{"id":1672,"date":"2009-12-06T20:00:26","date_gmt":"2009-12-07T03:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/?p=1672"},"modified":"2009-12-03T20:15:39","modified_gmt":"2009-12-04T03:15:39","slug":"2009-in-review-best-new-hobby","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/?p=1672","title":{"rendered":"2009 In Review: Best New Hobby"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"My
My "New FT-2800 2-Meter Rig<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In order to be a “new hobby” it probably has to be something I started this year. That kind of limits the selection to two things: making garden stuff and ham radio. It’s probably also a foregone conclusion which one makes the “best”?<\/p>\n

I decided to make some raised garden beds<\/a> and sell them. While they’re pretty nice, there’s no demand! I did sell one custom garden bed, one corner bed, and one potato box, but that wasn’t enough to even cover my expenses. I had a lot of fun making sawdust. I’d like to figure out something else to make that might be useful enough for people to buy. Suggestions welcome!<\/p>\n

In September while we were in Yellowstone Park, I was kind of bemoaning the lack of connectivity when someone in the line told me that they had great connectivity; they had a ham radio setup. I talked with them a bit more and learned that quite a few RV owners also had ham radio licenses. A few days later I was reading an article on people who are on full-time RV “vacations” and communicate with other similar-minded folks on the two-meter ham radio band.<\/p>\n

When I was about 14 or 15, I got my first ham radio license and a year later upgraded the license. I let the license expire while we were in the Air Force. However, I remember that I had a great time on the air waves.<\/p>\n

I’ve since become licensed<\/a> … my call sign is KF7FXZ. I’ve bought a two-meter radio, built a good antenna for the system, and am in the process of making it possible to put this transceiver in my car so I can use it while mobile.<\/p>\n

This new hobby is definitely the “best new hobby!”<\/p>\n

Ta ta for now!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In order to be a “new hobby” it probably has to be something I started this year. That kind of limits the selection to two things: making garden stuff and ham radio. It’s probably also a foregone conclusion which one makes the “best”? I decided to make some raised garden beds and sell them. While … Continue reading 2009 In Review: Best New Hobby<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pnKxs-qY","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1672\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}