Originally published in the November 1984 C&E.
As faithful readers will recall, we recounted last month how Boris Badenov, the Soviet DX ace, visited Oklahoma recently along with his brunette, nubile, 19-year-old secretary from Box 88, Natasha Bulwinkle.
After taking part in a celebrity dinner in Oklahoma City for the Russian delegation trying to trade three broken tractors and a Swan 350 for several million metric tons of American wheat, Badenov and his friend visited Norman where they were honored by a literary organization on the OU campus which makes a habit of honoring people with obscure reputations in faraway lands.
They then visited Oklahoma’s great Q. R. Zedd, A5A, at his home, Honor Roll Ranch, just a hoot and a holler south of the city beautiful. Badenov set a new world record for Coors and Twinkies, and Natasha threatened to stick the darling Tondelayo Schwartz with a knife.
For new readers, Tondelayo is Zedd’s nubile, 20-year-old QSL secretary and constant companion.
During the course of the festivities, Zedd suggested an ultimate test to determine who was the greatest DXer. After hearing the proposal, Badenov extended his leave from the Great Red Army and accepted the challenge on the spot.
It took a while to set things up, but the shootout took place just before Halloween. The scene was Honor Roll.
Drawn up facing each other at a range of 1,000 yards on a grassy pasture in the south part of Honor Roll were two 60-foot camper trailers, one for Zedd and one for Badenov. Each was decorated in the favorite style of its occupant. Zedd’s with interlocking OUs on the sides and an American flag, Badenov’s with hammers and sickles and various anti-imperialist slogans. Each had a 90-foot crankup tower topped by stacked monobanders, and inside, each had KWM-380s, outboard extra receivers, an identical kilowatt amplifiers. Mikes, keyers, logbooks, and (in Badenov’s case) several thousand cans of refreshment completed the stations.
By complicated formula agreed upon by the contestants, the winning score would be computed after four hours on the basis of total contacts multiplied by statute miles from Honor Roll to the contact divided by a rarity factor on the contact which it took the two great men almost a month to agree upon.
Naturally, if either contestant failed to work everything on the DXCC list, he was automatically disqualified.
Neutral observers from the ARRL and Box 88 monitored. Tondelayo, in a darling fuschia jumpsuit, and Natasha, wearing a jet black rubber leotard with her knife stuck in the thin gold belt, did the logging.
The contest started at 0000 Zulu.
Well, the antennas started spinning in all directions atop both campers, and little purple-white corona effects could be seen on the element tips as darkness crept in. You could have heard both Zedd and Badenov in several countries if they had had a power outage, as their excitement led both of them to use the Townsend effect of shouting as loud as they could, and swallowing the microphone.
In the early going it looked like Zedd was going to be an easy winner as he racked up 217 countries in the first forty minutes, and got a 5-9 from a remotely operated quake detector left by one of our Apollo teams on the moon. But then in the third hour Badenov really got into it by logging a long-delayed echo from Marconi, and logging 16,500 Russian stations.
Zedd, who still didn’t have a Soviet station in his log, tailended on about 4,000 of these contacts before shoving his chair back from the table and giving Tondelayo and this reporter a dismayed look.
“What is it, honey?” Tondelayo moved. “Those communists always love to work you!”
“It’s got to be that Boris got word out for nobody behind the Iron Curtain to answer my CQs or QRZs,” Zedd said darkly. “He is playing dirty pool.” Zedd then called Badenov a name for which parental guidance is suggested.
Well, there was nothing to do but go on with it, despite the worry now heavy in the Zedd shack. The great one worked some 3Xs and 4Ws and all manner of good stuff, including some on delayed echoes from a year or two back. But wouldn’t you know it, his receiver was acting up a little and his worry was clearly growing.
Over in the Badenov shack, the floor was knee deep in Coors cans, Badenov was singing lusty army songs between contacts, and Natasha was whirling about in the garbage, doing wild Russian folks dances and whanging her tambourine.
“Is over, do, Badenov chortled. “Is decadent American defeat at hands of truly greatest Dxers, my own self! Ha!” And he popped another can top.
Back Zedd’s part of the ranch, the gloom deepened until there were about fifteen minutes to go in the contest. Zedd was so far ahead on total contacts and points that it wasn’t even close, but those suckers in Russia would not work him, and without one of them in the log for each district, Zedd was an automatic loser.
“Dadblamel” Zedd cried in despair. “Heck!”
Tondelayo had an inspiration. “Let me try, darlin’.”
Zedd blinked, but handed her the mike. She cranked the antenna around for the polar route. She keyed the mike.
“Hi out there in radio land, ” she whispered in the most sultry tones you ever heard. “Is they anyone that’d like to QSO… or anythang… with little ole lonely me? Go ahead.”
Well, as everyone knows, Russians are, shall we say, zesty where it comes to women. The pileup from over the pole was fantastic. Tondelayo started picking up calls like mad, and making little breathy noises into the mike every little while, and listing the calls she had worked. As we sat there in amazement and admiration, she worked everything behind the Iron Curtain in about four minutes.
“Thanks, y’all,” she cooed finally. “This is Tondelayo sayin’ bye-bye, now. Incidentally, we ID’d just before I took over as control operator, but in case you want to make sure for your darlin’ little logs, this is ASA. That’s Alpha fiuve Alpha. Y’all be nice, now. Bye.”
In the Badenov trailer, Natasha stuck her tambourine with her knife.
Scoring results have been frontpaged in the nation’s press, of course, and everyone knows how Zedd has since been feted in Washington.
Badenov? We aren’t sure. Right after it was clear he had come in second, this helicopter landed in Oklahoma City and a limousine took several large, lumpy men in black suits away someplace. Badenov was sulking in his Oklahoma City hotel that same Tuesday night, but the next morning all the cleanup people found was some unopened Coors and some half-eaten Twinkies crushed into the shag carpet.
Clearly they had left in a hurry. Natasha’s shopping bag from Frederick’s of Hollywood was left behind with all the goodies still in it.
The hotel bill was handled with a Visa card listing a KGB address.
At presstime, Zedd was outhunting for his Thanksgiving turkey.