ARRL DX Contest, CW - 2021
Call: KU2M
Operator(s): KU2M
Station: KU2M
Class: SOSB/15 HP
QTH: Wayne, NJ
Operating Time (hrs): 17.25
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
160:
80:
40:
20:
15: 198 53
10:
-------------------
Total: 198 53 Total Score = 31,482
Club: Frankford Radio Club
Comments:
Some years ago, after having been staying with a friend in Los Angeles, I packed
up the car and returned home to New Jersey. On the last leg of the journey, I
stopped and stayed over at the home of an old friend in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
While there, literally overnight, one of my wisdom teeth decided it was a
perfect time to flare up. After being able to manage only a few hours' sleep
because of the pain, the next morning I set out on the final leg of my trip,
stopping at every rest stop along the way, coaxing Bufferin out of dispensing
machines and eating it like candy while I drove. My dentist had been called and
told me to drive straight to his office, and that even though it was a weekend
evening, he would be set up and waiting for me for emergency treatment when I
got back to New Jersey. What a guy.
When I finally reached the dentist's office, he took an X-ray and told me the
bad news: the wisdom tooth, which was still below the gum line, was impacted,
having grown sideways into an adjacent molar. And more bad news: because of
inflammation and possible infection, anesthesia would only be partly effective
at best, and would probably not be effective at all. Meaning: I would be
completely awake and feeling everything during the surgery. With that happy
thought, he and his assistant strapped me in and went to work cutting, dicing,
and extracting the tooth that was buried in my jaw. Unfortunately, I didn't pass
out from the pain.
The reason I relate this otherwise completely irrelevant story is because having
an impacted, sub-cutaneous wisdom tooth cut and yanked out of my head without
anesthesia was less painful than operating 15 meters in the ARRL DX contest this
past weekend.
It started out all right, since Friday night there was a decent opening to VK/ZL
and I even worked FK8IK. Saturday morning, however, the band was comatose.
Beaming the normal direction to Europe, I heard an impenetrable wall of S7 noise
- if there were any EU stations on, they were completely buried by band noise.
Beaming further south than 80 degrees for bent path alleviated the noise and was
the only way I could hear anything coming from Europe, which wasn't much. The
first EU I worked was II9P, who called me - and I could barely hear him. Calling
CQ after that resulted in zero responses. There were the usual suspects from
South America and the Caribbean lurking about, but not too many. My only run of
the entire weekend occurred around 1300Z - about a dozen EU stations. And that
was my EU run for the whole weekend.
It quickly became apparent that all the propagation was all down south - way
south. W4s and W5s were running EUs that I could not hear. Even guys further
west in PA seemed to be doing better. It was another case of the KU2M Triangle.
I knew things were bad when I took a break to vacuum the hallway rugs and
realized that I was having more fun doing that than the contest.
And while I did manage, probably through extra sensory perception, to work a few
vapor-weak EU stations here and there through the day, the sheer paucity and
variety of stations was, in a word, pathetic. I need not mention that there was
absolutely nothing heard out of JA or anything north of KH6 in the Pacific this
far north and east. Dupeday (some people call it Sunday) was even worse. While
there had been a few EUs heard and worked on Saturday, there were only two -
both EAs - heard or worked the next day. I finally threw in the towel and
devoted my time to doing other things.
My dentist tells me that I don't have to worry about wisdom teeth anymore, but
after deciding to do 15M single band this weekend, I now know that my sanity is
seriously in question.
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