For God's sake hide your astoishment.

Built an active, tunable antenna, and finally have something to seriously
play with. As I understand it, sunspot activity is only a notch or two
above the all-time recorded low, and I am still able to pick up some
stations off the whip, with only a little more noise than with the external
antenna. Radio Havana Cuba comes in like it's in my back pocket, which it
practically is, and the ubiquitous WWV comes in weakly, which doesn't
surprise me too much since I am inside a steel shell and sitting on the
floor. Wow. Feels sooo nice. And what's funny is, I can hear the clock on
the opposite side of the room ticking quietly in the background of weaker
stations. Not sure what to do next. May try adding another stage of
amplification to the front end. An NE602, maybe. The project that never
dies...

Dave