A Ham's Night Before Christmas
'Twas the night before Christmas,
The antennas reached up,
The children, Tech-Pluses,,
Mom put on her headphones,,
When the meter was pegged,
Mom yanked off her phones,,
While I ran to the window,
It was way in the distance,,
And a little old driver,
But no, it was Santa,,
He circled the tower,,
While Mom and I hid,
He cleared off the shack desk,
He ran copper braid,,
He tightened loose fittings,,
He neutralized tubes,
A new, low-pass filter,
He repaired the computer,
Then, he reached really deep,
"A new Kenwood? An Icom?,
Yes! The Ultimate station!,
He hooked it all up,
I should have been happy.,
He made final adjustments,,
Then he grabbed his HT,,
I ran back to the station,,
Oh, too late, for his final,
The Ham's Santa exclaimed,
And all through two-meters,
Not a signal was keying up,
Any repeaters.
From the tower, quite high,,
To catch the weak signals,
That bounced from the sky.
Took their HT's to bed,,
And dreamed of the day,
They'd be Extras, instead.
I plugged in the key,,
And we tuned 40 meters,
For that rare ZK3.
By a signal with power.,
It smoked a small diode,,
And, I swear, shook the tower.
And with all she could muster,
Logged a spot of the signal,
On the DX PacketCluster,
And peered up at the sky,,
To see what could generate,
RF that high.
But the moon made it gleam -,
A flying sleigh,,
With an eight element beam,
Who looked slightly mean.,
So I though for a moment,,
That it might be Wayne Green.
The Santa of Hams,,
On a mission, this Christmas,
To clean up the bands.
Then stopped in his track,,
And he slid down the coax,
Right into the shack.
Behind stacks of CQ,,
This Santa of hamming,
Knew just what to do.
Of paper and parts,,
And filled out all my late,
QSLs for a start.
Took a steel rod and pounded,
It into the earth,,
Till the station was grounded.
Resoldered connections,,
Cranked down modulation,,
Installed lightning protection.
In my linear amp...,
(Never worked right before --,
Now it works like a champ).
Cleaned up the TV.,
He corrected the settings,
In my TNC.
That would not compute,,
And he backed up the hard drive,
And got it to boot.
In the bag that he brought,,
And he pulled out a big box.,
"A new rig?" I thought!
A Yaesu, for me?,
(If he thought I'd been bad,
It might be QRP!)
How could I deserve this?,
Could it be all those hours,
That I worked Public Service?
And in record time, quickly,
Worked 100 countries,,
All down on 160.
It was my call he sent.,
But the cards and the postage,
Will cost two month's rent!
And left a card by the key:,
"To Gary, from Santa Claus.,
Seventy-Three."
Looked me straight in the eye,,
Punched a code on the pad,,
And was gone - no good bye.
And the pile up was big.,
But a card from St. Nick,
Would be worth my new rig.
Came over the air.,
It was copied all over.,
It was heard everywhere.
What a ham might expect,,
"Merry Christmas to all,,
And to all, good DX."