A Short Note, Still Alive and Well

Fluffy the Cat in better days, probably some time in early 2012. My table was a mess, as I was working on paperwork as well as my GE Superadio. Fluffy just made herself at home. She died on Palm Sunday this year, just a few months shy of 12 years.

Hello, internet people. I've had my internet back for over a week. I was working a lot, hence the lack of blog articles. I have two articles in the works, one just needs some pictures uploaded and edited.

The weather's been OK. In the low 80's F most days, although the nights are cold (50F, and it feels colder), and it's rained the past two days. 

On the radio front, I've DXed the MW band, and it's been more or less mediocre -- the usual 300+ stations are in there, but nothing super. Not complaining, though -- there is still plenty to hear. On Shortwave, I have been listening more to the ham bands lately, trying to re-learn (for the 1000th time) Morse Code, or -- as the codeheads usually put it -- "CW".

I can usually read CW up to 5 words a minute, with a few glitches. Any faster than that I get lost easily. I know how to listen for the call signs and the CQ's and DE ..... (Morse Code for "from") and the "5NN" (a shorthand CW term meaning "Yeah... I can hear you.").

The 20 Meter Band, the most popular Shortwave ham band, has picked up a little bit. There have been some European stations audible (Germany, Hungary, Austria, Italy, and possibly Finland) and mostly readable during the late afternoons, early evenings. Also I hear a lot of stations from the SE US, Midwest, and Florida. The higher bands are touch and go -- 12 Meters usually is dead, 15 is usually mostly dead, and whenever I've checked it, 10 Meters is usually dead. 17 Meters is nowhere as busy as it was during the last solar cycle.

30 Meters (the CW-only ham band between 10100 and 10150 kHz) is active, and fun to listen to, as the guys generally send moderate speed Code to each other. I also have found the German RTTY station at 10100 kHz (Pinneberg, near Hamburg) to be a good propagation beacon to Europe. NAU, the USN RTTY station in Puerto Rico on 10155 is another good prop beacon.

On the guitar side of things, it's been trudging through slide, trying to get perfect, and any guitarist worth their salt will tell you that you never get perfect... But you aim for it anyway. I have two electrics that I've still been incrementing (raising the string height by thousandths of an inch at a time, then playing it in, then raising it another 1000th of an inch -- to get it perfect) to get the string tension, action, etc. perfect... It's a long process. But when you do it incrementally, you don't pop strings, and your guitar is a happier camper for it. 

You don't take a hammer to a balloon. And you don't make drastic changes to your guitar, unless absolutely necessary.

My 1972 Sakai / Kawai / Daimaru / Decca / Wards / Whatever-it-is guitar. Still a perfect player. Go figure.

Meanwhile, my #1 guitar, my Sakai/Kawai/Daimaru/Decca/whatever it is, has been playing perfect since forever, and playing perfect on slide since the late 1990's. So there ya go...

All that aside, I hope to get a couple more blog articles out over the next week, once I get a few pics loaded onto the computer.

Until then, here's some Johnny Winter, whose album Still Alive And Well was a pretty good one. This is a solo slide guitar blues song he did in Open G, a few years before his death.:

Now for something a bit more upbeat.:

Still Alive And Well came out in 1973, after Johnny took a hiatus -- he had some drug problems he had to kick.

Here's my favorite version of my favorite Jimi Hendrix song, Love Or Confusion. The guitars are phenomenal. A lot of guitarists really hype up Hendrix, but there is a reason for that. He was a guitar expression machine.

My cat Squeakers, when a kitten. She is still alive and well. 

I hope all is well with everyone. Peace.

C.C. August 25th, 2023.

A Short Note on Living Without the Internet

Hello Internet people. As I am typing this, it's dark outside. I'm at my boss's office, after work. I am off the clock and using this spare time here to check out my notifications and maybe add a blog post.

Usually I do most of my online communications at home, on my own computer, using my own internet connection. But I am internet-free for two weeks, because the wiring in the pedestal out in the corner of my property is all effed up, and it's going to take the provider at least another week or so to get a repair person out there to fix it.

It's not the first time this has happened, although in previous years there wasn't an internet connection to speak of, unless dial-up is considered internet.

But, as it stands, it's an interesting foray into a world that is similar to the way things were before 2000, when the internet still was not common in most households. Right now, I'm getting a dose of pre-21st Century living, thanks to the shortcomings of the wiring in the telco pedestal out by the street.

Hopefully, by the first week of August, all will be well again.

I'm still working on a couple new blog articles, about four of them, actually. Two of them on radios, and a third one on my Shortwave loggings from the first half of this year. The fourth one is about the 4th Of July, a post which just needs some photos uploaded.

Until then, here are a couple music vids to make up for the lack of blog activity. In the first one, famous blues singer Skip James is singing his Depression-era classic, Hard Times Killing Floor Blues. The MC who introduces the performance is a (then) West German TV presenter, and I understand just enough German to make out at least half of what he says.

Skip James influenced Eric Clapton and Cream, who did at least one of his tracks on their Fresh Cream album, I'm So Glad. Here, Skip is playing fingerpicked acoustic guitar, with his guitar tuned to E Minor, which is a somewhat rare tuning but one that Skip James apparently used a lot. I've tried playing in E Minor. It's a cool tuning, but not useful for my own style of playing.

Here is Skip playing another of his classics, Devil Got My Woman. I think it may be in the E Minor tuning also, but I'm not 100% sure on that.

And I will close this post with a YT clip of a very good blues player and blues historian Edward Phillips. He has a lot of videos where he is playing old, 1930s, acoustic folk blues classics, and his video channel is well worth checking out. Here he is playing Robert Johnson's Crossroads on an old parlor guitar.

Until next time my friends,

Peace.

C.C., July 25th, 2023

ADDENDUM, 7-28: a new wrinkle appeared in my recent, internet-free journey: disappearing data thanks to the the automatic cell phone OS update.

I am on a budget cell plan. It's one of those services where you buy time when needed -- $20 US gets you 120 minutes of talk time, a couple thousand texts or so, and maybe 150-200 MB of data. Being that I don't talk a lot on my phone, don't text a lot of people, and I only use my cell phone on Wi-fi for internet, it works for me. 

The data limit isn't that big a deal, because usually I use the Wi-fi. The cell system internet is just a backup for me. But when you have no useful Wi-fi, all you have is the cell system, and if you're on a budget plan, you use your data sparingly.

So, last Wednesday I got an extra $20 phone card, because my data was low, and I wanted to add some. That night I added my 120 extra minutes, my 2000 texts, and around 180 MB of data, and thought 'hey, at least I can check some internet messages from home on my cell phone if I need to."

The next day my data was ZERO. I was floored. I did some searching on my phone, and found out that the phone's OS Automatic Update wiped out all my data.

Lesson learned: Use developer mode to turn off Automatic Updates when you don't want them eating up all your data. Just a few hours ago, I had no idea what developer mode even was.

I know now.

Peace.

C.C. 7-28-2023 (my late mother's birthday).

My Grundig G2 Shortwave AM-FM Radio Lost its Memory -- Then I Got It Back!

 

My Grundig G2, an AM-FM-SW radio I got in 2014, which has been my main SW radio since then. That's one reason I post a pic of the G2 so often -- I use this radio daily.

As I've probably said here a whole bunch of times, I am a fan of the Shortwave Radio spectrum. I tune into the SW bands every night and/or early morning. Why? Because there are some interesting stations and signals to hear there, and also because it's fun to hear signals from Southern Africa, Madagascar, China, Korea, Japan, Singapore, Thailand, NZ, Alaska, Central Mexico, the UK, Ascension Island, and other places across the globe.

Shortwave is a dying medium, that is true. But one could say the same thing for a LOT of different media in the internet age.

It doesn't make it any less fun to listen to SW, though. 

For the last 9 years, since September, 2014, my main radio for tuning the Shortwave broadcast bands has been my trusty Grundig G2. It happened almost by accident.... I bought the radio because it was on sale at Fry's Electronics, for around $30 (I've seen G2's for sale for as high as $299 online recently -- that's how much some of them have increased in price since they were discontinued some time around 2017 or so).

As soon as I started using my G2, I noticed that it worked great off the whip antenna, and not only that, the G2 was easy to use, and it sounded great through headphones. FM also sounds rich, and the G2 is quite sensitive on FM, too. We don't get much, if any, FM Band E-Skip here in my section of WA state, but sometimes tropo enhances FM stations from Canada and northern WA. Lately I've been listening to a new local FM station on my G2 -- KPNW, on 98.9 FM, which plays a wide variety of alternative rock and some classic rock. 

98.9 here in Seattle has been varied. In 2014 or 2015 they went rock, and became "Rock 98.9, KVRQ". They played a great selection of classic rock aimed at Gen X'ers, ranging from the mid to late 1980s metal (G'N'R and Motley Crue) to 2000's era alternative and Nu-Metal. I listened to Rock 98.9 every night, and even talked about it here on the blog.

Station ownership didn't seem to promote Rock 98.9 very well, and it flipped to country a year and a half later, and became "The Bull". That didn't fare well, so now the owners are trying an eclectic station that mixes old and new. So far, I like what I hear on KPNW. Either way, it sounds great on my G2.

THE G2 -- MY MAIN SHORTWAVE RADIO

The G2 makes it easy to tune through the SW broadcast bands, as you can toggle from band to band (through the 60m, 49m, 41m, 31m, 25m, 21m, 19m, 16m, and 13m bands). And because the G2 is set to tune in 5 kHz steps on SW, it's easy to tune across a band and see what's on. It has 55 memories on SW, which are already full -- most of the stations, like the Voice of Greece, are no longer on the air, but it's cool to have the frequencies loaded into memory anyway.

I was also able to record some of my catches, until I filled the onboard, 4 gig memory. I still have to get an SD card to insert into the bottom of it to continue recording SW and MW catches.

So the G2 has been my go-to radio on SW and FM. I sometimes use it on MW, with a loop. But I have other radios that I use more on MW. Even so, the G2 is a pretty handy little radio, and a battery charge lasts 1-2 months, depending on use.

I wrote an extensive article on the Grundig G2 here.:

Interrock Nation: THE GRUNDIG G2 -- A Look At A Handy SW-FM-AM DX radio

Fast forwards to 2023, I still use the G2 daily.

A pic of my Grundig G2, with the radio tuned to 9665 kHz Shortwave, to La Voz de Missionaria, a Brazilian radio station located in Santa Catarina state in southern Brazil, which broadcasts to rural areas in NE and North Central Brazil. Missionaria, a religious station that plays music and sermons in Portuguese, is often audible here in WA state. 

In the upper right hand corner of the G2's display you can see the battery indicator, which -- in this case -- is 4 bars of battery. The battery indicator goes from 4 bars (full power) to zero bars (time to recharge). Being that my G2 has glitched when the battery hits one bar of battery, I think that if your battery is up in years, it's probably a good idea to recharge it when it hits one bar.

THREE PREVIOUS GLITCHES

Now, up until recently, there were three times that my G2 wigged.

First Glitch, Maybe in 2016?

The first time, when I turned on my G2, it was on the lowest channel in the US FM band (87.5 or 87.9 Mhz, I don't remember which) and when I switched to MW it was set to 9 kHz spacing (the default). Naturally, I hadn't tuned to that FM frequency or had the radio on 9 kHz spacing when I had used it the previous night, so the changes meant that something had gone awry.

On SW, the radio was stuck on one frequency, and it wouldn't apparently tune. Turning off the radio and turning it back on didn't fix the glitch. I re-set the radio by pulling the battery (a BL-5C, which looks like a large cell phone battery) and putting it back in. It fixed the problem. Luckily, I didn't lose any preset memories, nor did I lose any sound files.

Second Glitch, Probably 2016

The second time, the radio locked up when I was recording a station off SW. Pulling the battery was the only way to get it out of the locked-up condition.

Third Glitch, 2020 or 2021

Maybe two years ago, the G2 glitched again, and like the first time, it was when the battery was low (it had been at around one bar of battery for two weeks). This time, when I fired up the G2 one evening, the clock was off by about 12 hours. The SW band was set to a frequency I never have tuned to or listened to (6340 kHz). I re-set the radio (by opening the battery compartment, pulling the battery out, waiting about 15 seconds, and plugging the battery back in), and then I recharged the battery.

G2 Loses Its Memories Last Week, June 2023

This last time, just last weekend, was a real puzzler. The G2 had been on one bar of battery for maybe a week, and one night (just a week ago) when I fired up my radio it was set at 87.5 MHz (no station in this area is on 87.5 and I never tune there), and the MW was on 9 kHz spacing. My radio's user preference memories were gone, and my sound files were missing. On SW, the radio was set to 2300 kHz, the lowest it will tune. 

Obviously, there was a power issue (due to the low battery?), and the radio was running on its default settings. And somehow, it was not seeing its temporary memory chip which has user settings, user pre-set memories, and soundfiles.

Pulling the battery and re-setting the radio that way didn't change anything. I tried again, waiting a little longer before re-installing the battery. It didn't fix the glitch, either.

For awhile I thought my G2 had mostly fried. The radio would still tune the FM, AM and SW bands, mind you -- on MW I'd have to change to 10 kHz spacing every time I switched on the radio -- but, even though it would still tune the bands, all the radio's memories were lost.

I was saddened by it, actually. A lot of the sound files were from stations that no longer exist -- Radio Disney on 1640 kHz, Voice of Greece, and a couple others. I had backed up all the sound files to my laptop computer, but still.... it felt bad losing all the sound files and user created pre-sets.

I thought about it for a while and figured that maybe the problem was the LOW BATTERY. My G2's BL-5C battery, after all, has been used since almost daily since 2014, and the date code on the battery itself is the year 2012.

So I recharged the battery, which took maybe five hours. 

Then I switched on the G2.

Same issue. Nothing was fixed.

Crap, I thought to myself. My G2 has lost its little mind.

A pic of the Grundig G2 with the battery compartment shown, along with the location of the RE-SET button pinhole.

In the process, though, I noticed the RE-SET button -- a small pinhole located just beneath the battery, inside the battery compartment.

I found a piece of stiff, thin wire and pushed it into the hole, re-setting the radio. While I did this, I kept the radio OFF. The battery, however, being at full power, was still obviously powering the microprocessor -- which runs all the functions, including the ON/OFF button. So, the RE-SET will still work with the radio off.

I took a breath and turned on my G2.

Instantly, it was back to where it had been two days previous!!!

All my memories were back, the radio's sound files were back, and when I switched to SW it was tuned to the last frequency I'd listened to (I think it was 11780 kHz, Radio Nacional da Amazonia), and MW was on 1660 kHz and set to the North American standard channel spacing, 10 kHz.

My radio was back!

A pic of the Grundig G2 right before it shuts down. You can see the 'calendar' date line (which I left at 2011 because that was a fairly good year for me) and in the upper right hand corner of the LCD readout is a small battery indicator. The fact that it is 'empty', or zero bars, shows that I was probably re-charging the battery that night or the day afterwards.

LESSON LEARNED: CHARGE THE BATTERY WHEN IT HITS ONE BAR

My takeaways from this experience is that when a lithium battery gets old, recharge it before the battery hits zero bars on your radio (my G2's battery meter has 4 bars, and it will work on zero bars for a while until you get a power failure warning and it cuts off).

Also, when your battery has a few years on it, buy a few backup batteries, which is probably a good idea anyway -- especially if you are in disaster prone areas like the NW US, which is earthquake country. I intend to get a couple spare BL-5C's and a small charger online.

Being that I average one to two months per charge, a couple extra batteries would be handy if I take my G2 camping, travelling, or during an extended emergency.

So, for all of you who have radios that use these rechargeable BL-5C's, and rechargeables that are up in years, when the batteries get old -- or if and when your radio glitches when the batteries showing one bar or less of power -- RECHARGE YOUR BATTERY when it hits one bar.

And remember the RE-SET BUTTON, if your radio has one. It might not be easy to notice at first. The Re-Set button on my G2 was hard to see. Someone who isn't well acquainted with SW and portable digital radios might not know where to look for one.

IN OTHER LIFE.... SUNSHINE

The weather here has been improving. Earlier today it was about 80-85 degrees F and sunny. I went for a three mile bike ride down the valley and back. My cat Squeakers is gaining weight and is always waiting by the door to her room, meowing whenever I approach, wanting me to watch her eat dry and canned cat food. I keep her separate from my other cats because she doesn't like to eat if other cats are around.

Work has slacked off a bit, giving me a bit more time to get things done around the house and yard. And there is a lot to do.

My main radio for listening to the SW ham bands, my trusty Realistic DX-398, Radio Shack's version of the Sangean ATS-909, a radio that was new in 1998. The DX-398 is a great performer on MW, too.

SO FAR, SOLAR CYCLE 25 IS MOSTLY A DUD

With that, I'll close this blog article, and hope all my readers are doing well and keep those radios humming. The sunspot cycle is looking more and more like a dud, but at least there is something to hear most nights and afternoons. MW really sucked for DX last night, although KFBK Sacramento came in strong with the Coast To Coast AM program. SW sucked big time earlier this afternoon, with the 19, 16, 15, and 13 Meter Shortwave bands all dead as a doornail. There were two US stations on the 21 Meter Band (Radio Marti and WWCR / University Network). Amazonia was alone on the 25 Meter Band.

The 27 MHz sideband channels were dead. The "Outband" (including the Latin American calling channel, 27455 kHz USB) was dead. The 15 Meter Ham band was dead, aside from some weak JT65 on 21065 kHz. The 24 Meter ham band was dead. The 20 Meter Ham band had a handful of extremely weak CW signals between 14020-14045 kHz. There were maybe 3-4 USB convos in the 20 M band sideband section, including a barely readable guy from Italy. But overall it was nothing like we have been told about the new Solar Cycle.

But, you learn to enjoy what you have.  :-)

Until next time, my friends,

Peace.

C.C. June 26th, 2023.

Canadian Radio Company Slashes Jobs, Kills 7 AM Radio Stations

Bye, bye CFRN. It was cool hearing you when you were on the airwaves.

I usually check out several radio forums online, some I check out daily, others once or twice a week. Through those forums I generally get a decent view of the state of the industry that I worked in for about 20 years.

The DX forums, which are getting fewer and fewer as the years go by, also provide some interesting information from time to time. On one of these DX forums, the HF Underground, I recently learned that four of the stations I've either tuned into, or listened to from time to time, are going off the air -- permanently. They comprise four of seven AM stations in Canada that are being taken off the air.

In fact, they already have been shut down. I found out after the fact.

One of the stations being shut down -- CFRN 1260, Edmonton, Alberta -- surprises me, as CFRN was a sports talker and Edmonton is a big sports town with a CFL football team and an NHL hockey team. CFRN, in fact, was the only sports radio station in Edmonton, a city with a million population metro area.

Stations like 'Funny 1060' CKMX brought some laughter to the airwaves, with a nonstop cycle of various comedy clips. Not any more.

The other stations -- Calgary's Funny 1060 CKMX, Vancouver's Funny 1040 CFTE, Vancouver's business radio CFTE 1410, and an AM station in Winnipeg plus two more AM stations in Ontario that I've never heard before -- all belong to a Canadian telecommunications company, Bell Media, that also owns CTV, a Canadian TV news network.

In all, Bell Media is laying off 1300 people, including newstaff on CTV, and other staff in corporate offices Canada-wide. In a country like the US, 1300 people being laid off is a big enough deal. But in a market like Canada it's even more of a big deal. Reaction seems to be ranging from shock to "what else did you expect?"

The four Western Canada stations -- CFRN, CKMX, CKST and CFTE -- were usually strong stations on the AM dial any particular evening. Sometimes I'd listen to a few comedy clips on CKMX, which used to have a country format, and then had an alt-rock format during the grunge boom. CKMX also had a Shortwave relay station that I used to hear in the early 2010's, competing with Radio Marti which broadcast on the same 6030 khz frequency.

CKMX's shortwave relay (call letters CFVP) also has, naturally, been shut down. The last time I heard it, it was still covered by Marti. I haven't heard CFVP clearly in over ten years -- that's how shitty the Solar Cycle has been. Now, of course, I won't hear it at all.

Right now, as I write this, it's night time, and I have my desk-side Sangean PR-D5 tuned to 1260. I am hearing Classic Hits KLYC, McMinnville, Oregon. I used to hear CFRN covering them with sports talk and ESPN at night. That's how great a signal CFRN had.

No more.

CFTE 1410 went through several formats in its 101 year existence. First on the air in 1922, in the 1970s it was a Top 40 station, that played Can-Con hits for Canadian rock fans south of the border. 101 years and you just pull the plug and lay off some people. That's radio.

RADIO IS SICK, AND EVERYTHING IS GOING ONLINE

It's the general state of radio these days. AM stations are on borrowed time. FM stations are not too far from borrowed time. Old time radio fans often say the migration of radio away from "live and local" presentation has killed radio, and they will say reduced listenership numbers are proof of that. Radio experts say the opposite -- that radio is doing the best job it can to stay vital in a world where everything is going online.

It's hard to determine the fact from fiction here. On one hand, it's fact that everything is going online, "radio" included. I have written previously on this blog about how the music industry's move to the online, streaming model is killing the music industry. The move to online-only, streaming delivery is like a massive steamroller, and not all of the results are good for the industries adopting that business model.

The same thing seems to be happening to other entertainment industries, which -- when they go all online -- they find themselves competing with not just with other competitors in their field, but they also find themselves competing with every other form of content, varying from social media to video games, to sites with numerous content channels, like OnlyFans.

Here is a recent article in Forbes, where it discusses job cuts in media platforms ranging from Warner Brothers' Discovery and Turner cable TV networks (100 laid off), the Los Angeles Times (74 staff laid off), and even Southern California Public Radio (21 layoffs from their 175 total positions). The new online, streaming media model is socking it to a lot of media.

2023 Media Layoffs: Warner Bros. Cutting About 100 Employees, Report Says (forbes.com)

One of the reasons for this shedding-of-workers phenomenon in the media is the decline in advertising revenue at most media platforms. Radio is a prime example. Radio in the US makes approximately one-third to one-half the revenue it made in 2005. It's because advertisers have a LOT more media to choose from than they did in 2005. 

Advertisers can pick or choose from gazillions of web portals to use. It's not just radio, TV, Cable, and print media anymore. Advertisers have literally millions of websites to choose from to advertise on. And that massive number of sites drives down advertising revenues. The 'pie' is nearly infinite. The 'slices' are razor thin -- as are ad revenues per slice.

You can't stop people choosing to use their phone to get every form of news and entertainment. It's just so convenient to use the phone to watch, view, or listen to stuff. No one under age 40 uses a radio anymore, and what used to be a 'TV' is now a large internet video monitor. Cable TV, which ruled from the 1970's to the start of this decade, is losing viewers. Cable channels like MTV -- which made hits, and made artists into big stars -- are fading. Other 'legacy' media like Magazines and Newspapers are in their dying throes. For those of us who grew up with these media, and even worked in them, it's a sad state of affairs.

And the changes in media that the greater population chooses -- like the move from broadcast and print media to the all-online model -- only becomes accelerated when the economy is marginal. The first instinct for the media moguls is to shut down marginally profitable operations and lay off people. It happened to me. It happened to literally thousands of other workers in radio since 2005. It happened in the newspaper and news industries, which went from 350K journalists nationwide in the late 1980s to merely 46K journalists (or less) in America today.

And, of course, in the case of these seven Canadian AM radio stations, people got laid off. As someone who was laid off from the radio industry in 2006-2007, I can relate. You almost never get a job again in the industry. Because the industry is not growing. Even growing industries, like the software industry, are laying off people. 

Radio, in contrast to stable industries like software, is a dying industry. Those who have jobs in radio now have their days numbered. AI is already being used on the airwaves. It's being used as a test bed on a shift or two on one or two stations, but once the bugs get worked out, you can guarantee that it will be bye bye DJ. Think about it. In the second month of 2020 the largest radio company in the US got rid of 10% of its employees, including airstaff that had great ratings. Does an industry which is more than willing to slough off workers like that, because of a downturn in revenues, sound like one that won't ditch real people for AI voices?

I say this because radio is not, in general, going to make more money in the future. Even the non-commercial stations will not make more money. Because their contributors are generally Gen X or older. The younger demos aren't paying for the non-comm radio operations to the same extent. All radio stations have their days numbered. It may take 15-20 years for what happened to CKMX, CFRN, CFTE, CKST, and the station in Winnipeg and two AM stations in Ontario, to happen to them. 

But it's coming. You can blame 'corporate greed' if you want. You can blame the lack of "live and local" if you want. You can blame the fact that FM sounds cookie cutter and boring (which it often does), and blame the fact that stations that aren't boring in their music choices don't get ratings. You can blame the fact that some radio companies flip formats on a station more than Mickey D's flips burgers. You can blame the fact that nearly all music on FM is researched to death, guaranteeing that every song you've heard is one you've heard a gazillion times before, driving you to YouTube with the rest of the radio refugees if you want to hear a little variety.

But really, you can't blame anybody. It's the state of audio entertainment -- and all entertainment -- in the 2020s. Everyone, and everything, is going online. They aren't switching on their radios, because they probably don't have one.

Anyway, so long CFRN. So long, Funny 1060. So long, Funny 1040, and so long 1410 CFTE, which once was a popular rock station north of the border. You all had a good run. I think Funny 1060 was over a hundred years old. 101 years old, in fact. So was CFTE 1410. Both stations were put on the air in 1922.

101 years on the air, and some suit in an office in Eastern Canada pulls the plug on it like it's yesterday's trash. That's radio.

Yep, that's radio -- my industry of choice for just shy of two decades. When I was a little kid, I wanted to be a DJ. My mom and dad rigged up a fake radio DJ studio for me, with a real, working, red on-the-air light and a fake microphone. It was in a space under the stairwell which also had my toybox. The radio 'desk' was big cardboard box. I'd pretend I was playing records, switch on the big red light, and chatter away. That's how bad I wanted to be a radio guy.

Years later, I was a radio guy. I wasn't a known name, but I was on the radio just the same. I was a DJ for maybe two and a half months, a news announcer for three years, and then worked in another side of the radio business for 16 more years.

And you know? When I was a little kid, dreaming of being on the radio, I never figured I'd be writing about it being a dying industry. That's how much things change.

And with that, I'm going to try to finish my latest fiction novelette, and I'll be listening to KLYC 1260 playing oldies for a while. They just played Baker Street. Now they're playing Transfusion by Nervous Norvus. I might as well enjoy it while it lasts, right?

C.C. June 20th, 2023.

ADDENDUM, June 21st.

I made a correction (7 AM stations were shut down, not just 6) and added a link to a Forbes magazine online article about layoffs in the media, along with a paragraph about it.

ADDENDUM, June 27th.

I corrected the spelling of our nation's #2 city from "Lost Angeles" (in the paragraph about the LA Times losing some staff) to "Los Angeles". It was an honest typo. Sort of funny, but not really. I like Los Angeles.

Finally, it Feels Like Summer, & What Kind of Moron Steals a Flag?

A pic of my American flags from the 4th of July, 2016. I have been putting them out front for more than a decade -- since the 1990s at least. Not any more. The 65 year old one on the far side of the pic got ripped off.

As I write this, it's dark out. I am finishing up a day at work. The weather decided to take a decent turn about a week ago and even though it's 40 degrees at night (4C) the daytime temperatures are in the 70s or 80s F, which is great May weather here in the Great North Wet.

Of course, as I finish this post, and publish it, we've endured a week of grey skies. But I am not complaining.

A blurry night pic of Seattle's Smith Tower. With all the 'advancement' in phone camera technology, it amazes me that night pictures so often never focus right. It doesn't matter if you follow the instructions or not. Getting a good night pic on a phone camera is hit and miss. SMH.

Work is OK, I'm feeling more energy than a year ago, my cat is doing better. Things appear to be looking brighter, I suppose. I haven't been fiction writing much lately, because I simply haven't felt a ton of inspiration. I have a short novelette that needs to be finished editing, and I open it up on the computer, stare at it a while, and then go find some rock vids on YouTube because... Well, just because.

I listen to a lot of music on YouTube, on my computer, because my stereo is broken. The CD player started wigging a couple years ago, and I never bothered to buy a replacement, because at the time I was so busy taking care of my mom, and going to work, that I really didn't listen to the stereo much anymore anyway. 

My old DVD player that won't play DVD's anymore works great as a CD player, so by itself that isn't a problem, but my speakers are shot. One of them works OK, the other one was broken by a previous roommate (they punched a hole into the speaker itself), and it's just another item that needs to be repaired or replaced.

I have always had a lot of music playing in the house, especially in the past when my stereo was working. Now I hear it on the computer, just like everyone else does. Except they probably hear it on their phone, through those shitty earbuds everyone uses. I use Sony headphones, because a lot of earbuds just make music sound like a tinny, trebly screech that destroys it. 

My best earbuds are Trisonics, a budget brand I got somewhere -- I don't remember where I got them. It was either the dollar store, or another budget operation. They cost me somewhere between one dollar and 5 bucks. Although they are a budget model, they sound OK. They actually put out some bass tones. The earbuds that came with my new Tecsun PL-398MP are also pretty good. My Sony's, amazingly, which cost me around $20, are tinny. The IPhone or Android phone compatible earbuds I found on the local bike trail about 4-5 years ago are midrangy and crappy sounding.

However, good earbuds or bad earbuds, I don't like using them much, because they can slip. Headphones do not slip.

Anyway, my writing hobby has been placed on hold for a while. It'll come back. It always does.

A pic of my trusty Radio Shack 200629, a terrific MW DXer (but needs an external loop in low signals regions like where I live), tuned to XEPE, Tecate, BCN, Mexico -- a town otherwise know for its excellent 'Tecate' beer.

My MW DXing hobby is el-dullo, being that the ionosphere hasn't exactly been bringing in the really distant stations. It's been more than eleven years since 2011 when I was hearing tons of cool stuff on the MW band, but the Sunspot Cycle isn't cooperating. I am enjoying hearing MW at night through my new Sangean PR-D4W, which has terrific sound, but the actual MWDX is pretty sparse.

KSTP 1500 and XEPE 1700 are my go-to frequencies to check for DX conditions. Both stations are around 1500 miles / 2000 km away. Also, I nightly check KBRE 1660, The Bear, from Merced, California, because they play rock music. If those three stations aren't in well, it means that generally MWDX is mostly dead.

And it's been mostly dead, or just fair DX conditions, since Winter. I am glad there are regionals and maybe 300 stations I can hear nightly. I am not complaining. But the really cool, longer distance stuff? It's MIA.

But I've got most of my health, my cat is doing better, and I've been getting a lot better on slide guitar, and I'm able to work out with the barbells again, so I'm not complaining about life in general. As one prominent female rocker from the 70's (Jackie Fox, the bass player for the Runaways) once said about life: "It sure beats death."

HONOR THE VETS BY STEALING THE FLAG

We had a holiday la couple weekends back, at the very end of May. Memorial Day, the American holiday that dates from after our Civil War, where veterans were honored for their service to the Country. I'll be blunt -- I haven't felt a ton of patriotism over the past couple years. I just ain't feelin' it. 

But, at the same time, a guy I truly respect, who lives down my street, took a bullet in Vietnam... So I put out my flags for him this Memorial Day. 

My two flags, Memorial Day, 2022. The one that was stolen this year is in the foreground.

So some asshole decides to rip one of them off. Yes, the older flag, the one my grandmother used to put in a planter out front of her house every Memorial Day and 4th Of July. That flag.

There are shitheads all over this planet, and one of them I think lives somewhere in or near my neighborhood, they're probably in their teens and have an IQ that matches their age range, and they stole the flag. Why do I think they're local youths? Because the few druggies that drive through the neighborhood periodically (either when they get lost, or they're looking for a party) aren't interested in ripping off flags, that's why. They'll rip off your mail, but flags? WTF are they going to do with a flag?

Flags aren't worth anything monetarily, except as a symbolic gesture to celebrate your nation's holiday, or honor the veteran down the street.

But yeah, seeing it was stolen really pissed me off. 

And you know? I've been putting out the flags every Memorial Day, 4th of July, and Veteran's Day since I can't remember when. I even put them out on 5-1-2011, the day that Seal Team Six got Osama Bin Laden.

But I'm not putting them out anymore. Unless it's the throwaway, miniature kind you get in the drugstore checkstand displays. It's not worth it to put out a holiday decoration if small minded people decide they need to steal it. No thanks.

Well, right now, as I write these words, it's time to shut out the office lights here where I work, and head home. Got to stop by the grocery store and get food and some cat litter. Maybe a hamburger and fries -- my once a month, fast food treat. I will undoubtedly finish this post at home, in my writing den.

ALL HAIL THE SANGEAN PR-4DW -- it's better than they say it is

I got a new radio, which I mentioned a few paragraphs above. I don't know why. It wasn't expensive, and a model with a pretty good rep -- the Sangean PR-D4W. It turns out it's probably the best new AM-FM radio you can get. I was pleasantly surprised at its sound, as well as its performance. 120 hours on a set of D Cell batteries, being played 4 hours a night at moderate volumes? Sounds great to me! 

I will have a review / article on it probably next month. I want to give it some time so I can review it properly. But so far I can tell you: It probably is the best AM-FM portable you can get. And it's stereo on headphones. Terrific sound overall. And it's probably an excellent emergency radio too.

MORE HUMAN THAN HUMAN! yEAAAAAHHHH

How about some Rob Zombie? Here's Rob with his solo band playing a rock show in New Jersey in 2005. Ozzfest. 103 degrees, and it looks like a lot of people were having a lot of fun hearing them play. Dragula -- what a big hit that was. My mother used to sing Dragula in karaoke. No lie. And people requested it. Not just because it was different seeing and hearing an older woman singing Rob Zombie, but she did a decent job of it. My mom liked all kinds of music, including rock like Rob Zombie and AC/DC.

2005, what a year, even music-wise. Rock still was relevant at the time. Nu-metal was fading out, but there were still a few bands kicking A and taking no names.... Eighteen Visions and Army Of Anyone were prime examples of that. Both had good albums out in 2006. Slipknot had recently turned out a great album, Vol. 3: The Subliminal Verses, in 2004.

White Zombie playing More Human Than Human at the MTV Awards show, 1995. Astro-Creep 2000, the CD 'More Human Than Human' was on, was a seminal 1990's rock album.

For those of you who missed out, here's Eighteen Visions, playing one of their hits, 'Waiting For The Heavens', from 2004's 'Obsession' CD. 18V, as they were known sometimes, weren't really big, but they had a couple of really good albums out in 2004 and 2006. Their music is well worth checking out, especially their 'Obsession' 2004 CD and 'Eighteen Visions' 2006 CD.

Here's Army Of Anyone's 'Goodbye' video. 'Goodbye' was released in 2006. Army Of Anyone was three guys from the Stone Temple Pilots fronted by Filter's Richard Patrick. I played this CD to death in 2006 and 2007.

This is the opening track off Army Of Anyone's 2006 CD, "It Doesn't Seem To Matter", played live. It's totally kickass.

After 2005-2006, things went thddddt in Rock music over the next few years, but there still is some good rock out there. You just have to dig for it. Mostly on YouTube. And make sure you've got a good set of Sony headphones. :-)

And with that, my friends, I shall close this blog article. I will post another one soon, as there has been some news in the radio industry of note.

See yas,

C.C., June 19th, 2023

Cold, Cold Spring and the Late, Late Sun

Seattle's landmark building, the Smith Tower -- when it was built it was the tallest building west of the Mississippi River. I took this on a sunny Thursday afternoon, when I accompanied my boss on a task downtown.

Greetings, internet people. As I write this it is night time, and it is the start of the month of May. May historically has been the month where you know Spring has arrived.... The local daffodils and snowdrops and bluebell flowers are up, the air feels fresh and warmer than Winter (sometimes you even have 80F degree days) and the trees have been green on the hills for a month.

But not so, this year.... More on this later.

Work for me has slowed down a little, as there has been a lull in the case my boss has been working on, so the extra time has given me some ability to get a few things done around the house, and take care of my cat, trying to get her to gain weight.

The Columbia Tower, on the right side of the picture. When built, the Columbia Tower was the tallest building west of the Mississippi River. Within a few years, that slot was taken by another tower in Los Angeles. I took this on my phone the same sunny, warm Thursday I took the pic of the Smith Tower. My boss, an attorney, was participating in a deposition on the 36th floor. 

I also have been riding my bike more. For the past year, I have to admit I haven't been riding my bicycle as much as I used to. I used to ride it five miles a day (or night) -- 365 days a year. But after a couple years of getting little, if any, sleep while taking care of my ailing mother, I really didn't feel like going out in the freezing cold and riding my bike around the neighborhood a few times, or down to the closest urban area and back. Sometimes I just didn't have the energy to do so.

But, lately I've been forcing myself to do it, because -- well -- you have to. My mother passed away in November, 2021, but the lack of decent sleep for the two previous years socked my health a good one. I found myself tired all the time. I am just now getting back to what I feel is normal. The energy levels are higher.

Now, as I either ride my bike around the neighborhood during the afternoon or drive to work and back, I naturally look up at the nearby hills -- hills which usually are fully greened on April 5th. That date struck me as odd because I had a girlfriend at the time (in the 2000s) whose birthday was on that date. I started noticing this trend in 2003 and 2004, when I started noticing that the hills were fully green on that date. For a couple years I even marked such things (trees green, trees in autumn colors, temperatures, etc.) on a calendar.

The view from one of the mid floors of the Columbia Tower in Seattle. It was a beautiful day that Thursday. Visible in the picture is the Federal Building (center of the pic, a square, beige tower with square, orange roof, and the First Interstate Building (I think it has a different name now), which at one time had the highest office rents in Seattle.

Every year since 2003-2004 the first week of April was pretty much when one could guarantee that the hills were finally great because the trees were finally leafed out. It was like nature's time clock. I am certain I have even mentioned it on this blog back in 2015-2016.

This changed in 2016 and 2017, when the trees began to be a week, and then two, and even three weeks late. I think last year they were 17 or 18 days late (I probably remarked about it on my blog here).

This year? The leaves on the trees are A MONTH LATE. 30 days, give or take a couple.

It was May 5th when I noticed that the leaves were all mostly budded on the hills. 

Now, in the news media and other media there is a lot of talk about "Climate Change" and "Global Warming", and I'm sure that those concepts are accurate, globally.

Looking down a local street in late December, 2022. It was nice getting a little bit of snow just before Christmas. It was one of the few Christmassy things to enjoy, really. Although we've had snow days at least once a year over the past several years, we haven't had a ton of colder weather, although we have had more nights where the temperature hit 20 degrees F or less than I remember when I was a kid.

But here in my neck of the woods, the trees have been late for several years, the frogs have been late in their croaking in Springtime, and the cottonwoods have been late in their letting loose all of their 'cotton' into the air.

Something is haywire. And I think what is haywire is related to the Sun. As you can see in this chart below (from NASA), which I've posted on this blog before, the Sun's solar irradiance has been gradually dropping for 15-20 years, and it dips even more during a Solar minimum -- and the years 2016-2021 were the Solar Minimum.

And, at the same time, the "peaks" of the most recent Solar cycle -- 2012-2013 -- matched the Solar MINIMUMs that we experienced in the 1970s and 1980s and 90s.

SOLAR FUN.....

For a memory refresher, here is that pesky chart again.:

See the yellow lines? Those indicate Solar Irradiance levels since 1900. The thick yellow line is the average. The thinner yellow lines indicate the levels of Solar Irradiance during the various Solar Cycles. You'll notice that the two Solar Minimums, in the mid 1970's and early 1980's had more Solar Irradiance than the most recent Solar Maximum that occurred in 2012.

Now does this data mean anything? It's hard to tell. The NASA article from which I pulled this chart doesn't go into detail on Solar Irradiance and climate, Solar Irradiance and what affects, if any, that it has on agriculture, plants, or even radio propagation. In fact, I can't find any information online, on any website, about Solar Irradiance and whether it affects those things.

The NASA article says that because Global Temperatures are going UP while the Solar Irradiance is going DOWN seems to indicate that Solar Irradiance and Global Temperature averages are unrelated. Or, any effect the Sun has on Global Temperatures is far outweighed by human-caused greenhouse gases.

The inside of the Columbia Center on a Thursday afternoon in late April. It was only 3:30 p.m., and I wondered: where were all the people?

Now, I am not a scientist. Neither am I an expert on climate. Nor am I an expert on the Sun.

But, that said, it sort of amazes me that talk of reduction in Solar Irradiance, and its effects on nature, and on plants, never seems to be discussed. Even on radio forums and websites, it's crickets. It's almost as if no one has bothered to investigate it. On some ham radio forums it's all Rah Rah Rah look at how awesome Cycle 25 is turning out to be. 

It's odd, though, any time I turn on my radios the reception is not indicating that the new Solar Cycle is all that awesome. Lately it has indeed improved slightly from the nuclear winter conditions in 2017 and 2018, when sometimes the Shortwave band literally sounded like there had been nuclear war, but it's been anything but spectacular.

WWVH, located near Kakeha, Kauai, Hawaii, near Kokole Point, on the western tip of Kauai Island. WWVH gets out really well. I never used to hear them before the last Solar Minimum kicked in around 2016-2017. WWVH still sometimes covers WWV, Fort Collins, Colorado. And often WWVH is alone on 10 Mhz.

An example: I've been hearing WWVH on 10 MHz nearly nightly. Earlier tonight I heard WWVH at S4 signal levels ('S5' is top level signals), with WWV being a no-show. Ever since I first turned on a Shortwave radio several decades ago I never even heard WWVH, much less heard the station drown out WWV.

I also do not recall NOT hearing WWV when I was younger, ever -- yet it's a frequent no-show lately, and I've got better receiving equipment than I had when I was a kid.

Like many MW DXers and SWLs, I look forwards to the propagation conditions on those two band improving over the next few years. But the lateness of the trees on the hills makes me wonder what is going on with the climate. This lateness is a trend that's been going on here for 7 years now. 

What's up, Mr. Sun? What are you giving us? Taking a short vacay?

My L520 needs some minor surgery.

On to other things. My red guitar, my Lotus L520, has decided to go on strike. The input jack is not working. I think the 'tongue' part of the jack wore out. It doesn't hold the plug of the instrument cable securely. I've tried some small adjustments and workarounds, but it's just not going as planned. So I shall have to replace the jack. That also means I've got to rout out more room for the new jack, because it's bigger than the original one, and there isn't enough room for the new jack unless I rout out more room for it. Work.....

Squeakers, when a kitten.

In much better news, my cat Squeakers is getting better. She is eating more, and seems to be gaining weight. I still give her kitten formula at least once a day to ensure that she gets enough nutrition and hydration. I keep her separate from my other cats so she can stay warmer and isolated from the rest of the house (I simply can't afford to heat the entire house very well). She's always meowing when I approach the door to her room, wanting to get petted, and wanting me to watch her eat. :-)

Sometimes ya just have to count your blessings.

'Gettin' High' with BUCKCHERRY

I'll end this with a couple rock tracks, because -- why not? 1999, when Buckcherry's "Lit Up" came out, was a pretty good year for rock music. Not only was it the year the US music industry made the most money in its history, there was a lot of good music produced during that time period. In fact that entire decade -- the Roaring 90's -- gave rock music a major kick in the backside. And bands like Buckcherry provided part of that 'kick', with upbeat rockers like "Lit Up" and "Ridin'".

I remember putting this song on hard drives for radio stations, way back when. The day I remember most, it was a sunny day in Belltown (a Seattle neighborhood just north of Downtown). I had just put "Lit Up" on a hard drive for our mainstream rock format, and I went out for a walk during lunch. It was 80 degrees, and a great time to work in Seattle. I enjoyed my job, putting music on CDs and Hard Drives... BPI was a good place to work.

Here is a vid of Buckcherry playing "Lit Up" live in Japan, 2005.:

Singer Josh Todd, who wrote much of the song "Lit Up" (along with Buckcherry guitarist Keith Nelson -- the Sex Pistols' Steve Jones also apparently played guitar on the recording), was writing about a drug he had used in the past, but when he and his girlfriend had their child some time before Buckcherry got popular, he gave up all drug use.

Commendable!

Here is the video for their next big hit, "Ridin'", which came out in 2001. The album this track came off of, "Time Bomb" (also released in 2001), was really good. Sort of like G'N'R meets AC/DC, and Hollywood to the max, dude. And guys, look at all the rock chicks in these vids.

Definitely, it was another era.

 

Well, that's about it for now, folks.

Until later we meet again,

C.C. May 10th, 2023