i dunno maybe its just the time of year but ive been getting on the radio more just to... talk i guess. not chasing DX, not contesting, just spinning the dial and seeing whos around. caught a guy in wyoming last night on 40m and we just chatted about his chickens for like 20 minutes. thats the kind of stuff i got into this hobby for honestly. been licensed since 2009 and i feel like i spent so many years trying to optimize everything and now im just enjoying it. anyone else in that headspace or am i getting old lol

yeah man totally get that. i went through a phase where every session had to mean something, new band, new mode, whatever. burned me out a little tbh. now i just get on 75m in the evenings and shoot the breeze with the same 4 or 5 guys. one of em talks about fishing every single time and i still look forward to it. theres something about just having a regular thing with regular people even if you never meet them in person

chicken guy sounds like solid QSO material lol. im pretty new to all this still studying for my general but this is actually exactly why i want to get into HF, the ragchewing side of it. all the technical stuff is cool but i just want to talk to random strangers across the country about nothing important