Ethan J. A. Schoonover

Climbed a cold war era warning siren tower today, one of Seattle's Phinney Ridge landmarks (you can see the bulk of the massive decommissioned siren above). Installed a solar #meshcore node on it for our emergency/disaster-response hub next door. #hamradio

The number of folks I meet who "work in tech" but do not UNDERSTAND technology is approaching majority. They know corporate tech structures and a smattering of systems. Same w/designers who don't design, just decorate (looking at you liquid glass).

Simulacra without meaning. Paging Baudrillard.

Just made my first cw (Morse code) #hamradio contacts on this 50 year old famous “tuna tin” radio!

WORKERS: BREAK YOUR MARKOV CHAINS!

surgery on my kenwood handheld #hamradio

The Brothers looking pretty and purple from Seattle tonight.

My Wisconsin dad has never been happier than when he can boast that a snow storm is no match for the power of his electric snow blower.

I appreciate whichever family member it was who managed to leave a single banana still hanging on the stand this morning.

Honestly I think if Apple released an iPod that only did audio it would slay. People are so desperate to leave their phones.

Every time I use my #hamradio antenna mast raise/lower system I am very happy with how I ended up designing and building it. Release the long wire antenna tension, pull two bolts, mast pivots down on a center pin, new antenna gets mounted! One person, 10 minutes, done.

Testing some #hamradio antennas I received reveals the two most common antenna types:

* (1st photo) common UHF tuning
* (2nd photo) common "contacting Cthulhu via a dimension of pure madness" tuning

Good news everyone! The patient survived my #hamradio surgery and has made a full recovery.

Playing the boardgame Takenoko which involves moving a panda piece, a gardener piece, and in our house also a cat piece.

I like this power supply for use with my #hamradio equipment but the fan was SO LOUD. Solution, as always, is to solder in a Noctua.

My normal anxiety response is "prepare" so I just dropped some radios in a metal tin (honestly useless here in Seattle, we're far to close to Targets for that to be truly useful) and rebuilt my antenna switching to enable my TM-71 #hamradio to pass through my duplexer :/

Ran radio comms for a Holi event and half my radios now look like this

Built a prototype 1w meshcore repeater. Couldn't find my roll of polyimide tape so just used... good ol' duct tape. Not pretty, but performant.

Bad news: Instead of toner I received a single shoe.
Good news: I have the shoe you are missing. Hit me up.

Preparing event comms #hamradio

Super proud that one of my former students whom I mentored in podcast production made it as a finalist in NPR's College Podcast Challenge! https://www.npr.org/2026/03/05/nx-s1-5727689/npr-college-podcast-challenge-2025-finalists

The US Supreme Court started making more sense to me when I realized that they are just like, a table full of RPG nerds for a certain set of rulebooks and some of them are 100% That Guy that ruins the game.

When did Apple start listing Apple Invites, a service that literally nobody I know has ever used, in their iCloud+ feature list? Why is it an iCloud+ feature at all and not just a free thing?

Give us "turn off liquid glass" as an iCloud+ service, Apple, and you'll double subscribers overnight.

me, 11:55am: what is that tickle on the back of my neck
me, 11:56am:

One of those tasks that I can assure you has a Very Specific Experience behind it

Seattle is 30º today and SNOWING and is forecast to be 60º by next Thursday. 2026 really is the "ride the wild waves" of, just, EVERYTHING.

Completed the "upgrade the computer inside the computer inside your vehicle" minigame of the "owning a truck" IRL DLC.

(CarPlay head unit mod in my Tacoma now no longer randomly crashing with iOS26)

testing out some mesh radio gear

Was using JUST an iPad for quite a while to remote in a distant member of the Mothership group that's been campaigning for over a year (!) but decided to increase video size and camera quality. Realized the little vesa mount could do double duty as an iPad support.

Seattle U-District just now. They run a red light, almost hit a car, a bus, another car, another car, another car. Car was beat up pretty bad already. Tried for a license but my aging dash cam couldn't pull it out.

Do billionaires know about some sort of a game where if they hoard enough wealth and cripple society enough they get some prize? Like do they get raptured if they hit 2 trillion dollars? If so I'm sure we could come up with a shortcut for them.

It's like everyone in power in the US both politically and financially heard the same lecture at Davos titled something like "Increasing human suffering globally: the life hack you aren't making use of... YET!"

SECTION 1: SAFETY PRECAUTIONS
"You're on own here, buddy, good luck don't die"

Apple Photos search for both "radios" and "green radios" 100% FAILS to surface this photo I took last week.

out to dinner in Seattle and my watch kept buzzing

North end of Seattle near Greenlake No Kings has a pre-march rally and event this weekend: