ok so ive been licensed for about 3 months now, got my technician and just upgraded to general last week actually, and i keep hearing and seeing all these shorthand things on the air and in logbooks that i just dont understand. like QSL, QRN, QRM, QTH... i know QSL means like confirming a contact or something but the rest im lost on. and its not just Q codes either, people say things like 73 and 88 and OM and YL and i have no idea what half of it means. tried googling but the lists i find are huge and dont really explain when you actually USE them. is there like a short version of the most common ones i should actually know? i dont wanna sit there on a sideband contact sounding like a total newbie every time someone throws an abbreviation at me

ha, yeah the Q code thing threw me off too when i started out. the ones you'll actually hear constantly are QTH (your location), QRM (interference from other stations), QRN (static/natural noise), QSB (signal fading), QRT (shutting down, going off air), QRZ (who's calling me), and QSO which just means a contact or conversation. QSL is yeah, confirming the contact, and people also use it to mean the actual card you mail someone. once you get those down you'll cover like 90% of what comes up in normal ragchewing.

for the number stuff, 73 is just "best regards" basically, kind of like saying goodbye but friendlier. 88 is love and kisses, traditionally used toward YLs but honestly its just casual now. OM means old man which sounds rude but its just how hams refer to each other, and YL is young lady regardless of actual age. dont overthink it, you pick it up fast just from being on the air.

one thing that helped me was just keeping a little cheat sheet next to the radio for the first few months. also QRP means low power operation, under 5 watts, you'll hear people say they're running QRP especially on CW. and speaking of CW thats where a lot of this shorthand really comes from, morse code operators needed fast ways to say things so the Q codes kind of carried over into phone too. honestly just jump in and if someone uses something you dont recognize just ask them, most hams are pretty happy to explain stuff and wont make you feel dumb about it