Mattes's Musings by KC2GIK

Greeting Family and Friends, Here's hoping everyone had a great holiday. I can't believe another year is closed as  a new one opens. Definitely been a roller coaster around here. Between travel and writing I have certainly  kept busy. Actually I'm trying something new, writing this entry on my blog and then copying it into an email!  However as tradition, I will start with the family Chris, Natalie and the kids are all doing fine. I can't believe both Zander and Quinn are in high school. Quinn's freshman year is going well, she's likes most of her classes. She joined a travelling soccer team that has taken her to places like Florida this past spring and California the first week of December. She's taking a break for the winter, but joined the girl's basketball team. I actually should say teams because the freshman and JV teams don't have enough players so she and a few of her teammates are bouncing around between the two teams.. Dad and I actually go...

 Over the years the City of C ape May has hosted training events for  numerous police departments on the eastern seaboard. One of my favorite times is when mounted patrols come into town. They usually set up along Beach Avenue twice a year, in the spring and in the fall. Usually t he horses patrol the promenade onto  the beach itself.  My house is on the route from the Parkway down to the beach front and today I want paying close enough attention to the radio that I figured out they were doing a photo  shoot at  the Cape May Point Lighthouse. So I quickly grabbed my phone and snapped some pictures right from my front porch, of course I was in bare feet.  A couple of radio tidbits for  the radio enthusiasts who read the blog. All of the departments were using the Jersey Shore Region talkgroup 4 (4187) on the NJICS system . There are three other talkgroups but this is the only one I've heard acti ce since I started  listening to the system a f...

The release of the Epstein files have dominated the news since President  Trump, his AG Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel, took office. In classic Trump fashion he dangled the nugget of releasing the  files since he first started his third run for the Oval Office. Now that he's back as President the people that backed him are wanted him to keep that promise while Trump's enemies, yes he has enemies=, are hoping whatever is in the files will bring Trump down once and for all. A few major things have happened, including two assassination attempts during the 2024 campaign.  There's also the problem of  President Trump never gets the benefit of the doubt. Whether it's the Russiagate Hoax,which I will get to in a second, Ukraine phone call "scandal" or the bogus charges brought  by biased DA's Letitia James or Fanni Willis, it only works out when the weak cases crumble! By then the damage is done, Trump's die hard supporters once again  circle the wagon...

 My father wanted to get out of the Cape May winter so he purchased a house in Murrells Inlet  this past June. We have friends nearby and it's closer than Florida. So I looked the trunked system up on Radioreference.com and of course programmed the entire system by hand into my trusty Bearcat BCD-396T! After a few sessions I got the system up and running! Thankfully Horry County (I  later found out the "H" is silent) is still on a Phase I system, I am crossing my fingers it stays that way for a long while. It is quite active and I have been  getting use to the southern accents over the digital airwaves.  I also am plugging away at the aviation frequencies as well. I have the Myrtle  Beach Airport programmed in which includes the ground frequencies as the Jacksonville  and Atlanta ARTCC Center frequencies.  It's a bit tricky to gauge the range of the scanner but I figure if I  dump all of South Carolina, the southern part of North Carolina a...

As I have written before  about losing hosting for various reasons, mainly because the hosting fees get jacked up and I wasn't using half the services they provided.  After much consideration I decide to move the entire site onto Blogger/Blogspot., This includes both my license plate trading list . links to other websites.  Although I'm divided on whether to put actual license blog entries on the new site or leave them here!  There might be a little cross-posting in the near future, stay tuned!!! Justin Mattes License Plates

   A soggy Saturday in October didn't stop 74 people (70 members, 4 guests) from attending the annual ALPCA Garden State Region meet at the Pennington Fire Company in Pennington NJ. People traveled from 13 states, including as far away as Arizona to exchange plates and renew friendships. As usual bagels and coffee were served to get everyone's day started off. Every year members bring some amazing displays, this year did not disappoint. Congratulations to Allan Attanasio for taking home the best display award for his very detailed display of the history of NJ Motor Vehicle Inspector plates & memorabilia. Best single plate went to a Pennsylvania We The People plate owned by Marco Sordi. Once again Kerry Weishaar traveled from sunny Arizona picked up the Long Distance Award Thanks to all the volunteers that help keep this meet running. We anticipate on having our fall meet next year on the 2 nd  Saturday in October. Stay tuned to Plates Magazine for details!!!! Submitte...

 A lot of tributes have been pouring in for Ch arlie Kirk the last few days, as well as some harsh words for his tactics. The Turning Point USA founder was gunned down last week right before he hosted one of his events hosted on a college campus in  Colorado. The tragic death marked the latest in a series of horrific political violence events that has scarred our nation for far too long. We have been warned to tone down the heated rhetoric. T hat words that travel the speed of the Internet seem to have twice the impact usually in a negative way which pushes people away from your point of view instead of pulling them closer. The impact can be so  great it can cause people to want to silence their opponents, sometimes in the most extreme ways! We have seen it play out in schools, theaters, political e vents and other gatherings. We all want it to stop, however we are unwillingly to do the work. We as a society have lost respect for opposing views. The people that don't like...

It has been a dream of mine ever since I visited my uncle out in California, not TRAVEL Route 66 entirely, but to see different parts of it. The annual ALPCA Convention rolled into Tulsa Oklahoma the second week in July. I was especially thrilled beca u se the club was supposed to visit Tulsa in 2022 however it was cancelled due to  the Coronavirus.    So three years later I finally got the opprinuity thanks to my brothe4r Pete and his -wife Sue. The planning started back in January! Since they had so much travelling to Lansing last year I thought they would like Tulsa!!! We  booked the host hotel way in advance this time, so we were right in the middle of all the action, although once again we had to  change planes, so I decided to  ditch the scooter once and for all! The walker worked perfect and since we had to change planes both on the way out and the way home, it was easier to hop in a wheelchair provided at the airports!!  We didn't argue too muc...

 Well after a year hiatus due to esophagus surgery I once again hit the Life Rolls On event in Wildwood, NJ!  It's an annual event that enables people with all kinds of abilities to experience the joys of being on a surfboard. This year was a more then I expected   The first year I was a bit skeptical. Friends of mine encouraged me to go and I wound up having a lot of fun. The one hiccup was you were  supposed to register ahead of time,  so I had to wait a bit longer.  Although watching the other people ride the waves got me really excited and  thinking that I actually  could do it. When it was my time to hit the waves surprised thqat my  

On April 29th I celebrated 25 years in ham radio!  So I have doing a series of blog entries to celebrate the achievement! I will highlight a few accomplishments.     It happened again, I made a simplex contact  from about 80 miles away. Not exactly a record but still pretty decent.  This isn't my first major contact but every simplex contact is special. It's a sign my radio and antenna are receiving, and more importantly transmitting properly. Ever since I  got my license twenty five years ago, I have been fascinated with simplex more than repeaters. For those who don't know the difference between a repeater is a machine usually in a high building or other structure that receives on one frequency and transmits on another.  With simplex it's just one frequency, direct from radio to radio  line of site. There are atmospheric conditions that can increase the distanced, that's call ducting and there's a map on the Internet that shows  the conditi...

 It;s a tradition in Cape May. Every year at 10 AM the Saturday of Memorial Day 150.9950Mhz comes alive with voices of the dedicated people of the Cape May Beach Patrol. I know a lot of them from cruising the promenade on the scooter. They are really active during the weekends from missing child reports to jeyllyfish stings. Even though Cape May is one long coastline, it's divided into twenty-five sections between Poverty Beach down to the Cove Beach.

  Another Facebook post that inspires a blog entry So I need to explain my previous post. I was cruising Beach Ave and I noticed Steve's Stockton Golf was wide open.....So as a goof I just turned around and glanced at a sign that said "I'm somewhere on the course just pay me when you see me" . So I thought I would just play a few holes, I was tired I hadn't slept well last night, my back hurt and i did have PT earlier that afternoon. The entire time I was playing nobody else showed up! I kept looking at the booth hoping to see someone so I could pay him or her.I get to the 17th hole right near the booth and it was a hole in one! I was alone, or so I thought. I get to the booth, the attendant was there. He looked at me and said "You played the entire 18 holes, alone" I answered " I kept looking for you" as I reached for my wallet. He simply said "I saw your hole in one, the game's on the house.: " I was humbled. Another day i...

Ok if you didn' t read last year's post regarding the Amateur Radio Field day go back and take a peek ! Even though this wasn't my first Field Day, it certainly was the best because not only did I use my own radio, I got to actually stay up during the entire event instead of going home when the bands just starting to heat up. Over the past year I became real close friends with the 10-70's VP, Isaac,NJ3C, he's gotten me to the meetings this year ands has really helped me setup my base station right, though I'm STILL not finished! Anyway Isaac,NJ3C, knew this year he was going to try to get me to stay overnight, it's not like we sleep that much anyway!! So anyway I had my radio and arranged for a laptop, "borrowed" a table that was in the lodge and patiently waited as Paul,KC2CJW, built my station. Paul and Issac had an unspoken deal, Isaac would get me up there, and Paul would set me up. Well after a handful of tying different laptops to see if they...

By now you have heard that during a rally in  Texas Representative Jasmine Crockett decided to take a swipe at  Governor Gregg Abbott's immigration policy. During her speech, or rant depending on your views, Crockett seemed to take a jab at Abbott, who uses a manual wheelchair, "Governor Hot Wheels".  After a few comments from people, Crockett realized her mistake, but didn't apologize.  Of course the first reaction from the right was she made fun of someone in a wheelchair, and the left's defense was to trot out the time President  Trump made fun of a reporter with a disability. There was another time where Trump order a wheelchair user removed because he refused to move when he was told he was blocking a fire exit. These two instances caused real backlash,  and in my opinion  people swooped in to defend   both people. nb  They were made into saints overnight. It's soo predictable it's sad Governor Greg Abbott didn't have that luxury! Y...

Once again I have coverted a Facebook post into a blog entry. There have been mixed reactions about President Trump shutting down the Department of Education. My only fear is what will happen to IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act). W e will see what  happens   Here I am listening to all the noise about the future education in this country. I've heard parents, from those who fully endorse the public education to ones who home school. I;ve heard from teachers who of course hate the idea to students who have excelled in carter schools. Now you're going to hear from ME, a former student who survived special education, was fully mainstreamed, but lacked to confidence to continue to college. You've heard stories how I had great high school experiences, which I did, but the previous eight years before high school were pure hell. I went to a pub lic school that never recognized I had a brain. My mother fought them tooth and nail for them to provide me basic services...

 This came in the mail in early Feburary of last year, it's my new membership card signifying I paid my 2024 dues to the Automobile License Plate  Association. It's especially special because it means I have been withALPCA for 30-years, I joined in 1994 when I was 16. Well I didn't "join" I received it as a Christmas gifit from my parents, but my license plate collecting story starts a full year earlier. I decided to end my 30th year in ALPCA by writing a little about how I started and then highlighting some of  entries I have written  When I was around 14 I started to pay attention to the different licenses platess on cars. First it was antique cars that in NJ had the letters"QQ" either at the beginning or the end of the license plate. Then I looked at police cars and firetrucks had "MG" and some had "CG". I later found out later in New Jersey "MG" stood for "Municipal Government", "CG" stood for "C...

 WELL here we are folks one quarter of the way into this century!! I have been thinking about writing this email since the beginning of December but of course I am a month late. I am happy to report the Mattes Family is healthy!  Chirs, Natalie, Zander and Quinn are busy as ever! Zander is now a sophomore and studying for his written test to get his driving permit! I have to double check that fact because it's so hard to believe. Quinn is doing well in eighth grade and is on a travelling soccer team which plays in tournaments all over the country. She has one coming up in Florida in  February that dad and I are thinking about going down for a few days to watch her. They BOTH are getting as tall as their uncle Jay which is very hard for him to accept! The family adopted three kittens which as a dog person even I admit they are cute!! We spent Christmas with them and got  to see the new Bob Dylan movie, partly filmed right here in Cape May. Unfortunately, I didn't get ...