Greetings all-
I guess this has to be the minute of highest stress, as my D710 is 48 hours old,
The ISS just past overhead and I have no idea what I'm doing. I've spent 4 days combing through the web for some kind of site that actually puts more than one element of this INCREDIBLY EXCITING mode on a web page. All I find is idea fragments, anecdotal references and after the fact -YeHaw I did it's. The last time I felt like this was 1990 when I asked a friend "So, how do you operate the internet?". I'm as savvy as they get technically, but I can see -there is no place to get any traction in the basic concepts of "what the heck is going on here".

I successfully connected to the ISS bbs and uploaded a message using only a 2.5W Jingtong radio and homemade J-Pole antenna!

The J-Pole antenna was strung up in a tree in the garden, under which i sat with my radio and laptop. Living in Cape Town, South Africa means I have the ISS to myself on most passes.

Just proving its possible!

1. ARISS School Contacts Status Due crew schedules onboard the ISS, no Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contacts are planned at this time. The ARISS team expects contacts to resume once STS-122 launches in early February. 2. Astronaut Training Status On Wednesday, January 16, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Skripochka, RN3FU, participated in a simulation of an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) school contact. The Kenwood D700 radio in the JSC Service Module mockup was used for the contact. Skripochka spoke with the training support team who participated as students, asking Oleg questions about space and his visit on ISS. He is currently scheduled as an Expedition 17 backup crew member.

When did the U.S. launch its first satellite? What day did the first crew arrive at the International Space Station? A new calendar that highlights 50 years of NASA milestones and a decade of station assembly can be downloaded at: http://www.nasa.gov/station

The colorful 2008 calendar is packed with historical tidbits and photographs that capture the work and wonder of a decade building the world's largest orbiting laboratory. Each month of the calendar has a specific theme with images, photographs, significant NASA historical events and Web sites for educators.

"Teachers inspire. We hope this calendar also will inspire a new generation of explorers," said Mike Suffredini, manager, International Space Station Program at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

The International Space Station continued to perform well Friday as the Expedition 16 crew wrapped up a productive week filled with science experiments and station maintenance.

All three crew members--Commander Peggy Whitson and Flight Engineers Yuri Malenchenko and Dan Tani--began Friday morning with a routine inspection of their orbital home, followed by the collection of their body mass measurements.

Source http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html