{"id":2243,"date":"2014-02-07T21:47:11","date_gmt":"2014-02-08T04:47:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/?p=2243"},"modified":"2014-02-07T21:47:11","modified_gmt":"2014-02-08T04:47:11","slug":"olympics-snow-paperwork-and-a-cold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/?p=2243","title":{"rendered":"Olympics, Snow, Paperwork, and a Cold"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_2244\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-2244\" style=\"width: 640px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rnsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/IMG_1469.jpg?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"2244\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/?attachment_id=2244\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rnsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/IMG_1469.jpg?fit=1280%2C960&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"1280,960\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;2.2&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;iPhone 5s&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;1391531453&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;4.12&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;160&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0.0333333333333&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"VE Certificate\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"&lt;p&gt;VE Certificate&lt;\/p&gt;\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rnsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/IMG_1469.jpg?fit=300%2C225&amp;ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rnsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/IMG_1469.jpg?fit=604%2C453&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"size-large wp-image-2244\" alt=\"VE Certificate\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rnsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/IMG_1469.jpg?resize=604%2C453&#038;ssl=1\" width=\"604\" height=\"453\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rnsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/IMG_1469.jpg?resize=1024%2C768&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rnsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/IMG_1469.jpg?resize=150%2C112&amp;ssl=1 150w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rnsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/IMG_1469.jpg?resize=300%2C225&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rnsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/IMG_1469.jpg?w=1280&amp;ssl=1 1280w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rnsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/IMG_1469.jpg?w=1208&amp;ssl=1 1208w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 604px) 100vw, 604px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-2244\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">VE Certificate<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>In order to receive an license to operate in the Amateur Radio Services (also known as ham radio), the applicant must pass a test. The test is administered by &#8220;volunteer examiners&#8221; who have been certified and cleared to administer the test. Before Christmas I sent in my paperwork to be certified as an examiner, and the paperwork finally arrived! Three examiners have to administer the exam, none can be close relatives. However, it&#8217;s a way to give back to the amateur radio community! I participated as an examiner in my first exam session on January 29th. Four people took the Technician Class license exam and all four passed.<\/p>\n<p>Before the exam, I talked a little with them about test-taking strategies. Since this is a multiple choice test of 35 questions and there is no penalty for a wrong answer, it&#8217;s best to answer every question, even if you have to guess! I also told them that their first answer is usually right and they should be very careful about second guessing their answer! One of the test takers changed two answers &#8230; from the right answer to the wrong answer, and further left one question unanswered. The test-taker passed, but barely! Fortunately, once you&#8217;re licensed, no one is interested in how you scored on the test.<\/p>\n<p>One of the people I work with in Idaho Falls took her Technician Class test a week go and is anxiously awaiting her call sign. I just checked the database, but her call sign hasn&#8217;t been assigned yet. It&#8217;s been fun talking with her about the many facets of this wide-ranging hobby.<\/p>\n<p>A significant snow storm finally blew through here last night. Today was my every-other-Friday-off day, so I got the snow blower out and cleaned the driveway and sidewalks of a bit more than three inches of snow. It was fairly light and fairly dry snow, however. It was welcome &#8230; with prayers for a whole bunch more to come. We&#8217;ll gladly take it here and give the east coast some relief!<\/p>\n<p>The Winter Olympics have started and I&#8217;m quite happy about that. I really enjoy the games. I&#8217;ve also been quite disappointed in all the criticism I&#8217;m seeing on social media about Russia and about NBC. Things are getting just too partisan. Just too critical. Not willing to cut anyone any slack. It&#8217;s all quite contrary to the spirit of the Olympics.<\/p>\n<p>A local case in point: The headline in today&#8217;s Idaho State Journal reads:\u00c2\u00a0<strong>Man shoots retriever for mating with his dog: Canine&#8217;s death leads to fight between neighbors<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>A Robin man is facing misdemeanor animal cruelty and battery charges after allegedly shooting a neighbor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s dog and killing it, then getting into a fight with the neighbor after disclosing what he had done.<\/p>\n<p>According to court filings, Rodney Lish told his neighbor in early November that he shot his golden retriever a day earlier after finding it \u00e2\u20ac\u0153locked up and mating,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d with his son\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s dog.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>That was just plain wrong. Animal cruelty and battery charges have been filed against Lish and trial is scheduled for March 21st.<\/p>\n<p>And, to top it all off, I&#8217;ve caught a cold. I&#8217;ve been thinking it would be mild and just go away, but today I&#8217;m not so sure any more. It&#8217;s kind of threatening to move down into my chest. Argh.<\/p>\n<p>Time to go back to the TV and watch the Olympics!<\/p>\n<p>Ta ta for now!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In order to receive an license to operate in the Amateur Radio Services (also known as ham radio), the applicant must pass a test. The test is administered by &#8220;volunteer examiners&#8221; who have been certified and cleared to administer the test. Before Christmas I sent in my paperwork to be certified as an examiner, and &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/?p=2243\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Olympics, Snow, Paperwork, and a Cold<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/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":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2243","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-Ab","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2243","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=2243"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2243\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rnsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}