We’re on our second new car. Both were leased. We didn’t get a Volvo but we’ve had two really great Hondas. We miss our Volvo but we are certainly grateful to have a new and reliable vehicle to commute and get around in.

We left the City and moved up the country baby. We’ve yet to pain our mailbox blue. But here we are.

There is even a lovely little river across the street we can skate on… but its much nicer just to look at from my home office window.

When people focus on things, they happen. Not always exactly according to plan – but the basics are: Focus on real goals. Stay focused on them.  Focus on the goose and not the golden egg.

Peace and health to you this new year…

Charley

I got back into my hobby full throttle back in the summer of 2010, and my current callsign is K1DNR – a shortened version of my original callsign KA1DNR.

I’m enjoying the peaking solar cycle we are in and talking to people from China to Antarctica nightly from the station in my home. I’ve built my own antennas and am studying antennas and transmission lines via correspondance with a very knowledgable technical friend in Australia.

I enjoy the math and engineering aspects as much as I enjoy the operating aspects of making contacts all over the world. I enjoy using morse code (CW) most of all – and I’m proficient at 30 wpm.

I currently use a Yaesu FT-857D mobile radio with an amplifier and my home made antennas. The radio itself isn’t very good for the distance work and competitive nature of getting through to the most rare stations. The receiver isn’t great, and the controls are very small and the menus very cryptic – so it is hard to use it for long periods of time without getting fatigued or frustrated.

The Elecraft K3 is considered the dream radio amoung many CW enthusiasts for a variety of reasons. It has a great receiver, multiple filtering options, and is laid out well. http://www.elecraft.com/

I now work in a slightly different capacity for a very different kind of company. At the end of the day I feel like I’ve been supporting something special. I like it there.

But I now sit at a quasi cubicle, on the interior, with no windows at all. This is really the only part of of my current employment that kinda sucks. Plus, I’m in a high traffic area – and for an IT person – especially an IT person who has to actually focus and concentrate on anything this is especially difficult. Just when I’m putting the finishing touches on some new script or Cisco project, someone walks up and needs a Blackberry configured. Or one of my colleagues needs some advice or a hand with something. I get kinda pissy sometimes.

Sometimes I just wish I had that office again where I could close the door and just focus on what I have to focus on. Or just space for a little while and look out the window.

So Charles Socci would very much like an office again someday.

Then there is the question of that raise.

Photo – 2004: my son Alex in my old office at 3 Park.

Not having the time to slave over scanning film, I’m all digital these days. But Leica has an option. I don’t want to give up my loud and arrogant SLR, but Charles Socci longs to carry the sexy little Leica in his day bag once again.