Crystal, 2006-2021

This is Crystal, and she has been our cat for 15 years. She came to us from the neighbors who were making her an outdoor cat, and she kept "invading" our home. 

We adopted her and kept her indoors and she would still love to go in and out at her leisure and cruise the neighborhood. Some crazy cat lady apparently would feed her when she wandered down to her house and we didn't know this and couldn't figure out why she'd come home to eat then throw it up! Only when we were leaving to go on errands and saw her at the cat lady's house did crazy cat lady confess she thought she was a stray (even with a COLLAR???) and was feeding her...

She was loud, noisy, annoying, always hungry (only to throw it up!) and independent. She had a damned attitude about everything and everyone. She would also find time to be affectionate and loving and allowing you her undivided attention. Usually when she was hungry...

I found this damned cat annoying. I kept remarking how I was gonna kill this damned cat if she wouldn't get out of my way, shut up, etc....

Saturday at 5:45 PM, we said goodbye. I've been taking it harder than I ever thought I would. I've attended family funerals and not lost my composure as much as I have with my animals when I've had to make "that decision". 2 dogs and now her. I'm not a cat person. Didn't think it'd hit me as bad as it has. 

She had lung cancer and was having trouble breathing. I thought we'd have a week or so but only had 72 hours to spend.

As usual, she didn't want much anything to do with me, probably from having to take her to the vet. But in those last moments, she put her paw on me as if to say it was okay.

We're all hurting, but life will go on. Both kids have their own cats. But they had Crystal first, and they were reminded (like we all were) not to take our pets for granted.

Give your fur babies an extra treat and a hug. You never know when it will be the last time you get that opportunity.

Radio Shack (1921-2015)

According to reports, RadioShack is about to file for Bankruptcy, selling 1/3 of it's stores to Sprint Corporation, the remaining stored being liquidated.

The bankruptcy filing may occur as soon as just a few hours, ending a legacy that was both a resort for ham operators and experimenters and a near-parody of its former self by moving away from its radio, computer, and maker roots and gravitating towards cell phone sales and satellite TV and radio that focused less on the tech and more on the bottom line.

From Bloomberg:

RadioShack Corp. is closing in on an agreement with creditors and other parties that would put the retailer in bankruptcy as soon as Wednesday night or Thursday morning, people with knowledge of the discussions said.

As part of the deal being completed, RadioShack would sell leases on as many as 2,000 stores to Sprint Corp. and Standard General, its largest shareholder, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the talks are private. The rest of the electronics chain’s more than 4,000 U.S. locations are expected to be closed, the people said. The filing could be delayed as the parties hammer out final details. 

I was in RadioShack this past weekend and went to almost all of the stores in Knoxville, seeing what was left as many of the stores clearanced out their inventory (I think they shipped their scanners to stores that were surviving) and many of the stores were already picked through.

Radio Shack TRS-80 Model III

I would still patronize the stores (albeit less frequently over time) and the way the stores looked in the 1980's versus the 2000's are like apples and oranges. I can remember going to West Town Mall and walking into the back of the store and tinker with the TRS-80's (affectionately called "Trash-80's") that were on sale. I'd have loved to own one, but the $2500 price tag (in 1980's dollars, remember) was beyond my price range, or that of many people I knew.

One time I was in the mall and my mother turned me loose in Radio Shack (back when it was TWO words) while she looked for boring stuff in other stores (clothes...UGH...what boy under 14 wanted to shop for THAT?) and I spent 2 hours playing a poker and blackjack on a TRS-80. I got so involved (and no salesman could try to sell anything to a 12-year-old kid) that eventually my mother came up to me yelling "WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN?!?!?!?". She apparently had been madly searching for me all over the mall for about an hour, and because I had been in the back corner of the Radio Shack, out of view of anyone looking in from the mall entrance, she'd thought I had taken off to the arcade (another favorite hangout of mine) and when I wasn't at either place she panicked. I think she was 10 steps from calling the cops, because if she hadn't taken those 10 steps to the back of the store, then I am certain that my face would have ended up on milk cartons.

TRS-80 Color Computer 2

Playing with that TRS-80 got me into computers. Playing with Apple II's in school furthered that addiction. One Christmas, Santa Claus got us a TRS-80 Color Computer II. It was, for me at least, a dream come true. I spent my Christmas vacation in Speedwell, TN at my grandparents house toying with that "CoCo" on my "monitor", a new color TV, a glorious Zenith 12" with wood paneling and rabbit ears. The whole time I was in Speedwell, I think I was in the upstairs attic/bedroom learning BASIC programming on that thing. And if I rebooted or turned it off, everything I worked on for HOURS was gone...because there was no storage device. There were no hard drives in the CoCo, and if I wanted to save anything, a cassette tape drive was over $100. I mainly used it for playing cartridge games and tinkering with BASIC.

HTX-202

Over the years, I would visit whenever we made a trip to the mall, and when I got my driver's license, the visits got more frequent. When I had a technical issue, almost every employee had an answer that was right. They knew their stuff, and they were helpful. When I got interested in ham radio, my first rig was an HTX-202 2 meter radio.

I had a minor run-in with a couple of RadioShack employees while I was waiting to get my license in the mail (this was in 1993, right before they had electronic filing and fast turnarounds. I was waiting for 2 months before I got my license). While I was looking over an HTX-202, one of the salespeople said that I couldn't purchase a radio until I was able to show my license, so that they could verify I was using it legally. He did let me put it on layaway, which I was planning to do anyway since I didn't have the entire $199 to buy it. 

As I waited...and waited...........aaaaand waited for my license in the mail, I went to a meeting at the local radio club and met some new friends. As we talked, I mentioned I was waiting to get my license so that I could get my HTX-202 out of layaway, and when they asked why, I told them what I was told. All of them hit the roof, wondering who in the hell would tell me that. It turns out I could buy a ham radio whenever, I just couldn't transmit on one.

Maybe it was misunderstanding on my part, or on the salesperson's part, but they all wanted to raise tee-total hell on whoever would keep me from getting a radio. I tried to keep it low-key and said not to worry about it. When I FINALLY got my license in the mail, I headed to Radio Shack to get my new rig. When I approached the salesperson and asked to pick up my radio, he mumbled "Oh...it's YOU!" and ran to the back. I still to this day don't know how he meant it, if it was because somebody called and chewed the store manager out, or if the guy remembered me putting it in layaway. Or both.

An electronics experimenters kit like this was sold
in the 80s at Radio Shack. I lost count the number
of times I begged for one.

I've owned 3 Radio Shack rigs over the years. A mobile 2-meter (HTX-212) rig and the HTX-10 10-meter rig. All of them have been rock-solid and worth the money I paid (either retail or hamfest prices) and they were true workhorses. 

Unfortunately, it was in the mid-90's when things changed drastically for "the Shack". When I was a kid, I remember getting a catalog and all the gadgets and gizmos were amazing to look at. I can remember putting so many products on my wish list for Christmas. A remote controlled tank, an electronics experimenter's kit (to make an AM radio!), the talking Atomic Robot, all sorts of electrical toys and products to waste time with, and over the years, the experiment toys and gadgets went away one at a time. Toys to tinker with trickled down. As I would come into a store to look for parts for my ham radio addiction, the knowledge level of some salespeople drastically declined. 

Case in point: I needed RG-58 coax for my mobile and asked the salesperson where the "coax" (as in, co-AXE) was, and he had the "deer in headlights" stare and asked me what I needed an axe for. I said "no, coaxial CABLE" and he directed me to where the cable was. And he tried to sell me on RG-59 (cable TV coax) and I said "no, I need RG-58 for my ham radio" and he tried to sell me on the RG-59 "because it was a later version". Who knew that coaxial cable could be upgraded to new versions?!?!?

Retro logo

Over the years, the questions I would ask about solder, connectors, and antennas would go unanswered, except by the occasional employee who either was a ham themselves or was in college at a technical institute to earn a degree, and they were the diamonds in the rough. The ones that didn't know would just try to turn the conversation into a sales pitch for a cell phone or Sirius radio. I would often leave in disgust because they went from "You got questions, we got answers" to "You got q...BUY THIS PRODUCT YOU DON'T NEED!"

As I made my rounds in the different RadioShack stores last weekend, it was obvious the situation from the way that the store looked, to the way the employees behaved. There was a sense of unattached attitudes and the salespeople didn't seem to want to be there. Don't get me wrong, others were helpful, in that way that Wallace Hartley and his band played "Nearer, My God, to Thee" as the Titanic sank in the cold north Atlantic. I did purchase some items that were being clearanced out. I have a mount for a mast on the side of the house and some scanner items, such as an antenna and a programming cable for one of my handhelds. I even picked up a mini-RC helicopter I've been torturing the dogs with around the house. 

So as I wrap this up, let me just say that it was a great store for tech geeks and makers to get their goods and at an affordable price. Mostly. Unless you wanted a TRS-80 in 1980, that is. Otherwise, they were good to go to in a pinch for spare parts and stuff you already knew you needed. Also, police scanners had a business thanks to RadioShack. I hope to catch a sweet deal on a digital scanner but I'm not holding my breath. I think that the "high end" stuff got moved to the stores that weren't currently closing. But I'll keep looking, being the vulture that I am.

Jason Roach, KF4VDX, SK

Jason Roach, KF4VDX, and his wife Kris

This is a post I've been dreading to publish for awhile now. One of my best friends ever, Jason Roach, KF4VDX, became a "silent key" this past Thursday after an 18-month battle with prostate cancer. 

I don't know why he was called to Heaven so soon (he's my age) but there must've been a good reason. He was never one to turn his back on a friend in need and up until a few weeks ago was still making trips to the mountain top to work on his repeaters as well as that of a friend's. Any time I needed someone to help me with an issue he was ready and willing to offer his support.

It's been almost 2 years since another friend of ours, Tom Ogle, passed away (also from prostate cancer) and while we were attending the burial, Jason commented how he was having stomach cramps and pain. None of us put much thought into it at the time, but over the next few weeks he seemed to continue having issues. Whenever we talked on the radio, he kept complaining of "problems", but never elaborated, other than heartburn and cramps in his stomach.

He finally went to see a doctor and he received the news that he had prostate cancer, stage 4. But, unlike Tom, there was a sense of hope. His doctors seemed more optimistic and proceeded to work on getting his tumor removed. However, setbacks seemed to always occur. He was set to have surgery to remove the tumor, but during surgery, the doctor couldn't because it was too big to extract. Then, a "spot" was found on his liver. Then the chemo didn't affect the tumor. The list goes on.

I tried to be there for him, but at the same time let him fight his battle without getting in the way. Every time I talked with him, on the phone or on ham radio, it always seemed to be something causing a setback or delay in getting treatment. He was in and out of the hospital several times, but never gave up hope, even as the weight came off and his strength waned. He fought until his last breath.

I never gave up hope, either, but at the same time I saw the toll it was taking physically, emotionally, spiritually, financially, and socially. In the back of my mind, I could tell over the last few months there wouldn't be much time left unless a miracle happened. Sadly, that miracle never came.

I've known him for about as long as I've been married. He really enjoyed weather, the same as I do. As East Tennessee SKYWARN grew into a well-respected community, Jason, Tom, our friend Chuck, and many others including myself comprised a team of people who helped relay severe weather reports to the National Weather Service in Morristown. We all became a well-oiled machine and provided reliable information to the NWS when called upon.

During a "dark period", which I will not discuss, there were a lot of people who turned their back on me, believing that I was the bad guy. But a few hams showed me who my true friends really were, and both Jason and Tom were right there by my side. There were others, absolutely, but Jason was more than vocal about letting people know why he was my friend. There were times I felt completely isolated and alone, and Jason was always there to talk to me on the radio and the phone when he was able to do so.

When people began to "see the light", and I got back in to SKYWARN, Jason helped me pick up where we left off, getting (most of) the so-called "band" back together. I never forgot that act of kindness, and I always worked to show him my eternal gratitude.

His knowledge of electronics, radio, and music was incredible. Like me, he was an 80s kinda guy, although he preferred hair bands, where as I've always enjoyed new wave and synth pop more, but we both did crank up AC/DC without hesitation.

We enjoyed Field Day, SKYWARN, and just talking on the radio in general, whether it was on one of his repeaters or on simplex, or even 10 meters. He'd message me whenever there was a band opening, and I would join him if I had the time.

The night before I left for vacation last month, I ran by the hospital to see him. He was noticeably weak, his voice was gone to barely above a whisper, and he was frail. That's probably the first time I truly saw the seriousness of his illness. I stayed for just a few minutes, as his son was there, and I felt like he needed that time together. I told him I needed him to get out of the hospital to help me set up my tower and get my hamshack remodeled, and he'd have to climb the damned tower. He just rolled his eyes at me. I did say I planned to take him to Dayton someday for Hamvention, because I wanted to go back (I've not been up there since 1999). He'd never been and seemed to like the thought of going up there. Whatever I thought would raise his spirits, I did my best to say.

However, that would be, in effect, the last time we had a conversation where he was coherent and alert. I'd gone to see him several more times in the last few weeks, but he was always in and out, heavily medicated, and it pained me when he would talk and I couldn't understand him.

Thursday night, I saw a message on Facebook and had an awful feeling. I told my wife and we rushed to the hospital. He was not conscious, shallow breathing, and his heart rate was in decline. We said our goodbyes, shed our tears, and as I took Jes home, I called our friend Chuck, who wanted to see him, and so I rushed him back to the hospital. As another friend (Josh) arrived, his heart rate dropped sharply, and when Chuck and I got to the room, he was gone.

It tore me up to see him wear away to practically nothing because of cancer. He was 44. Medical experts say that men shouldn't have to worry about having a prostate exam or colonoscopy until they hit 50. I would STRONGLY encourage all men to have an exam if they hit 50, but be aware of any issues with your digestive system no matter what age you are. I had my gallbladder taken out at 40 and just a few months ago had a colonoscopy after a test came back recommending one, even though I am "too young". Fortunately my colonoscopy came back negative, but it was a nervous time for me. It certainly made Jason feel at ease when I told him I had a clean bill of health.

I'd like to conclude with a story about how much of a sense of humor Jason had. He could be a prankster, both on the air and in person. One night on the radio I was testing out a new MFJ desk mic and trying to calibrate it so that my audio wasn't too "hot". Jason and another friend of ours, Eddie, kept having me do 10-counts, adjustments to the mic, etc. At one point Jason asked me where the radio was in relation to the room, saying he thought he heard an echo, and wasn't sure the source, and I told him I was in the far corner, across from where the closet was. Jason asked me what was in the closet, and I told him in contained the boxes my radios and microphone came in. He then instructed me to press the "lock" on the mic, and go back to the closet and get the box, and talk while I did so, in order to test the microphone's sensitivity. I did as instructed, telling them in elaborate detail where I was in the room and talking loudly, then quietly, and trying to give them a good idea how sensitive the microphone was. When I un-keyed the microphone, Jason replied (with a great sense of pride I might add), "Congratulations, Greg, on coming out of the closet!". This became one of his favorite inside jokes I'd occasionally get reminded of, whether I wanted to be reminded of it, or not...

Thanks, Jason, for being my friend. Now and always, you will be missed.

Tom Ogle, KE4WFJ, SK

It's with great sadness I report that one of my closest friends, Tom Ogle, KE4WFJ passed away this morning after a brief fight with cancer. He was 52.

He is known to many in the Knoxville ham community, from APRS, chasing high-altitude balloons, DFing QRMers on some repeaters, bike tours, Field Days, and as an NCS for SKYWARN.

Tom (right) with me at Field Day in 2010

I hadn't been in touch with him for a few weeks but invited him to come up this past Friday for SKYWARN Recognition Day but had not heard back from him. I didn't think it was anything serious, but he apparently kept his illness a secret from even his closest friends.
He only found out last Saturday (Dec. 1) that he had Stage 4 cancer that had spread rapidly in his body, and was given just 6-8 weeks. It ravaged him so fast I don't know if it could have been caught early enough, because he claimed he didn't feel any symptoms until a few weeks ago. I was contacted at 7:30 this morning with the terrible news.

He loved ham radio and he was always wanting to help whenever possible. He was also a great friend. A few years ago when I had a falling out with another ham, he was one of a handful who stood by me from the beginning and reminded me what a true friend could be.

Here is his obituary.

RIP Tom. I miss you already.  ..._._

Rocky Beckner, K8DRB/ex WD8SBO SK

One of the main reasons I got seriously involved in ham radio was the aspect of emergency communications and community service that comes along with it. When I first got licensed I was doing bike races, 5k runs, and marathons for local track clubs.

Every Spring, the weather in East Tennessee can be some of the most complex in the country. One minute it's hot and sunny, the next it's cold and rainy. The thunderstorms in the region can rival a hot, muggy day in Tampa (the self-proclaimed "lightning capital of the world") and the occasional spurring of a tornado can make you think you're smack in the middle of "Tornado Alley" in the midwest.

I can recall a time when, as the weather got severe in these parts, there wouldn't be a SKYWARN net, just a gaggle of hams discussing what the weather's doing in their neck of the woods, or even better, "it ain't doin' nuthin' over here,"with subsequent discussion on their latest visit to the doctor...

Back in the early to mid-90's, that was the norm for these parts. It was especially frustrating for me, because I would often get in my '91 Chevy S-10 pickup truck and stupidly bravely chase these storms, and to not have a bona-fide way to report to the National Weather Service my observations (remember, this was before everyone and their mom had a cell phone). 

Then, along came Rocky Beckner.

He was living in Morristown at the time, having come down from his home state of Michigan, where he had helped with SKYWARN up there to get ham radio a permanent presence in the local weather office up there.

Whatever the reason he ended up here in East Tennessee (I've since forgotten) he made it a mission to get a ham station set up at the Morristown office. It wasn't just him, but he was a driving force in getting it done.

WX4MRX, circa 2000

The hamshack at the weather service was officially started in 1998. He was operating at the weather service about a year or two prior, often with his own equipment. The Lakeway Amateur Radio Club contributed some money and equipment and a government grant was given to the weather service office to secure the radios and cabling. Soon, Rocky was able to run a pretty slick operation from inside the weather service office. 

The station's initial callsign was initially KF4EKQ, which was quickly changed over to WX4MRX within a few weeks. 

Early on in the project, around 1994, Rocky came to know me well, and apparently so did some of the meteorologists who worked up there at the time. I can't count the number of times he would chastise me on the air (or off) for chasing these storms in these parts, sometimes at night, with little/no knowledge of weather myself. He couldn't STAND it when I was operating "stormchaser mobile". I do admit I was so full of piss & vinegar I didn't care what he (or any meteorologist) thought, I was having fun and doing daredevil stuff years which I'd been doing YEARS before "Twister" hit movie theaters (and blasphemed stormchasers everywhere in my opinion).

The current setup at WX4MRX

Then on May 18, 1995, there was an outbreak across the area that was part of a larger outbreak across Tennessee. This event changed how I respected weather and what I felt my "calling" was in ham radio. It had already been an active day weather-wise, and I was attending a RACK meeting but took my radio in and had it on the then-wide area repeater on English Mountain. Barely 15 minutes into the meeting I heard the then-used EBS tone and the announcement that a tornado warning had been issued for Anderson County, to the west of Knoxville. I stood up and let everyone in the meeting know, then booked it to the "chase vehicle". I headed north on I-75 towards Raccoon Valley Road, and I saw the cell that spawned the warning, but if there was a tornado, it was wrapped in rain. As I approached the Raccoon Valley Road exit, a golf-ball sized hailstone hit my windshield. It didn't crack, but I took the hint to get the hell off the road, because I was on a stretch of Interstate with no way of turning around, and little options if all hail broke loose. I quickly got off the Interstate at the exit and found shelter under a gas station awning right as the hailstorm hit. Baseball and softball sized ice rained down overhead, and fortunately the awning sheltered me. At one point I did hear the distinct "freight train" cliched noise, but never saw the tornado, nor did I see signs of it doing damage, so it may have only been a funnel cloud.

I drove home, at the time living in north Knoxville, and got my Radio Shack HTX-202 on a local repeater. All I heard was a bunch of hams hollering that there "wasn't a net" and yet no one seemed to want to take the reigns and do something about it. So I grabbed a pen and some paper and started calling one. I'd had some net control experience with some area ragchew nets and tech nets, but this was going to be a new experience. Overall I did as well as I could, before a tornado touched down about 1/4 mile from my house and knocked out power and caused some pandemonium in my neighborhood.

I learned a lot that night, that I was much better at calling a weather net rather than trying to chase the damned things. Rocky wasn't aware of the net because we weren't on the normal repeater where we'd hear the him transmitting from. But he'd heard about it, and soon after I started finding out more about SKYWARN and studying more about weather, tornadoes, wind, hail, and flooding.

Once Rocky and friends (not sure about Moose and Squirrel) got the hamshack in full operation it was not uncommon to hear him at all hours, any given day of the week, whenever the weather went bad.

We became well acquainted as fellow net control stations and he warmed up to me as a Net Control more than as a very amateur stormchaser, and he even invited me to operate WX4MRX at the NWS office following a lengthy rainstorm that caused major flooding in the area. When he left to go back home to Michigan due to his health, I knew I'd never see him again, unless we both ended up checking out the Hamvention in Dayton, which never happened.  We'd email each other every so often, and he gave me some words of encouragement (albeit brief, but his emails were not much on content) when there was a "meltdown" in 2006 that forced me out of SKYWARN for a couple of years.

I'd send an occasional email to him about things going on down here, but he wouldn't respond much, if at all. I knew his health was not the best, so I thought nothing of it. Then, last weekend while at the the weather service during SKYWARN Recognition Day, another ham who was there gave me the news that he'd passed away "a year or two ago", which shocked me. I figured someone would have told me. I guess I got that far out of the loop to get that bit of info...

He was a pioneer in SKYWARN getting the recognition it deserved with regards to the contribution of ham radio and how it could benefit the weather service here in East Tennessee. He was dedicated to both the hams and the meteorologists and these days I think few hams here truly realize or appreciate what he brought to the table.

He was not one to mince words with you, and would often tell you exactly what he thought. If you were wasting precious time asking him questions irrelevant to the weather situation, he had no reservations about letting you know it. Being diplomatic was not always in his repertoire, but then again, as he often told me, SKYWARN nets are not the time to win friends and influence people. 

I for one have missed his dedication, often being at the weather service pretty much 24/7, sometimes struggling with the health problems that eventually drove him back home to Michigan. While his presence has been replaced, he will not be forgotten by those of us who remember the times prior to WX4MRX being on the air. Ham radio has made weather spotting in this area more complete and has helped to bridge a needed gap in what the radar "sees" and what is on the ground. Rocky was a crucial part of that in its infancy. He will be missed.