[BrendaAnnD]

I learned code to get my novice license back in '82. Never once used it. I barely broke the 5WPM barrier. To even do that, I had to write a BASIC program that would 'send' me a character as I typed it on the keyboard. My problem is that I can't do instantaneous processing, I have to 'translate' what I hear into English before I can process it. Same thing with other languages. I took Spanish for three years, and have a fair vocabulary, but I can't listen fast enough to talk to a native speaker because I have to translate what they say into English and then translate what I want to say from English into Spanish before I respond (all in my head, of course.)

Got my Tech as soon as they would let me test for it. Finally got my General when they dropped the code requirement to 5WPM in 2000. Of course, since then, I've been in Korea, and have done very little ham work. I can't hear anything other than Korean, Japanese, Russian and Chinese on the bands (HF). They finally put in a 70cm repeater here for 'foreigners', and I get on there once in a blue moon.