Annnnnd - just got a notification another 8 port gigabit switch died. 😖 To get by I had to steal a 5 port switch from a less important part of the house.

The one other time we had lightning damage I remember devices slowly died over the next 48 hours. But I can hope no more do, or at least nothing expensive.

None of the surge protectors tripped. Ingress is a bit a mystery.

Whilst in the middle of an intense Gloomhaven scenario a strong but brief storm blew through and dumped .75” of rain in 15 minutes. We had two lightning strikes out the windows less than 100 yards away. No sirens so no houses hit but it took down cellular for a while. Also discovered later it fried an 8 port gigabit switch and the ethernet port on an Apple TV. Proverbial “could have been worse”. ⛈️

Feeling strongly tempted to install the iPad OS public beta to give the new windowing a try. Not something I typically do.

Meanwhile watching the live stream of NISAR launch from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre.

It finally dawned on me today I could stream a PC Steam game to my Steam Deck. In the past I tried Steam Link with my iPad and it was too laggy. Works great with the SD just have to put up with a smaller screen.

Why not just install the game on the Steam Deck? In my case it is mods. I don’t want to be saddled with managing mods on both the PC and SD.

More wildlife, this time an armadillo hunting food alongside the exercise trail. I hadn’t seen one in over a year and was missing them.

I have never been so close to a wild deer in my life. Quite the start of our morning hike.🥾

Seriously excited by Ghost of Yotei and this video doesn’t change my mind.

youtu.be/cgM6poO2JmY?si=MeXMjA

Got my invitation to buy a Nintendo Switch 2 today, if anyone is keeping score. I’m going to pass on it. None of the games are compelling enough to me to warrant the cost and we just built a PC for about the same cost.

Built my second ever PC with my son today after building one with our daughter 5 years ago. Tomorrow will be a marathon of software updates and installs. Being weird I kinda enjoy that sort of thing.

I have this itch to build a PC for basic gaming connected to the TV (to free up the Steam deck).

If I’m being honest mostly just to do the build.

But man GPU prices are in a crazy place. And I’m too lazy to filter through used parts.

Guess it is time for some anti-itch creme.

Does anyone have a caliper brand they really like? I’m more than frustrated as I wasted about half a day on dimensional issues due to my Reed caliper deciding to start measuring wrong.

I have a Hauti which I dislike for several reasons (one of which being the analog scale measures wrong).
😖

I was this many years old when I learned XKCD has a “What If?” Video channel. Pure gold

youtube.com/@xkcd_whatif?si=7E

Today I designed a simple stand for my M4 Mac mini. The mini has two USB-C ports on the front and I didn’t like having the cables running off to the side. The stand has two cable recesses front-to-back and is designed not to interfere with the bottom cooling of the mini. I’m pleased with the clean look.
printables.com/model/1324315-m

I’m more satisfied with my Logitech MX Vertical mouse since discovering that if I want to move it on my desk I can simply tilt it and slide rather than needing to pick it up. With the slightest tilt, which is easy to do, the mouse doesn’t register the move.

The transition to the M4 Mac mini was completely trouble-free. I was surprised to find that even some command line hacks I did on the previous Mac worked straight away.

The only app that needed special treatment was tQSL which I knew ahead of time. Easy enough - if you know you know. In a quick test while the bands allowed I made 14 QSO including a couple of POTA.

Apparently I decided I need a headache.

I am replacing my M2 Mac Mini with a M4 Mac Mini. Many things transfer auto-magically but from past experience I know there are hoops to jump through for certain settings and for apps like tQSL.

I will still somehow enjoy the process. Masochist eh?

Is anyone using the Surf Social beta? I got an invite but I’m a bit lost on finding what to follow since I am averse to all the “fashionable” topics.

I used the NanoVNA app to sweep the bands on my EFHW after installing the antenna switch yesterday. Results were nominal vs pre-switch.

Then I put my 20m hamstick on a tripod in the backyard connected via the switch. A bit of tuning resulted in great SWR. Today the best results were with the whip relatively short and only 2 radials. Couldn’t test actual operation since thunderstorms decided to interfere.

Discovered the hard way that ants had nested in the housing of the balun😖

I stopped my procrastinating and installed an antenna switch in the backyard and moved the EFHW to port 1. Happily the SWR worked out. I wanted a convenient way to experiment with other antennas so the switch would be handy. Of course I did this today not knowing the bands were going to be crap tomorrow so testing is basically a no-go.

Over dinner and prompted by the looming Switch 2 our kids were talking about their disappointment in the games while expressing nostalgia for the Wii. They really miss the family games like Wii Sports. So they wondered if our Wii worked…

So we searched for the Wii and its parts. Discovered we only had one TV it could connect to (RCA cable) and were then delighted we could boot up and play. I expect playing the Wii will be a favorite summer activity. Sadly we only found 3 of 4 controllers🤷🏼‍♂️

Another good day for FT8. 26 QSOs including 5 confirmed POTA. I’m awkwardly poised at 299 Parks Hunted. One more may trickle in while I’m dreaming.

I did get from 7 to 6 states remaining this week. That is a slow slog.

In other news I got a HF mag mount for the top of my car. Hopefully I can put it on and do some initial tuning with my 20m ham stick this week.

With there being no signs of Icom doing an updated ID-5100, Kenwood’s convention update on next year’s triband D750 really caught my eye. I love my D75 HT so I’m sure there will be a lot of similarities. Gonna start saving my pennies. 😉

Welp, welcome to storm season. First tornado warning of 2025 with ARES net activation. Our ARES net has a direct tie to the NWS so is a great source of info.

— 30 minutes later

We are now on the other side of the warning and the ARES net condition is down to 3. Looks like I can get my beauty rest tonight. 😜

I had a good day using FT8 on and off, 20m and 40m. 28 QSOs nearly half, 13, POTA operators.

After a few years in the 3D printing hobby I discovered a new way to fail. I was a bit mystified and it was repeatable on two attempts.

When I loaded the STL into PrusaSlicer it complained about a thin part and recommend supports. There was no thin part and even when I selected "Supports Everywhere" the slicer didn't actually generate any supports. I figured I'd just print it…

Something between Fusion and PS was clearly screwed up. I re-created the model a different way and it printed fine!