Understandable. I am married, too. But I'm willing to bet that
2/14/04 was listed as the date of the contest long before the change
was made. The consequences of doing so were apparently not considered
well enough, just as they were not considered the last time a last
minute date change was tried for the CW Sprint.
It should have been done differently, like this:
"Gee, it's unfortunate that the CW Sprint, advertised as 2/14/04 since
who knows when is on Valentine's Day this year. But given such short
notice to make a change, and remembering the fuss that came up when we
tried to move it from Labor Day weekend on short notice a few years
ago, perhaps it would be best to put in a future revision to the date
scheduling to exclude Valentine's Day from being a possibility for
future CW Sprints. Sorry this happened for 2004."
You see, I am a BUSY PERSON. I work two jobs. I have a 4 year old
daughter. I have an XYL who works and is a full-time graduate student
at Univ. of Tenn. We are rehabilitating a wrecked 100 year old house
that we also happen to live in. The ONLY way I can operate contests is
if I plan them well in advance, based on the dates given by the contest
organizers. I understand other people can adjust quicker -
I cannot. I can't go out to dinner without several days' notice, much
less try to operate a radio contest.
Based on knowing that the Sprint is on Feb. 14, I assured K2KQ that it
would be no problem for me to give a talk at the Yankee Clipper Contest
Club meeting on Sunday, February 1. I made sure I checked the contest
calendar beforehand - hey, no problem, not even the CQ 160 is that
weekend! Silly me.
I will be in New England the night before. To operate the Sprint from
W1 - I'll have to find a suitable place to do so, re-schedule my flight
plans to an earlier flight (I am arriving Hartford at 7 p.m. Saturday
night at present), cancel my #2 job (which usually is late night
weekends, Fridays I usually work until 2:30 or 3:00 a.m. - I can't be
flying 3 or 4 hours later out of Knoxville), rent a car (I had a ride
to/from BDL arranged), in short, this has become very problematic
through no fault of my own. I am ready to operate the Sprint, from
Tennessee on Feb. 14th. So?
I take back my earlier call to revoke the date change. Do whatever,
I'll either figure out the logistics of changing everything around and
finding somewhere to operate in New England or I'll just skip the
contest altogether and watch hockey on TV in my hotel room instead.
Ridiculous.
Scott Robbins, W4PA
--- "J. Edward (Ed) Muns" <w0yk@msn.com> wrote:
> I'm not ticked off about it, but I certainly understand your
> frustration
> with the change. However, in thinking about the entire constituency
> of
> Sprinters, there are probably just as many, if not more, who had
> conflicts
> with it being on Valentine's Day evening. Either way, some folks are
> going
> to be disappointed and the contest organizers had to choose.
>
> 73,
> Ed - W0YK
=====
"Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time." --
Bertrand Russell
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