What you were probably hearing was "skip" from what I was hearing it was from up north with mention of "pamida" stores as quotes on there. Never did catch where it was but the best guess was up north. The band openings on VHF were great last weekend due to the high humidity and the high heat. I am a fire fighter and Ems member so scan the county quite a bit, also a ham operator so I was talking on repeaters from Iowa and Indiana last wekend. Other channels that were doing it were the county paging channel and "C" charlie channel.
Justin
KC9IWG
CPFD/CPEMS