This afternoon I beat Satan’s Putting Green back into submission. I admit that I like the pungent aroma of fresh cut garlic mustard filling the air. My neighbor has yet to cut his this year and it is getting long but that is not my issue. He has a riding mower so he really doesn’t have an excuse. There is no contest, just a bit of a contrast. In any event, my cats don’t care. They still get to gaze out the windows and watch life go by. Now for the horses: there is an old troubleshooting credo: when you hear hoofbeats think horses, not zebras. I really need to take my own advice. I found the troublem with my radio and it was so simple that I am slapping my forehead still. It was a menu setting that was causing it to not transmit when I was using the playback on the voice recorder. Well at least the company gave it a clean bill of health. I am thinking of getting a sign made for my shack saying “HORSES FIRST” . Now about the impaled pigs. My wonderful and long suffering wyfe has great ideas. Her latest is to keep as low a profile as possible for activations when we are out of state and in high populated areas such as Gettysburg. I agree and today we were testing out the idea of operating with a “HAMSTICK” antenna on a 4″ magmount. it would be fast to deploy and would be rather circumspect and would not involve anything like putting a wire in a tree or anything such as that. Well, it worked and worked well. This morning we went to Little Buffalo State Park (US-1376) and worked 21 contacts in less than an hour on 40M. This was between 0830 and 0915 EDT and the sun had yet to burn off the cloud cover. After we packed up and left, we went to Big Springs State Park. By the time we arrived the sun had emerged and the clouds were gone. The sky was clear and blue and the temperature was up in the low 30’s Celsius. A very nice day, indeed. I tried a 20M “HAMSTICK” and could not find a vacant spot on the band as the Florida QSO Party was going on. I put the 40M ‘stick back on and worked 14 contacts including 6 park-to-park contacts in less than an hour during the middle of the day when D layer absorbtion was going strong. All in all, I call the great experiment a rousing success! Even Ptolemy was pleased! Well TTFN. Namaste, y’all