YOUR HOBBY SUCKS: LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT ALL THE RADIOS ===================================================== Published: March 28, 2025 Author: Daniel Conderman Context: Recovered Conderman.Group radio satire Original URL: https://conderman.group/2025/03/your-hobby-sucks-let-me-tell-you-about-ham-radio/ (Ham, CB, GMRS -- If You Can Turn a Knob and Hear Static, You're One of Us) You're busy perfecting artisanal jam derived from the single tear of a Siberian mountain goat. Adorable, truly. You spend evenings gluing rhinestones onto vintage ashtrays for your Etsy store. You even have 37 sizes of crocheted hats for your cat, in pastel colors. That's great. But come The Great Collapse, when the power grid sputters like a deflated beach ball, your craft-fair dreams will crumble into a biodegradable mess. And I -- armed with a battered handheld transceiver, CB rig, GMRS walkie, or ridiculous homemade antenna -- will remain oddly serene. Because I'm a radio operator. Ham, CB, GMRS -- it's all the same wild frontier: the open airwaves. "Radio enthusiast" suggests I do it for fun. I do it to be the last voice on Earth shouting, "Copy that, Bigfoot on Channel 19!" before opening another can of discount chili beans. YOU'LL OFFER BIRDHOUSES TO THE WARLORD; I'LL INTERCEPT SIGNALS FROM SATURN --------------------------------------- In the post-apocalyptic free-for-all, you'll try to charm the warlord with a crocheted cat hat: "This one's in teal! It's totally your color. Please don't feed me to your pet hyenas." The warlord may wear it for a moment, but your fate remains precarious. Meanwhile, I'll be shoulder-deep in my bunker, flipping switches like a mad scientist and dialing into frequencies NASA forgot existed: a ham repeater, a CB channel, or some weird GMRS net. My life becomes an '80s sci-fi movie, and I'm the protagonist with the big headphones and cooler lines. RADIO LOOKS LIKE A MISTAKE UNTIL THE WORLD ENDS ----------------------------------------------- Until the cataclysm, radio seems like an old man's pastime -- like collecting state quarters or yelling at clouds. People see you stringing a 30-foot wire, mounting a CB whip, or stacking GMRS walkies and ask why you're messing with a 1940s phone booth that glows in the dark when FaceTime exists. After doomsday, I'll become a spectral presence who can talk to anyone, anywhere, even under a rock in Siberia: an immediate jump from "quirky" to "oracle." MEANWHILE, YOUR ROUTER IS FEELING... LEFT OUT --------------------------------------------- When Wi-Fi goes down, your automatic fridge is offline, the cat-yoga stream is gone, your phone is a flashlight, and your TV a black mirror of dread. Me? I have vacuum tubes, a battery that could power a small tractor, and an unhealthy affection for faint static. At 3 a.m. I'll await the crackle of Gary in Des Moines, a trucker named ThunderHawk on Channel 9, or a GMRS group reporting mutated boars in the next county. WEEKLY NETS: A BOOK CLUB FOR SURVIVING THE APOCALYPSE ----------------------------------------------------- Every Thursday at 7 p.m., I join my crew on a net check-in -- an invisible pub for rumors of mutated raccoons and the best late-night frequencies. Station 1: "Anyone got traffic?" Station 2: "Negative. Just a solar flare messing with signals. Also, Dale's windmill collapsed. He's fine, though." Me: "10-4. I'll pass it along. I also heard the new currency is salted peanuts." We sign off with "73" (ham lingo for "best regards") or a CB-style "10-7," set our sets to standby, and feel less alone in the cosmic wilderness. MY MORPHINE IS MORSE CODE ------------------------- Everything is bleak if the grid goes dark, but I've got a fallback. Morse code is my therapy. Or I'll flip between CB and GMRS channels -- anything that crackles back. If things get dire, I'll beep SOS until my fingers cramp, broadcasting an off-key symphony while you try to turn decorative soy candles into a heat source. (Hint: you can't. Not effectively.) YOUR INSTAGRAM FILTERS VS. MY FARADAY CAGE ------------------------------------------ You may have 17.5K followers, half of them bots. I have a Faraday cage for the day an EMP hits. That sounds paranoid, but paranoia resembles preparation when the sky lights purple and the electronics hold a mass funeral. A FULL-BLOWN APOCALYPSE PERSONALITY ----------------------------------- My call sign? Tattooed on my heart -- not literally, but give me time. I sleep with my radio under my pillow. My nightmares revolve around dead air: total silence where even static refuses to comfort me. Radio -- ham, CB, GMRS, or any band between -- is uncool. But so were fire, wheels, and eyeglasses until they became vital. Here we are. SO, HONESTLY... WHAT'S YOUR PLAN? --------------------------------- If it involves a phone, an app, or electricity you don't generate, good luck. I'll be in my underground fortress, ravioli in one hand and a mic in the other, whispering onto a frequency that bounces off the ionosphere. If you hear a crackly voice in the darkness saying, "No traffic," that's me, signifying that for another day I'm alive, still weird, and still hogging the airwaves like a personal diary. FINAL THOUGHT ------------- While you scramble to save your sourdough starter, I'll be talking with Gary about mutated boars or RoadKill Slim about Mile Marker 285, building antennas from old furniture and a deep-seated fear of loneliness. Because radio isn't about technology. It's about the pure, stubborn refusal to let the airwaves go quiet -- no matter what kind of radio you've got in your hands. 73, 10-4, & Over and Out.