“Spurious Signals” is a cartoon that appears monthly in CQ Amateur Radio Magazine and previously in Popular Communications Magazine until 2013.
These cartoons are copyrighted and may not be reproduced without express written permission. To get permission to use a cartoon in a non-profit club newsletter or other format, email jaythurbershow@gmail.com.
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CQ cartoon for Aug. 2023
It looks like I forgot to post the August 2023 cartoon from CQ Amateur Radio Magazine. This is another one of those “it happened in real life” moments from the recent trip a friend and I made to the Dayton Amateur Radio Association’s clubhouse in Huber Heights, Ohio. As always, a reminder that these cartoons…
Not so funny any more
(Today’s trivia question: I’ll award one solid brass figlagee with bronze oak leaf palm to the first person who can tell me the significance of the names on the tombstone. Answer at the end of this post.) We moved recently and I’ve been cleaning out some old files. I found this cartoon that I did…
CQ cartoon, July 2023
Sorry! I realized I forgot to post my July 2023 cartoon for CQ Amateur Radio Magazine. This month’s cartoon was a tribute to the late Al Jaffee, who contributed to Mad Magazine for an incredible 65 years before his death in April at age 102. Jaffee was the originator of a number of long-running features…
CQ cartoon, June 2023
My cartoon from this month’s CQ Amateur Radio Magazine. This was inspired by a visit I made recently to the National Voice of America Museum of Broadcasting between Cincinnati and Dayton. The museum is located at what was once the Bethany, Ohio, shortwave radio relay station for Voice of America, beginning in 1942. It was…
CQ cartoon, May 2023
This week, I’ll be headed to Dayton, Ohio — actually, Xenia, a little bit to the southeast — for the annual Dayton Hamvention, billed as the world’s largest gathering of amateur radio operators, or “hams.” (My show this Saturday will be produced and broadcast from Hamvention, and I’ll be talking to some people at the…
CQ cartoon, April 2023
(As always, a reminder that these cartoons are posted after they’ve appeared in CQ Amateur Radio Magazine. Why not subscribe today?) This is true: Remember the freak-out a few months ago when a Chinese “spy balloon” was observed crossing into U.S. airspace, and Republicans and Fox News (but I repeat myself) lost their ever-loving minds,…
CQ cartoon, March 2023
Probably everyone who’s ever been married or in a long-term relationship knows the most perilous question you can answer is, “What are you doing right now?” closely followed by, “How do I look?” and “What should we have for dinner tonight?” (And in all fairness, I’ve done it to my wife more than once, and…
CQ cartoon, Feb. 2023
From time to time, for my monthly cartoons in CQ Amateur Radio Magazine, I draw a “dubious moment in radio history.” It’s almost always based on some actual momentous occasion, but with a dumb anachronistic punchline. For instance, in 2012, a Georgetown law student testified to Congress in favor of legal access to birth control.…
CQ cartoon, Jan. 2023
I often do a “CQ Predicts” cartoon for the first issue of the new year. It helps to have a working familiarity with The Amazing Criswell. I wish I had enough hair to comb it into a spit curl. Criswell: Cartoon: (Cartoons are posted about a month after they appear in the magazine. To see…
Like it so much, I’ll doodle some more
(Optional soundtrack for this post.) I suppose the fact that my real name isn’t “Jay Thurber” isn’t a surprise to a lot of folks. I picked the DJ name more than 20 years ago as a tribute to my favorite writer and cartoonist, and it just kind of “stuck.” But I use my real name…