What a Great Buy

      It only takes a few moments to go through an ebay search of police scanners to see all the wonderful buys that are available today. I'm not talking just your little 20, 30, 40, or 50 channel scanners, but some of the better, more high quality, more channels then what most people can still program or no what to do with scanners. Maybe not at many, but the 100, 200, 500, and 1000 channel scanners are out there, some of them for a song and a dance.
      Now your asking yourselves, old wise one from the north, are these analogs from days gone by still worth the cabinet made to put them in? The answer of course is yes, they are worth it, and still in use today and rightfully so. Take our area for example we have yet to make the switch to digital; well police calls that is, the TV is a different story all together. So it is almost a no brainer for people interested in the exciting world of scannering, wanting to hear what their town's finest are up to, not to spend a couple of dollars and find out. I am sure we are not the only ones who have not leaped forward yet, so for that reason alone a fast 20 dollar bill would be just the thing to curb your appetite and say wow I did not know criminals could be so dumb.
      OK, so you zeroed in on your scanner of choice, won the bid and sent in your money. A few days later your very beautiful, slightly used, then cost $400.00 now you paid 20 and change scanner arrives. You trip over the couch, slam into the door, (just before you open it), attack your favorite UPS man, (hopefully not at gun point) and demand he hand over your hard earn prize. Nervously he does and you run back into your home, rip the wrapping off the box, then rip the box for good measure, yank the scanner out and neatly and carefully set it up in the perfect spot you made room for.  Once plugged in, you flip the switch and the scanner lights up like a Christmas Tree on steroids. You enter a few frequencies with ease because you've been studying the online manual waiting all week for your scanner to arrive.
      After several long boring minutes  you're sort of surprised that you have not heard a peep out of the local PD, a half hour goes by then an hour and still nothing. Your mind is racing on what you could have done wrong or what might be up. You entertain most every thought going through your head, maybe they are having a half price sale at Uncle bob's donut hold and figured the cops got win of that, all 10 of them.  Once you quickly dismissed that weird idea, you decided to call a friend of a friend who may just have an answer that will help you figure out the mess your in. It rings, he answers, you explain your situation, and he gives you the answer you did not want to hear. Turns out the day you purchased your ebay scanner was the day the city PD decided it was time to go digital.
      Wow, what a let down, you felt cheated, betrayed and oh so hurt, what to do now? Guess you could pack the scanner back in the box, oh wait you ripped the box up in your haste to open it, darn the luck. Well it does look sorta good as an over sized paper weight. And hey if nothing else it could be used as  a over active night light for those moments when your sneaking down stairs to get a bite to eat from the refrig. Finally with a few keystrokes in the google search engine you run across a web site that has frequencies besides the PD in your area you did not know existed. They may not be as grandiose as listening to the local PD asking for a small break to visit Bob's Donut hole but none the less at least your getting something for your fast 20 dollar bill.
      As humorous as this may have been, the point being not everything is going digital at least not for sometime to come, so load that baby up, sit back with a cool tall glass of Iced Tea and catch in on the latest happenings. Power goes out, run the scanner on batteries and listen to the power company do their thing, some fire frequencies may still be analog; life care and or ambulance services, more then likely will still be heard talking to the hospital. Cab companies may be doing their thing and you never know what they may say. Your airport may be buzzing with local aircraft traffic and of course the good old amateur radio operators will always be around talking about one cool thing or another. So take advantage of some of the great offers on ebay for those once high price scanners and start Listening In to the other stuff you may have been clueless about before.
73 N8RGO