The holiday was great fun with the family and we all had a wonderful few days of pure enjoyment. Our daughter experienced her second Christmas which proved to be very exciting indeed. Dudley the DX hound also enjoyed the festive fun especially the part which included a 2 foot marrow bone treat! Louise and I were kept busy throughout the week and unfortunately for my blog and transceivers, I did not manage much radio time until the new year kicked in. More recently, I have been operating in the evening after 10.00 utc and have found conditions fairly quiet, the higher end of the HF bands have been more or less completely closed down but 40 meters and 80 meters have remained open. My FT-1000 MKV and Carolina Windom antenna are still doing a great job along side my CobWeb and 6BTV. Up to press, the Winter WX has not troubled them to much and I am hoping to get away with minimum antenna maintenance this winter h.i. (All hell will probably break loose now I've said that). Ove