Mamba

Welcome to TN, and congrats on your PRK escape.

This sorta fits in with this thread.... Been watching "The Tech Prepper" channel off/on for awhile. I'll definitely be interested in his EmComm Tools app once he gets it rolled out. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkIlmzmOuC4

I put it off too, but now I'm semi-retired so no more excuses. I was mildly big into CB back in the pre-trucker days when it was more Ham-like in nature (licensed, family-friendly) so I setup a CB shack earlier this year. Still glad I did but it's just not the same as it was. Popularity-wise, now is a good time...not so great a time new equipment-wise due to lingering shortages (chip, etc) from the past year. And license-testing fees will go from $15 per to $35...someday, the FCC is still undecided on when. I took my Tech test remote (via Zoom) but not sure how much longer that option will be around before most testing returns to in-person. So I wouldn't wait too long if any of that matters to you. Equipment-wise, you'll surely hear "buy once, cry once" but I don't have much to spend so went cheap... all new gear from eBay. A couple BF-F8+ HTs and a TYT TH-9800+ quad-band mobile that shares power with my mobile CB from a TekPower TP30 12v P/S, to use as a base. I added a copper J-pole antenna just above the roof line, no problem hit'n the area repeaters; haven't tested simplex TX range yet but RX is very good. Add in the coax, connectors, accessories, etc and all the above was still under $500. Yah, I'll want better down the road if I decide I to stay in the hobby long-term but I can re-purpose the 9800+ as a mobile, the 2-piece J-pole for travel, and the HTs remain handy for basic SHTF (FM, UHF/VHF, GMRS, weather). If the shortages ever end, there should be a glut of better-quality used gear on the market as people sell to upgrade to top-tier....I hope. lol There's a Hamfest coming up soon but probably too soon in that regard.

Good to hear...Josh has a ton of great vids on his channel. His recent "Stealthy and Covert" vid was a hoot. Dunno that I'd want to ever James Bond it radio-wise, but fun stuff to watch. Finally got around to remote-testing for my Tech ticket on the 11th, but not had much time to do anything with it due to family issues out of state. Hope to test for my General by year-end. For now I'm mainly interested in VHF/UHF, and I picked up a dual-band DMR HT but I can already feel the draw to HF. lol

Dunno if you'll find any repeaters in that area but this vid really helped me out in programming my BF-F8+, including loading in area repeaters via CHIRP.

As has been said, it depends on your hardware & your "software" as to what works for you. I'm a southpaw, which has it's own challenges; most times I carry AIWB-ish since that suits my (recently slimmer) body-type and needs. Around the house I often settle for a 9mm in a front pocket holster. I advise that whatever you choose, do practice your draw & presentation (unloaded of course) from various positions (driving, prone, seated, etc). I've seen too many times where precious seconds were lost due to fumbling, holster or cover-clearing failures, and so on that were mainly due to a lack of testing/practice beforehand.

On the brighter side, I'm sure that sales at the alternative "dry fire practice gadgets" companies is healthily in the black. That's also probably a safer intro to gun-handling and shooting mechanics for the new shooters, providing that they enlist experienced tutelage.

When selling here, I've experienced more "looks like they just created an account for the Classifieds" contacts than in the past. Sign o' the times I guess. While I can't blame them, neither do I want to deal with a complete unknown. So I'm much more picky on communications permissions. As for FTF dealings, I always make sure that we exchange phone numbers before the public meetup and I confirm that meetup via text before I get on the road. So far so good.

No worries. Sure wish I'd known about them back when, however they likely didn't exist that long ago. Good luck with your search.

I ran across a YT video on Nomad Internet. Glowing review tho' the homesteaders giving the review had only used it for a couple months at the time. Worked great for them after they added external antennas on the roof. Looks like Nomad also caters to RV gypsies. I would ask them about carrier caps, as some (like Verizon) are known to throttle their 4g after 15gb or so.

Yep, they decided that DSL was out-mode'd tech that they didn't want to deal with any longer so they effectively pulled the plug in situations like mine. Didn't matter to them that I couldn't be a broadband customer due to no existing or planned rural infrastructure, and even for wireless I had to track down my own one-off solution. Carpe diem Elon....

Yah, and sometimes there's other issues. One reason that we went ahead with the rural home purchase near Portland, TN back in '16 was that the owner worked-from-home via DSL. Not thrilled with DSL but figured it would be the best we could do and was workable. Well, when that owner closed her account, turns out she only had phone & DSL service at all because she was grandfathered in when AT&T had bought out the local provider. So when we moved in, that was all shut-down. Had to scramble for a solution. At least these days looks like there are more options in that area, and hopefully rural TN in general.

"JTM Broadband is a family owned business that was started by two brothers who wanted to create a more reliable Internet network in their rural community." Great to see local SMB solutions step up to fill the gaps. Finding options like this is often only accomplished via word-of-mouth or luck. The latter was our case with the hot-spot solution.

For SL news I keep an eye on Lon's YT channel, he has real-world experience with it. Yah, Hughes and the other sat venders have horrible reviews, enough to save me from traveling that road back when we lived "in the frick'n forest" as my wife called it. The AT&T hotspot service ran $150/mo via an eBay vendor, data cap was 50GB as I recall. We had decent bandwidth & latency....could stream a movie but rarely did due to the cap, saved that for Zoom. I did game online regularly which uses minimal data but needs sub-100ms latency. Weather did impact signal-strength.

Having "survived" living in rural N Middle TN and work-from-home on an expensive AT&T wireless hot-spot for a couple years all I can say is...good luck. Luckily this was pre-2020 so vid-meetings were only a couple times per week. Even then, we spent many hours at the nearest public library to sponge off their free faster bandwidth to save on our meager allotment. Loved the country life, but eventually had to move to Nashville for family reasons and can't say that I miss the hot-spot. lol As Mark said, ya might keep an eye on Starlink...not in TN yet; they have up-coming competition so pricing should drop eventually too.