The trigger for this, was SV8RX's post-wish for New Year !
Well, when someone like me, who has gotten his/her ticket during the absolute quietness of the solar activity -and while we thought that the activity had hit the bottom, it was eventually going even lower- oh well, I think that the amateur radio generation I belong to, has built another mentality upon this.
I believe that we do perceive things in a much more optimistic way, considering that we have lived up only the worst, which is the norm for us (the worst solar recession of the century actually.. now that's bad luck, isn't it ?), so we have absolutely no other option apart from looking upwards, for the better.
From my personal experience, what felt really painful was the lack of 10m and 12m QSOs in my log during the first term after I got my license. So back then, I was convinced that I had assembled my antenna wrong and this ended up in numerous tilt-up-and-downs struggling to find something wrong to justify the zero QSOs on the high bands :-)
(never found anything wrong though and I had to hide this conclusion every time from the guys -mostly fellow university students non-hams- who were assisting me!)
So here's the part where I go all genius, to get started thinking positive ! All I had to do was to flip a solar activity chart around 180 degrees. And.. voilà ! Now everything starts to make sense (awesome isn't it ?!)
Allright, I stop whining, things on the air feel much better as time passes by, and the numbers have started to climb up impressively, indeed.
Last but not at least, I want to share a very interesting article I came across, which explains the zero SSN on the long term that took place by analyzing sonograms in a straightforward and comprehensible-for-the-rest-of-us way. You may read it here, just scroll down to locate it.
Keep smiling :o)
