lit-up house at dusk.

Day lilies

The day lilies have burst into bloom in the last week. I planted 300 day lily sets last July. All that work is now paying off.

Busy, busy, busy

I haven’t had much time to post lately. I’ve been busy with a long list of things that need to be done to get the house ready for the final inspection. Plus I had a visitor from California last week. Above: A new chicken feeder ordered from Randall Burkey has made it much easier to keep the chickens’ food clean and cut down on waste. Floor level troughs don’t work very well. This one is suspended from a wire.

The baby squash are coming along.

Basil, a bug, and a squash tendril

The view toward the North Carolina Piedmont from Fox Hunter’s Paradise on the Blue Ridge Parkway. My friend from California and I went for a little road trip to the New River Valley of Virginia.

Some perspective on California's budget

Those who like to bash California have been tsk-tsk’ing at California’s budget problems, trying to blame California’s “public sector.” California’s budget shortfall, at present, is estimated to be about $22 billion.

For comparison, the bailout of one bank alone — Citicorp — means that American taxpayers have now given $60 billion in direct assistance to Citicorp, plus $340 billion in guarantees. That comes to $400 billion, to one private bank! So far, the United States government has made about $12.7 trillion in guarantees and other financial commitments to private interests — Wall Street.

Another bit of perspective: During the California “energy crisis” of 2000 to 2001, Enron and other private interests ripped off Californians for between $30 billion and $70 billion, depending upon where one gets the numbers. Enron, by the way, paid no federal income taxes in most years and even used gimmicks to get tax rebates.

The reason California has a budget problem is that its revenue has fallen off a cliff because of the economic catastrophe brought to us by Wall Street. Last month, sales tax revenue in California was down 51% compared with last year, and personal income taxes were down 44% compared with last year. Californians are not making much money, and they aren’t spending much money.

If you look at the pie chart for California’s revenue, it’s pretty obvious which sector of the economy is not paying its fair share. California could easily fix its budget problem by increasing corporate taxes.

All the noise about public spending and the public sector is propaganda, distortion, and distraction. It’s unregulated greed and a corrupt Congress that we need to focus on.

Kitchen cabinets

I haven’t felt inspired to take a lot of interior photos because there’s still so much missing detail, clutter, and a saw table in the middle of the living room floor. But here’s a preview of the kitchen cabinets, which my brother finished last week. With luck, the plumbers will install the dishwasher and faucets tomorrow. The electrician also should be here tomorrow to hook up the switches, receptacles and light fixtures. I’m seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.

These cabinets, by the way, are all hand made by my brother, though he jobs out the door panels. The wood is maple, with a varnish finish.

Chicken gym

Formerly I had a ramp, with toe-holds, for the chickens to move from upstairs to downstairs. But, for whatever reason, they would use the ramp to go up, but they would refuse to use the ramp to go down. So today I put in small pine limbs arranged as steps, hoping that the limbs feel safer and more instinctive for them. They used them to go up this evening. I guess we’ll see in the morning whether they’ll use them to come down.

The chickens love to perch. They also are fascinated by anything new and interesting that shows up in their chicken house.

Sunbathing

Their egg nest has been installed now. The hens are supposed to lay when they’re five months old. Eggs in August!