Category Archives: Days in My Life

I don’t just sit around and watch TV.

Is eBay for Suckers?

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I think it’s for people too lazy to do their homework.

If you’ve been following this blog, you know I’ve been spending a lot of time with photographers lately in some of the most outstanding scenic areas of Arizona. I’ve had a lot of downtime on these trips, waiting for passengers, etc. I brought along my Nikon D80 camera with the 3 lenses I used to use on my old film cameras, a pair of Nikon 6006s. (I still have those camera bodies in excellent condition. They’re great for anyone interested in working with film. Make me an offer.)

Again, I’m not a great photographer, but I do get lucky once in a while. It’s hard to come away without any good photos when you’re in a beautiful place and have a camera capable of storing 300+ 10-megapixel images on a single card. Digital cameras give us the luxury of experimentation without cost. We can try different lenses and different aperture or shutter speed settings. We can shoot a dozen photos of the same thing at different times of the day. Something has to come out okay or even — dare I say it? — good.

Wide Angle ExampleA lot of the photographers I’ve been working with — Mike Reyfman and Jon Davison come to mind — do a lot of work with wide angle lenses. The photos look great, the curvature gives the images a certain character. And Jon even showed me how to remove the curvature when it isn’t wanted (although I admit I forgot how; I’ll have to research that again in Photoshop documentation).

Wide Angle ExampleAlthough lens collection includes a 28-85 mm zoom lens, I only recently discovered that a 28 mm lens for a film camera doesn’t give you a 28 mm focal length on a digital camera. There’s a conversion factor, which I looked up for my camera: 1.5. That means the focal length of my lens is 1.5 times whatever the lens is labeled. So, for example, a 28 mm lens is resulting in a 42 mm focal length. (Please, someone, correct me if I’m getting this wrong. This is my understanding and I’m not an optics expert.)

This explains why I’m not getting the curvature effect I was looking for with my “wide angle” lens.

Wide Angle ExampleSo I did some research and found that Nikon makes a 18-55 mm lens. I saw the retail price and decided to see if I could do better on eBay. I did. I bought a used lens in pretty good (but not “mint,” as advertised) condition on eBay for $81 including shipping. I got to play with it on Sunday when we were goofing off at the local airport. The photos you see with this post are examples. I didn’t have much to work with in the way of subject matter, so I took a few shots of my car (parked in front of my hangar) and a cool little airplane sitting out on the ramp.

But, as I expected, this curvature wasn’t enough. I wanted more. It looked like I’d have to go with a fisheye lens, which I’d already been researching and bidding on on eBay. I kept losing the auctions. The lenses were going for $700+ and one used one slipped out of my grasp for $620. My top bid was in the low $500s, and even that was more money than I wanted to spend.

Then there’s the condition of the lens that arrived on Saturday. The seller said it was used, but also said it was in “mint” condition. In my mind, “mint” condition means perfect. It doesn’t mean dusty, like it’s been sitting on a shelf for half a year. It doesn’t mean accompanied by a skylight filter that has dust on both sides. And it certainly doesn’t mean dust on either end of the lens. This was not mint. I couldn’t complain because I thought I’d gotten a good deal, but I wasn’t about to spend $700 on another lens and have it arrive in the same condition. For that kind of money, I wanted a brand new lens in a box.

I lost my most recent bid on a 10.5 mm lens on eBay. Just for the hell of it, I decided to check Amazon.com. And guess what? They had the same lens, brand new in a box from a camera dealer, for $589 with free shipping.

So what the hell was I doing on eBay?

I bought the lens on Amazon.com.

I also learned a few valuable lessons here:

  • eBay should be the discount seller of last resort when buying an expensive item.
  • Buy used only when condition is not vitally important. (To me, it’s vital that photographic equipment be in pristine condition.)
  • Do your homework on an item’s pricing in at least four other places before placing any eBay bids.
  • And of course, the rule we should all know: don’t get auction fever when bidding on eBay.

The good news of all this is that I still have about $300 left from some “found money.” (I unexpectedly sold some post-level advertising on this site, resulting in a little windfall of mad money.) And when the new lens arrives, I know it’ll really be in “mint” condition.

A Computerless Day

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And on the seventh day, she shut off the computer.

A comment on my blog post, “Is Social Networking Sucking Your Life Away?,” got me seriously thinking about how often I use a computer when I really do have better things to do with my life.

Why We Use Computers

Well, obviously most people always have something better to do with their lives than sit in front of a computer. But I can’t deny certain reasons why we use computers:

  • To get work done. After all, a computer is a tool for getting many kinds of work done. So you may have to work with a computer every day just to get your work done. I use a computer for this reason quite often.
  • To relax and unwind after a long day at work or doing something intense. This is what the commenter said and I think it’s a perfectly legitimate reason to use a computer. After all, computers have become a hub for entertainment, with video games (but please don’t get me started on those), sites like YouTube, and sites that provide news and entertainment information. My husband watches TV to unwind in the evening, many people turn to their Internet-connected box. I admit that I do this once in a while, although I really prefer a good book or movie.
  • To communicate with others across long distances for free. iChat, Instant Messaging, Skype, and many other tools make it possible to use the Internet to keep in touch with friends and family members anywhere in the world. When Australian photographer Jon Davison was here last month, he used iChat on his MacBook to have a video chat with his girlfriend back home. It was amusing to see him walking around the house and yard with the computer, pointing its camera at the guest room he was staying in and the views of the mountains to the north. But heck, why not? Live audio and visual communication across thousands of miles to another continent for free? If I had anything to say to someone that far away, I’d be doing it, too. And, of course communication doesn’t have to be audio or visual — it could be a simple e-mail message.

When There Are No Days Off

But on Saturday, I spent nearly the whole day in front of my computer. I did a bunch of things, the most important of which was to create some marketing material I’ll need this week. But did I have to do it on a weekend? My husband was home from work, we’d cancelled two days of a helicopter gig in Wickieup due to wind, and we had both days unexpectedly free at the same time. Yet I was sitting in front of a box working with Photoshop and InDesign to create flyers and he was sitting in front of a different box watching sports.

One of the drawbacks to being a freelancer/business owner and working from home is that there’s often no distinction between work days and days off. After a very busy month and a half of hard work for both of my businesses, I’d completely lost the distinction. I’d fallen into the trap that made every day that I wasn’t flying a day that I could be working. Where were the days off?

So I took yesterday off — from using the computer.

A Day Away from the Computer

It was a conscious decision I made the night before, so it wasn’t difficult to get started on the right track.

The only tough parts for me were skipping my morning blog entry — which I like to do every morning, if I have time — and not checking the weather. I had plenty of time — I was up a 5 AM while Mike continued to sleep. I made my coffee and gave Alex the Bird his scrambled egg. But since I wasn’t going to start the day with a blog entry, what was I going to do? The answer was kill clutter.

Our kitchen has a built-in desk with cubbyholes above it. Over the years — and I do mean years — the desk and cubbyholes have become the gathering places for all kinds of loose papers and other items. I found expired car registrations, broken jewelry, the title for my Honda, photos taken and developed in 2001, business cards, and a lot more. I wound up throwing half the stuff out. Half of the rest was put away immediately. The rest — well, let’s just say the clutter has shifted to a new position. (I’ll deal with it today.)

Then Mike and I went to Wickenburg Airport to socialize with fellow pilots at the Sunday morning coffee and donuts. This was a “tradition” that I started back when I ran the FBO there and every FBO operator after me has done the same. (It’s actually a money-making proposition, with voluntary donations covering the cost of the coffee and the donuts, with plenty to spare.) It was cool and windy out, so most folks were inside the terminal. I spent quite some time with a newcomer, giving her a long list of flying destinations that included either restaurants or lodging or both. (In fact, I didn’t realize I had so much information in my head about that.) We also stopped by the hangar to drop off a few things and tidy up a bit. I got to play with my new 18-55mm camera lens, which we found in our mailbox on the way to the airport.

Back home, I did a bit more tidying up while Mike took his truck back out to help a friend move some furniture. By the time he was back, I’d brought our two horses up to the tack room and had prepared them for saddling. We went for a nice ride out in the desert behind our house. I’d brought my GPS with me and my point-and-shoot Canon camera. My goal is to match up photos with track points to put GPS info in the photos. (I discussed this in my recent post, “Day 5 on Google Earth,” and will go into greater detail when I actually achieve this goal.)

At one point, we stopped on top of a ridge that overlooked the whole west side of town. On one side was a golf course and hundreds houses. On the other side was rolling desert hills without a structure in sight. I commented to Mike how special the place was — the border between civilization and wilderness — and how terrible it was that greedy developers all over Arizona are trying so hard to replace the wilderness with tract housing. The scars on the land that will soon be Wickenburg Ranch — so clearly visible from our vantage point — really brought home this point. How long would it be before our vantage point on a horse trail would be the middle of someone’s living room or garage?

Wickenburg Panorama

Back home, it was difficult not to rush to the computer to offload the pictures and GPS tracklog. But I spent the next hour and a half doing something I hadn’t done in a long time: taking a nice long soak in the bathtub with a book.

Then, at 5, it was time for dinner with some friends. Jim and Judith have left Wickenburg for the Las Vegas area, with a second home on the California coast. They were in town this past weekend to finish packing up their house, which is for sale. (They want me to buy the house because it has a helipad and hangar, but I think their neighbors would kill me with the amount of flying I do.) We had dinner at their favorite restaurant in town, which is also one of ours: House Berlin. We had a great dinner, checked out their new car, and exchanged hugs and best wishes.

I finished up the day reading in bed while Mike watched the baseball game on television. I fell asleep early and woke well-rested.

I Did Cheat Twice

I do have to admit that I used my computer twice during the day.

The first time was when I went into my office to shut it down early in the morning. The computer starts each morning at 5 AM to gather my e-mail and download podcasts. When I went to shut it down, it was displaying an e-mail message about my eBay bidding status. I’m trying to buy a 10.5 mm lens for my Nikon D80 and I couldn’t resist seeing if I was still the winning bidder. I wasn’t. But the auction doesn’t end until today, so I still have a chance. I shut the computer down within 30 seconds.

Later in the day, I also used the computer to suck my existing track logs off my GPS. I wanted to start with a clean slate, but keep the existing data. The whole process took about 2 minutes.

I won’t argue that these two tiny uses “don’t count.” They do. But I’m not ashamed of them. And I’m extremely proud that I didn’t use my laptop, which sits in the kitchen these days, to check the weather. I was sorely tempted on several occasions.

Was it a Better Day without Computers?

Yes. It was. I spent time with my husband and critters and friends. I made a dent in some of the clutter in my house. I spent hours outdoors in fresh air on a beautiful day. What could be better on a computer?

So I think I might practice what I preach a little more often — maybe on Sundays.

Fire Hazard Weather

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High wind and dry conditions are a bad mix.

I’ve been watching the northwestern Arizona weather carefully for the past few days, checking National Weather Service forecasts for Wickenburg (where I live) and Kingman. I had a flying gig at Wickieup this weekend and although I didn’t expect much revenue from it, it was an opportunity for Mike and I to escape home responsibilities for a few days and camp out with some extremely unusual folks. Wickieup is 2/3 of the way between Wickenburg and Kingman, so I figured that if I extrapolated between the two, I’d get a good forecast.

The forecast wasn’t good. It called for high winds — 30 mph or more — on Saturday and Sunday. Although I have flown (and I suppose I will fly) in winds up to 50 mph (not recommended, folks), the landing zone in Wickieup is on a narrow ridge with one way in and out while the event was going on. If the wind was coming from the northwest, I’d be operating with a tailwind, which is always a bad idea when you have a heavy load at 4,000+ feet elevation. The area is very mountainous, so all that wind going over the mountains would make for a rough ride. The end result: me operating in marginal conditions to give my passengers rides that they might not enjoy.

Since I’m just coming off a month-long period of heavy flying — I flew about 50 hours in the past 30 days — I decided that it just wasn’t worth it to spend the weekend. So we flew up for the day, did a few rides, watched the activities — more on that in another post — and flew home.

When we got home, I checked the weather again, mostly to make sure I’d made the right decision about the weekend. (I had.) The Wickenburg weather forecast included something I’d never seen before: a Fire Hazard Watch. Here’s what it said when I checked it again this morning:

...FIRE WEATHER WATCH REMAINS IN EFFECT FROM LATE TONIGHT THROUGH SUNDAY EVENING DUE TO STRONG AND GUSTY NORTH WINDS AND LOW RELATIVE HUMIDITY..

A LOW PRESSURE SYSTEM IS DEVELOPING OVER THE WESTERN STATES THIS MORNING. THE COLD FRONT ASSOCIATED WITH THIS SYSTEM WAS LOCATED IN NEVADA AND WILL CONTINUE TO MOVE SOUTHWARD TODAY AND TONIGHT. SUSTAINED NORTH WINDS OF 20 TO 30 MPH WITH HIGHER GUSTS APPROACHING 45 MPH MAY DEVELOP ON SUNDAY. IN ADDITION...VERY LOW RELATIVE HUMIDITY CAN BE EXPECTED. THE COMBINATION OF STRONG WINDS AND VERY LOW HUMIDITY MAY CREATE HAZARDOUS FIRE WEATHER CONDITIONS.

(Sorry about the ALL CAPS, but that’s the way they publish them.)

This warning just emphasizes how dry it can be here in the desert. I can’t remember the last time it rained here — maybe a month ago? We have plenty of stretches where it doesn’t rain for two or more months. Not long ago, Phoenix had a record 143-day dry spell. That’s almost 5 months!

The weather, in case you’re wondering, is almost always clear here, with bright blue skies. During our dry season — which is 8 to 10 months out of the year — there are rarely any clouds at all. Sure it’s beautiful, but it gets a bit tedious at times. You find yourself wishing for some cloud activity. You find yourself wishing for rain.

Right now, there’s a fire burning north of Wickenburg, although I’m not sure exactly where. We saw the smoke as we flew home from Wickieup. I have a feeling it’s somewhere southwest of Williams, AZ, perhaps in the Big Chino Wash area. There was another one burning southeast of Flagstaff when I flew back from Flag with passengers last Friday. In this dryness, it doesn’t take much to get a fire going. And when the wind kicks up, a small fire can quickly turn into an out-of-control blaze.

Yet people will continue to toss their cigarette butts out their car windows as they drive on highways and back roads. I can see the results of their carelessness as I fly around the state. Acres and acres burned east of Vulture Mine Road just south of Wickenburg. More burned along I-40, I-10, I-17, and SR-89. Signs up and down the highways proclaim Fire Danger Extreme, but no one stops to think of the consequences of a tiny cigarette butt or the sparks from an ATV or dirt bike. Those signs are for other people.

While I don’t expect a fire to break out in the area this weekend, I hope one doesn’t. If it does, with the high winds that are expected, we could get clouds — clouds of smoke.

The End is Near

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I’m almost done with a month on the road.

On September 14, I left home to start the first of a string of flying gigs that kept me away from home for 16 of the past 28 days. I estimate that I flew at least 3,000 miles during that time. (I flew about 200 miles just today.) I know I slept in 9 different hotel rooms — plus my camper — and ate in at least two dozen restaurants.

Right now, I’m stretched out on a Sleep Number bed — in other words, an overpriced, remote controlled air mattress — in Flagstaff’s Radisson hotel. The linens are nice. I’m watching the Weather Channel, angry that I just missed Stephen Colbert on Larry King, and amazed that there’s nothing else on worth watching.

Tomorrow is the last day of our Southwest Circle Helicopter Adventure. Normally, I think I would have enjoyed every minute of the trip. But somewhere about halfway through this week, I realized that I was tired of traveling, tired of being away from home.

Fortunately, my passengers want an early start tomorrow. So I’ll pick them up at their B & B at 8 AM and whisk them away to their last activity: a hike around the ruins in Walnut Canyon. I suspect that I’ll be too tired to join them on the hike in, so I’ll hang out in the rental car (a PT Cruiser, I think) or on a sunny bench and read until they’re done.

Then, it’s back to Flagstaff airport, where the helicopter has been fueled by the excellent crew at Wiseman Aviation and the hour-long flight back to Deer Valley Airport. I’ll say goodbye to my clients, give them the parting gift that I’ve been lugging around for the past five days, and high-tail it back to Wickenburg. With luck, I should be back in my own home by 3 PM.

I think I might spend the afternoon napping in my own bed.

Best of all is what’s on my calendar for the next seven days: nothing.

No books to write, no clients to fly, no meetings, no phone calls. I might even shut off my phone to keep it that way.

Okay, so I’ll be honest: I do expect to work next week. I need to start writing Leopard articles for Peachpit’s Web site. I’m hoping to knock off about 20 of them during the next two months. And I do need to start thinking about the video I’m under contract to do for MacPro Video. And develop a new brochure for Flying M Air’s multi-day excursions. And put together a proposal for the Navajo Film Commission. And create a package for Phoenix-area concierges.

But I’m not going to do it all next week. I’m going to take a little break and knock off just a few of the east tasks.

I deserve some time off.

Still Working Hard

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I am so incredibly tired.

September knocked things up a notch when two things happened at roughly the same time:

  • I got a bunch of flying gigs. To be fair, the biggest gig was booked back in March or April. That’s the gig I’m on now — flying a group of Russian photographers around Lake Powell, Monument Valley and Shiprock. (I’m in Monument Valley now; more on that later.) But in addition to my annual appearance at the Mohave County Fair, I scooped up two photo shoots at Lake Powell and three relatively lucrative custom tours for Realtors. And did I mention the Australian photographer I needed to take around so he could get shots of my helicopter operation for an upcoming book? (Of course I did. I’m still tickled about that.) I flew more than 45 hours in September, and most of them were solid revenue hours.
  • My editor reminded me that Apple promised to deliver Leopard in October. Counting back from the end of the month, it became obvious that I’d have to have my book done by the first week in October if Apple delivered on that promise and we wanted our book to be in stores the day Leopard became available. And one look in my personal bank account reminded me that I write for a living and had been neglecting my livelihood.

Thus began a month of very long days. And timing couldn’t be worse. Not only was I scheduled to do this big gig with the Russians, but the dates happened to fall on the very last days I had to write the book. So I had to finish it before I left. I am not exaggerating when I tell you that I was packing for my trip as my computer was generating PDFs and uploading files to Peachpit’s server.

I worked 14-hour days last week. Basically, every waking hour was spent in front of my computer, writing about Leopard. And, believe it or not, I have two laptops with me here on my trip so I can knock off the Introduction before the book goes to the printer.

But although the book work is not 100% over, it’s over enough to relax a bit. And even though I’ve been flying my butt off, I do have a nice quiet evening to myself.

And I know — I’m way overdue for a blog post.