I was driving when the odometer on the car ticked over 140k miles, and by the time I had noticed, it was 140003. And here it is reading 140005 miles.
Hopefully the Camry will keep going for a few more years before it starts giving me a hard time.
Ham meetup? Ham-up?
Ham radio clubs can be a great place to meet other hams and to find out what’s going on in the local ham community. In the Charleston area, there are two formal clubs that I’m aware of. I’ve been a member of the Charleston Amateur Radio Society (CARS) since I got licensed, and recently learned about the Trident Amateur Radio Club (TARC).
CARS has their regular meetings on the second Monday of each month, and while the meetings are a good source of info for what’s happening in the area, they’re rather business-like and can be kind of boring. TARC meetings are on the third Monday of the month. I haven’t make it to a TARC meeting yet but from what I’ve seen on their website, their meetings seem a little more casual.
Outside of regular club meetings, I haven’t come across many other gatherings of local radio people. There’s a Monday/Wednesday/Friday breakfast meetup at the Bojangles on Ashley Phosphate. It’s a nice little meetup that I’ve had a couple of opportunities to get to when I have an excuse to be in that area for work. It’s not something I can get to on a regular basis though.
It got me thinking that it would be nice to have a regular evening or weekend gathering where local radio people can get together. There are numerous possibilities for things to do:
- talk about radio
- get on the air and play radio
- check out the newest rig
- make things
- share/collaborate on projects
- code practice
- study group for getting/upgrading your amateur radio license
- sharing radio know-how
- just hang out for some face-to-face rag chewing.
As for meeting places, it could really be anywhere. Coffee shop, someone’s garage, out in a park or field somewhere.
Anybody interested?
A new Art of R Programming
The new complete copy of The Art of R Programming arrived from the No Starch folks yesterday (thanks!). No missing pages in this one (at least none that I’ve noticed yet).
(The cover is the same, that’s just the strap from the camera hanging over the book on the right). The new book, naturally, is just a wee bit thicker than the first copy.
Gotta give big props to No Starch for their awesome customer service and sending me a new copy of the book.
Missing pages
Back in Nov 2011, I ordered a copy of The Art of R Programming (published by No Starch Press). It sat on my shelf for a while and I’d flip through it now and then looking up a few things about R when I needed something. It’s a pretty well written book with lots of examples, which I like.
Last night I was looking something up in the index, and when I flipped to the page, I couldn’t find it.
Then I noticed it. Somehow, my copy of the book is missing a pretty large chunk of pages (pages 41-88). What amuses me most is that I never noticed until now.
I mentioned it in a tweet because it amused me and mentioned the @nostarch twitter account just because I thought they’d be amused too. A few hours later, I got a response from Tyler Ortman (@oty)
@imabug @nostarch Sorry about that! Can you email info@nostarch.com? We’ll get you a new file in the morning, figure out what went wrong.
— Tyler Ortman (@oty) March 26, 2013
So I fired off an email like he suggested and am waiting to hear back. This is a nice use of Twitter for customer service.
Update: So not only did No Starch send me a PDF copy of the missing pages, but they’re also going to ship a new copy of the book to me! That’s pretty awesome of them. Thanks No Starch!
Where to find electronic components, bits and pieces
As I get more into building electronic things, I’ve come across schematics for various other things that seem like they’d be interesting to build. It’s a progression from assembling kits on boards where everything is laid out already, to building circuits. Maybe I’ll even get to the point where I’m laying out my own circuits and etching boards. Probably not for a while though.
All this leads to the question: Where do I go to find boards, components, connectors, wire, cables and other bits locally?
In this day and age of “disposable electronics”, scavenging parts from the trash pile is an option. However, you’re getting kind of a grab bag of bits that may or may not be immediately useful.
There are online sources like Digikey and Mouser, but then you have to wait for the part to arrive. Normally not a problem, but there might be times when i want/need something soon.
I have the good fortune to have a nearby Radio Shack that still has a decent electronics hobby/DIY section. They’ve been able to supply me with most of the components I’ve needed so far. The selection isn’t huge, but the fact they even have one is impressive. Just about everything I used for the breadboard version of the Morse code oscillator came from there (except for the button)
I’ve had a few people suggest Wholesale Industrial Electronics on the peninsula on East Bay St. Will have to go check them out and see. I wonder if there are any other places for me to go shopping at.