Jeff K1NSS
03-12-2012, 11:03 AM
Yes, another Fusillade of Flackery, but with every hope that it might amuse youse like a clown, or at least prove diverting as any given minute of the Knife Channel. If I do squeeze an eBook or something out of this stunt, any proceeds will be donated to the Washington State University amateur radio club, a very real and vital group of good kid hams. http://hamradio.wsu.edu/
5545
WSU ARC, is among the oldest collegiate clubs, established in 1911, a year or two before most of us and possibly KB2VXA. The club's original proper name -- Alpha Chapter, Rho Epsilon Radio Fraternity -- remains a quaint vestigial holdover, conjuring a boatload of jazz age pop culture. The catalyst for sending Dash! back to college -- Dog-Face SAY WHAT? -- was stumbling across Alpha Chapter's W7YH QSL posted on Facebook, which looked something like cards that classic QST cartoonist Gil Gildersleeve, W1CJD, drew for lucky individuals and clubs, including the hammy whiffenpoofs of Yale University. While not by Gil, this cool card set in motion a train wreck of thought that led to getting in touch with the club and securing their awesome help in dramatizing what must be one of ham radio's more entertaining Believe It or Nots, right up there with the Wouff Hong.
Speaking of Warped Wouffs, I didn't LET The Dog out for this one. This Old Man, he all but charged the door, running back to school faster than you can say Rodney Dangerfield. Suffice to say Dash! never joined a fraternity the first time around. And now, just coming to terms with his mortality, he's determined to make up for all the toga he missed, in no small part because whenever he tried to rush a fraternity in the 60s, he'd nervously talk a blue streak about ham radio and the brothers would look at him like he had two headphones.
Of course, when I tried to explain that Alpha Chapter was Amateur, not Animal House, and that 21st century college life is not the Pleistocene he remembers, Dash! paid no attention. It's all YLs with Dragon Tattoos now, I told him. The Hallicrafters collecting craze peaked in the 90s. A few weak sister audio nerds get weepy over tubes, but modern geeks are full sprectrum. Oh they still like their ham radio, but as a spectral niche, roughtly five or six Angstroms wide. All this was, as usual lost on Dash! He would only admit that he might need to swap one of his guitars for a Uke, but he knew he'd fit right in, especially at a ham radio fraternity. Why, in mind's eye, he could aready see a gang of Gil's Little Big Head Hams in plus fours and argyle sweaters stringin' up end fed Zepps. In his mind's ear. he could hear Super Skyrider speakers in the windows , blaring Rudy Vallee crooning Betty Co-Ed. I always thought Dash! should get out of his head more, out the shack a little more still, but these paunchy Peter Pans, ya can't tell 'em a damn thing.
Oh yeah. There's also the small matter of picking up the BSEE Dash! chose not to pursue when he matriculated at University of New Hampshire. His decision to attend UNH was largely based on the school chosen by the majority of those seated at his Nashua High cafeteria table. And after five years at three high schools, the tiresome nature of math beyond geometry led him to the inescapble conclusion that pursuit of a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature offered the distinct advantage of no pesky right answers, beyond the old dead stuff like grammar that nobody's red penciled since the 1950s.
Oops! Dontcha hate life-altering whims?
They often lead desperate hams to do desperate things.
Chapter One, Dash!2 Alpha Chapter, www.dashtoons.com (http://www.dashtoons.com). Just when you thought we were kidding.
5546
5545
WSU ARC, is among the oldest collegiate clubs, established in 1911, a year or two before most of us and possibly KB2VXA. The club's original proper name -- Alpha Chapter, Rho Epsilon Radio Fraternity -- remains a quaint vestigial holdover, conjuring a boatload of jazz age pop culture. The catalyst for sending Dash! back to college -- Dog-Face SAY WHAT? -- was stumbling across Alpha Chapter's W7YH QSL posted on Facebook, which looked something like cards that classic QST cartoonist Gil Gildersleeve, W1CJD, drew for lucky individuals and clubs, including the hammy whiffenpoofs of Yale University. While not by Gil, this cool card set in motion a train wreck of thought that led to getting in touch with the club and securing their awesome help in dramatizing what must be one of ham radio's more entertaining Believe It or Nots, right up there with the Wouff Hong.
Speaking of Warped Wouffs, I didn't LET The Dog out for this one. This Old Man, he all but charged the door, running back to school faster than you can say Rodney Dangerfield. Suffice to say Dash! never joined a fraternity the first time around. And now, just coming to terms with his mortality, he's determined to make up for all the toga he missed, in no small part because whenever he tried to rush a fraternity in the 60s, he'd nervously talk a blue streak about ham radio and the brothers would look at him like he had two headphones.
Of course, when I tried to explain that Alpha Chapter was Amateur, not Animal House, and that 21st century college life is not the Pleistocene he remembers, Dash! paid no attention. It's all YLs with Dragon Tattoos now, I told him. The Hallicrafters collecting craze peaked in the 90s. A few weak sister audio nerds get weepy over tubes, but modern geeks are full sprectrum. Oh they still like their ham radio, but as a spectral niche, roughtly five or six Angstroms wide. All this was, as usual lost on Dash! He would only admit that he might need to swap one of his guitars for a Uke, but he knew he'd fit right in, especially at a ham radio fraternity. Why, in mind's eye, he could aready see a gang of Gil's Little Big Head Hams in plus fours and argyle sweaters stringin' up end fed Zepps. In his mind's ear. he could hear Super Skyrider speakers in the windows , blaring Rudy Vallee crooning Betty Co-Ed. I always thought Dash! should get out of his head more, out the shack a little more still, but these paunchy Peter Pans, ya can't tell 'em a damn thing.
Oh yeah. There's also the small matter of picking up the BSEE Dash! chose not to pursue when he matriculated at University of New Hampshire. His decision to attend UNH was largely based on the school chosen by the majority of those seated at his Nashua High cafeteria table. And after five years at three high schools, the tiresome nature of math beyond geometry led him to the inescapble conclusion that pursuit of a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature offered the distinct advantage of no pesky right answers, beyond the old dead stuff like grammar that nobody's red penciled since the 1950s.
Oops! Dontcha hate life-altering whims?
They often lead desperate hams to do desperate things.
Chapter One, Dash!2 Alpha Chapter, www.dashtoons.com (http://www.dashtoons.com). Just when you thought we were kidding.
5546