Hi Dave,
First of all give my best to Dan.

Since we last chatted I moved to California, was in a marriage with a lady 
that works for Social Security that did not work out.

Gale passed a way a few years back too.

I never kept in touch with her since I moved out here.

I have a really good job working for the Department of Rehabilitation as 
their in-house Braille transcriber.

I use Duxbury and we have two really fast Braillo 200 embossers.

I live in an apartment in downtown Sacramento with two Siamese cats named PC 
and Pixel.

I haven't been on the low bands at all since I left Philly in 1990.

I'm proposing to get a Yaesu FT817 the little qrp rig.

If I didn't already have the British made Radio Mate keypad and the John 
Hansen Millenium Qsyer I'd never get a readio that is so menu driven.

I'm also planning to use two small antennas the Canadian made Miracle Whip 
and a British equivalent called the Wonder Wand that has it's own 
counterpoise system.

I want to get back on the air because I miss the public service aspects of 
the hobby and the code.

Even though I'm an extra I'm probably way out of practice.

I have also acquired an old Dell laptop with a serial port. Have placed Jaws 
on it. I also have three programs that might be able to communicate with the 
FT817. Simon Brown's commander program, ham radio deluxe and something 
called FTbasic.

I hope to goodness with all these programs I can access the menus and make 
changes to them.

If not I will certainly have different forms of access with the two keypads.

The Millenium Qsyer will let you hear the frequency and mode etc in Morse 
code. The Radio Mate will let you store 20 memories within itself. John 
Hansen tells me there is no wan to access the radio memories on the FT817 
because of the protocol that Yaesu uses.

It was great hearing from you. If you are going to Louisville have a great 
time. The Galt House is a wonderful hotel.

If you need a repeater list for Kentucky check with Harvey Haigee.

I'm not going to Dallas this year.

I'm spending the money I would normally spend on conventions on buying my 
Qrp rig and accessories instead.

Those Yaesu FT817 radios need to be accessorized to death to turnthem into 
real radios!

I should probably be sensible and get a Kenwood TS480 which is currently the 
most accessible rig out there.

But I've always been chalenged by the byways of accessibility.

There is a fellow here on this list named Danny Dyer who has used an FT817 
successfully with an Mp1 antenna.

Best of 73 and thanks for writing.

Eric
KU3I