Grabow's Ramblings From 2016

Plans for 2016 POSTED JAN 2, 2016
Happy New Year! I've been making up for lost time since I paid off the big student loan in 2014, taking four major road trips in the last sixteen months. All these road trips meant more bandscans on the YouTube channel , which in turn meant more subscribers (328 as of this post). Unfortunately the honeymoon is over... Lord willing I'll be buying a condo this year and that makes $aving the priority. Better to see it in a savings account than vanishing down the big black hole of college de...

New DXing Pages POSTED FEB 29, 2016
My latest database, which I'm branding as my "Interactive Logbook" , is now finished. This took a lot of work, but I enjoyed it, and now I have a great logbook that I can access from anywhere, share with others, and process data from in all kinds of ways. I expect to make a lot of TV and FM catches in the coming decades, and this logbook will be invaluable in helping me keep track of everything. This part of egrabow.com's upgrade will be paying off for a long time. The database is n...

Escape Velocity POSTED APR 6, 2016
To use a rocket analogy, my checking and savings accounts are firing at full burn. When I first attempted to make the jump from renting to buying in 2011 I termed the considerable cost of transition its "escape velocity." (And understanding the process and its costs is indeed rocket science.) 2011's effort failed due to the burden of large student loan payments, a problem that would go away just as the housing market began "recovering." Now, in 2016, we'll see if six months o...

I Hate Short Hair POSTED JUN 11, 2016
I always said the one thing I miss from working at Wendy's was the free food. This was before I worried so much about fat/calories/sodium. But ten years ago I saw my weight and blood pressure rising and decided to reign my diet in. So what does this have to do with shaving my hair, or my hatred of the buzzed look? After various attempts to limit my fast food consumption (with varying success) or to healthy-it-up I've finally decided on the nuclear option... all fast food has to go. If I sli...

Across the Bridge POSTED JUN 26, 2016
The ink is definitely dry on the closing documents. In fact I made my first mortgage payment this week. Finally, after a slow and leisurely process of getting the place ready to move in, I've begun the slow and leisurely process of moving in. It'll typically be one carload per week, at the times I go to do my laundry. Pfffft. Thursday was my 4,000th day as a Florida citizen (not counting those few years when I was a kid)... It would've made a great moving day if only I'd been able to get o...

New Local Scans POSTED OCT 12, 2016
Long time no post. Suffice it to say I'm moved in now. Yes, the FM6 is the centerpiece of my new living room. :) My 4228HD will soon be joining it, as soon as I get a little bit of tropo to test different spots near the ceiling. Seems like my handicap to the south is gone. In fact, 102.1 WKLG comes in well enough here to be a semi-local... all the way from the Keys! I'd like some tropo to Cuba and e-skip to Honduras to be sure, but it looks promising. But in keeping with 2016's trend, I sp...

The Chris Dunne Collection POSTED DEC 18, 2016
In February I posted some vintage TV DX from oldfldxer's YouTube channel, which had shut down and taken many great tropo clips with it (alas, I didn't save all of them). I already liked the idea of posting other DXers' work - that the DXer hadn't posted himself - and now I'm uploading another haul of clips. This batch comes from Chris Dunne, a fellow WTFDA member from South Florida. Chris had boxes of VHS tapes I offered to digitize for him. Tape wears out and gets eaten by (increasingly old...

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