Audio and some visuals

I set up a station for the North American QSO Party using only the equipment in the cases today. Because I am so short on time, I only spent about two hours on the air, but it was a useful exercise. I recorded the audio from the this exercise.
Listen to the K5TR QSO
Listen to the K0RH QSO
Listen to the N3BB QSO
That's the point of the iPod and the record everything strategy. You can't predict when somebody really interesting will call, or when someone will make a really interesting comment. Record it all, sort it out later. I'm hoping that at least some of this audio will help make my DVD and future presentations more interesting.
Of course, as soon as I declared victory on the packing exercise, I discovered a couple of piles of stuff that had been set aside. Oops. Well, as I have said, the packing exercise is an iterative process. It has always been my plan to be all packed a week before departure. Why so early? Well, imagine what would happen if I were suddenly sent out of town on a business trip. Or, if there was a crunch project that required lots of overtime. In the software business, it isn't unusual to have a whole week (or month) of your life disappear in the wink of an eye because of crunch project. I didn't want to be scrambling the day before departure wondering what would go and what would stay!
I have removed a large number of small things. Weighing that pile showed me how even little things add up quickly. I've also had to make some tough decisions. I had planned on bringing a Cobra UltraLite Senior antenna to ensure I had something that would cover 160m. But, the antenna in its bag with 4:1 balun was about 6 pounds. I just swapped it for a shortened G5RV from RadioWavz. This antenna is only 67 feet long and weighs about 2 pounds.
We did not create a comprehensive antenna plan prior to the trip. I should have pushed for that. The more I think about it, this should have been done back in July. More fodder for my post-mortem, I guess. In the mean time, here's a notion I've been playing with.

I needed to come up with something like this so I would have some idea of how much coax to bring. Here is a sketch of the villa (aerial view) showing feed line lengths for the G5RV, 80m vertical, and 40m vertical. Paul, who will be doing lots of digital modes, will populate and wire the other posts... maybe. This is just one idea.

This will all be discussed in tonight's conference call.
One week from tonight I'll be in Orlando meeting with the team. I'm really getting excited now!
Just 7 days to go...