Propagation, Tis a Puzzlement

Erratic propagation today, into N. Italy, New England, the Midwest, central Canada, Texas (of course!) and Florida with good signals, then, in the middle of a QSO with Bob, W1ARL, things went flat and the QRN was a steady S-5 to S-7 hiss and nobody was there. No doubt Al Gore would blame it on my carbon footprint. I mean, according to him it effects the sun's output-hence global warming, oops, no, my bad, climate change. So it must be why there are not enough sunspots. I'm sure there is nothing to the Maunder Minimum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maunder_Minimum. Cold and no band openings guess I could build a LF rig. 73 de Rob