Today was the Green country Hamfest… I made it last year and it was interesting and fun so I figured to make it again this year. I had asked Sherrie if she wanted to go as there would be more than … Ham radio stuff going on but when the alarm went off at 6 she punched me and went right back to sleep… that was the sign she was not going…
I got up, let the dogs out, fed the dogs, put them back and told my dear sleeping wife, I was leaving… (note: when I got home she said she never heard me leave?). I grabbed a quick biscuit for breakfast and hit the road… it is not all that far to Claremore… about 90 miles I guess… and it is all 4 line once you get out of town (if you take the toll road). I got there about 8:30 and checked in and put my “non-winning” ticket in the hopper… of all the years I have gone to things like this that have drawings… I have never won anything… I am so lucky!
I had just enough time to make a quick walk down two rows then I would head into the meeting room as my main interest was in the 3 morning forums on Geekology stuff… (Weather Watch training, Digital radio, ARRL updates). the walk down the rows indicated that the picking of quality items was already done and the antiques were still out…
They have a nice large arena to hold this function in… and not all the stuff is Geek stuff. I noticed one full table of knitting stuff? guess the wives have to have something to do…
This one has been around awhile… Hamarlund… most of that stuff was old when I started hamming (1977)…
I got my learning in for weather stuff, got a little more info on digital radio things and such then went back out and made a more controlled walk down the isle… but still was not impressed with the stuff on display. I did spend $5 on some wire connectors I needed for the motorhome lights… I did get to talk to a few people I had not seen in some time, but not as many as last year… then I was out of there by 1:15pm… Most of the people were packing up to leave anyway… if the closing bell is 3 they are almost always packing by noon…
I grabbed a quick sandwich for lunch and started my trek home but this time I took the “non-toll-road” route… and came back down Hwy 51… through the big city of Yale… I don’t remember getting off the main road other than to drive by the house/museum of Jim Thorpe… since I had seen that I wanted to just drive down main street and I noticed an interesting building off that way… so down main I went and boy… this town is old and wore out… and they have an abundance of churches… and multiple Baptist places? one in the down town building had people coming out so I didn’t picture that one but I got this one up the street a block.. (First Baptist)
Looks more like it should have been the post office or maybe city hall but with the stained glass it had to be a church… lots of stained glass and a gold dome? and there was another Baptist church across the street? Freewill maybe? don’t’ remember now? should have got a picture of it but it was not as photo genic as this one… down town it is just a lot of old empty buildings for the most part..
Sad that so many window are out as this will soon have the inside of this building falling down, if it hasn’t already…
lace curtains blowing in the wind and a bed frame in the other window…
I had not known that they grew cotton in this country but they must have as there is an old Cotton Gin in Yale…
Well, that was enough excite for me so I moved on home… got in about 3:30 or so… sat down, read the paper and then took a nap… it was a long hard day…ha!
For dinner we even got more exciting… take out Chinese… and that was the day of Geekology this weekend…
WD0AJG