On Sunday, May 8, 2011 12:22:46 PM UTC-5, Tom Rutherford wrote:

The Yagi
would be nice, but running out on the balcony and moving it around all the
time isn't practical. That's why I wanted something fairly omnidirectional,
as much of "omni" as I can get, anyway. Since I remember what my
communications instructor told us about loops (they radiate equally poorly
in all directions g), I figured this would be the most practical solution
for what I want to do.

Another possible idea could be the turnstile.
That is horizontal, pretty omni, and pretty simple
to build. Just a set of crossed dipoles fed 90 degrees
out of phase. I think you would have less gain vs
the broadside of a dipole, but you wouldn't have the
nulls off the ends.