Originally published in the May 1986 issue of the Collector & Emitter.
Rumors about a possible wedding that would unite Q. R. Zedd, the world’s greatest DXer, and Tondelayo Schwartz, his blonde, nubile QSL secretary, were confirmed last week.
The world was agog.
Zedd, A5A, flew into Oklahoma City’s Will Rogers Airport in a private jet of his own design, Tondelayo at his side. When the happy pair disembarked, the great man looked sheepish and Tondelayo was wearing a rock the size of a 40-meter crystal and a slender wedding band on the third finger of her left hand.
“It’s true, boys,” Zedd told the assembled world press. “I have been but by the love bug at last. Two can live as cheaply as one. She lights up my life. She is my bridge over troubled waters. Ah, sweet mystery of life, at last I’ve found thee.’
“Zowie,’ said Tondelayo. “Darlin’, go fetch the luggage and bring the car around,” Zedd ordered fondly. ‘I got to fill the boys in on this deal. Oh, and buy me some RoiTans at the counter on your way out, that’s my good girl.”
Tondelayo clattered off in her gold Candies, and Zedd, holder of all DX records for this planet, settled down with representative from the AP, UPI, Reuters, Women’s Wear Daily, The New York Times, USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, and C&E. The great man looked tanned and fit, LEDs on his multiple-band scanning transceiver, chest-mounted, twinkling constantly. He said he would take all questions.
“Sir,” said AP, “could you please tell us when and where you married Tondelayo?”
“Sure, boy,” Zedd smiled. “We got married a week ago in the Vatican. That’s an outfit over there in Rome that runs a one-operator station barefoot on the low bands.”
“And is it true,” asked USA Today, “that you married the darling girl because — after activating the lost continent of Atlantis in January — you felt there were no more DX worlds to conquer, and you might as well settle down?”
“Nothing could be farther from the dadburned truth,” Zedd answered. “There is always new DX to conquer. Now I admit that putting Atlantis on the air, all bands, all modes, was the greatest feat ever. But they are creating new countries out there all the time, and changing prefixes and all. And if I am to stay No. 1, I got to work them all, all the time. There will always be new challenges in DX. Believe me.
“No,” Zedd went on, stuffing fragrant latakia tobacco in his oom-paul, “I married Tondelayo for two reasons. First, she’s been a loyal little thang and I think she’s earned a break. Second, everybody agrees the solar flux is going to bottom out about next December, which means hf communications are going to be in the pits for the next three years or so. I figger, if you’re going to get married at all, now is the time when there ain’t a lot else to do anyways.”
“How about children?” asked UPI. “If they got a callsign, I’ll work ’em,” Zedd shot back.
“No, no, I mean are you and Tondelayo going to have any?”
“Children?” Zedd said, looking blank. “Children. Children. You know. Goo goo. Da-da. Ma-ma.”
“You ought to take something for that stomach gas. Well, as to children, probably I ought to sire some. I owe it to the gene pool of humanity, don’t you think? Well, I’d better go down and let the old lady pick me up now, boys. She’s got a lot of laundry and cleaning to do down there at Honor Roll before she fixes my supper, and then at nine o’clock she’s gotta climb the south tower and check out why a couple of the strobes ain’t working.”
The press corps trailed Zedd downstairs and then outside, where Tondelayo was waiting in the Ferrari. With a jaunty wave and a hi ho silver, she gunned the racecar out of there, heading for Norman, from where Honor Roll Ranch is just a hoot and a holler south.
Contacted for comment in Mena, Arkansas, Zedd’s momma chortled, “Goodie, goodie!” and was reporting the grand news on all ham bands.
In Hollywood, Joan Collins was reported seeing her shrink in a fit of depression about having lost out.
And in Moscow, Russian DX ace Boris Badenov was quoted as saying marriage was about what he would have expected from a decadent capitalist pig like Zedd.
Badenov said, “I will never marry Natasha Bullwinkle, my brunette, nubile companion from Box 88!”
Natasha then stuck him with her knife.