Speaking of iPods

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I’m glad I didn’t sell my old iPod; here’s why.

My new helicopter has an audio-in jack so you can plug in a portable tape player, CD player, or MP3 Player. My old helicopter also had a jack like that, but it was an aftermarket installation and didn’t play in stereo. I know that sounds like I’m being pretty picky, but it also had a tendency to drop out one of the channels on some stereo music so you didn’t hear all the instruments/vocals, even in mono. Better than nothing, I guess, but not nearly as good as real stereo.

The headsets in the helicopter’s front seats are Bose Generation X. They cost a small fortune (which is why I didn’t get four of them) and I don’t think they’re worth what they cost, but they are the best. And they are stereo.

So I have a stereo line-in jack and stereo speakers.

And a very new iPod Photo with over 2,000 songs on it.

It makes sense to use the iPod in the helicopter, right? Well, unfortunately, the iPod Photo doesn’t seem to like the helicopter. I’ll plug it in and get it playing. 5 or 7 or 11 songs later, the iPod freezes up, right in the middle of a song. Dead in the water. Won’t shut off, won’t reset, won’t work at all. The only way to bring it back to life is to plug it in at home and use one of the reset procedures. I’ve wiped it clean and reloaded the songs and music several times. The problem persists.

I think I know the reason for the problem. The iPod seems to be able to sense when something is connected to it. When I plug in that RCA jack, the iPod turns itself on. So something’s coming down the cable to the iPod, saying, “Hey, wake up!” The iPod obliges.

One of the features of the helicopter’s audio system is that it automatically cuts out audio when the radio goes on. Say I’m flying along, listening to Pink Floyd while my communications radio is tuned into the Wickenburg Unicom frequency. When someone else talks on that frequency, Pink Floyd is shut off until he’s done talking. My other helicopter worked this way, too. It’s the way I want it to work: after all, isn’t it more important to hear what’s going on around me than some music?

I always assumed that it cut out the music by just tripping some circuit. I don’t know electronics. For all I know, what I just said might be pure nonsense. The point is, I was pretty sure it didn’t cut out the music by telling the iPod to shut up.

Evidently, however, some kind of signal must be coming down that wire to the iPod. And the iPod is getting confused by it. And when it gets really confused, it just freezes up.

I gave this some thought. I realized that my old, original, 5GB iPod never seemed to know when you plugged something into it. Perhaps it would work without getting confused and freezing up.

So I charged it back up — its battery doesn’t last long off the charger these days — updated the songs, and took it for a flight. And guess what? It worked fine.

I’m glad. On long cross-country flights, it’s nice to have music. And it’s nice to not to have to resuscitate an iPod after every flight.

Clash of the Technologies

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I teach an old computer new tricks.

I have a 20th Anniversary Mac. I bought it about six months after they were released and got a pretty good deal on it. It sits on a table in my living room, a piece of functional art. It runs System 7.6 — if anyone can remember that. The cool thing about this computer — other than the fact that both a floppy disk drive and CD ROM drive are built into the monitor — is that it has a Bose sound system. It also has a stereo receiver and, somehow, my cleaning lady has learned how to tune in Mexican music while she works.

Anyway, I bought an iPod Photo a few months back so I could write about it. I really don’t need an iPod Photo, but once you have something like that, you try to come up with ways to make it useful. I thought, wouldn’t it be nice if I could attach the iPod to the Mac, play music through those Bose speakers, and show photos onscreen?

Remember, the 20th Anniversary Mac is old technology. It dates back to ADB, Serial, and SCSI ports. There wasn’t any USB or Firewire in those days. But it does have an S-Video port and a microphone-in port. So I started experimenting.

The iPod Photo’s dock includes both an S-Video port and an audio line-out port. I didn’t have an S-video cable with the multi-pin connectors on both sides. But I did remember someone saying that an ADB cable’s pins are the same configuration as an S-video cable. So I took an old keyboard cable from the office, brought it home, and used it to connect the Mac to the dock. Then I took a standard RCA-type stereo cable and connected it from the line-out port on the top of the iPod to the Mac. (When I connected that cable from the dock to the Mac, I had no volume control and I still can’t figure out why.)

I fired up the two devices and set up a slide show. The iPod’s music immediately played through the Mac’s Bose speakers. It sounded really good at any volume. But to get the video to show up, I had to fire up an application that comes with the 20th Anniversary Mac. I think it’s called Apple Video Player. It enables me to use the built-in TV tuner (which doesn’t work here on the edge of nowhere) or to take video from an external source. It recognized the iPod Photo’s signal and displayed the images onscreen as a slide show. The only drawback: I had to set monitor resolution to 640 x 480 to get it to work right.

So now, when I have company, I can entertain them with music and a slide show, playing in the background while we chat.

Needless to say, I use the 20th Anniversary Mac a bit more often now.

Tiger: The Saga Continues

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I continue work on my Tiger book.

The other day, I got a new Tiger build from Apple. I’d been waiting anxiously for it. My editor, Cliff, who’d been at the Keynote address at Macworld Expo had reported that the build Steve Jobs was using for his demo looked different from what we had. Although most authors wouldn’t mind a few appearance differences, my book has over 2,000 screenshots in it and every minor difference will affect at least one page. So after having some difficulties with Font Book and not being motivated enough to revise the Classic chapter, I put the book aside to wait for new software.

The differences, it turns out, are not major. Sure, some screenshots will change, but not many. The New Burnable Folder command has become the New Burn Folder command — that little change will force me to revise every single screenshot of the File menu. But hey, I expect stuff like that. It goes with the territory. It’s one of the drawbacks of writing about software that hasn’t been completed yet.

Interestingly, I’ll work with the software right up to the Gold Master and still get the book out on time. That’s because of the “system” Peachpit and I have for getting these books done. No other publisher works the way we do. As a result, if another book comes out on time, it’s likely based on something other than the Gold Master. That means it’ll have errors in it. But more likely, other books will be delayed and will appear on shelves a month or more after Mac OS X 10.4 has gone to the Apple Stores and is available in new computers.

Yesterday, I worked on the Applications chapter, the one where I go into some detail on how to use the applications that come with Mac OS X. We’ve decided to folk the i-Apps chapter into this one, so it’s likely to be a very long chapter. I got about 20 pages done yesterday and I hope to finish it up today. I found two surprises in the Applications folder: a brand new application that I’m looking forward to using every day and the return of an old application that disappeared when Mac OS X was first released. I’m not sure if I can talk about them — Apple is notoriously secretive about pre-release software and I don’t want to get sued — so I won’t. But I think Mac users will be pleasantly surprised (as I was) to find at least one of these new tools.

The book is over 600 pages long so I have a lot of work to do. It’s my biggest book, both in size and sales, and the one I’m proudest of. Mac OS has grown quite a bit since I first wrote about it for Mac OS 8. It has far more features and is a bit more complex than the Mac OS of the old days. The book makes the complex features simple and the simple features even simpler. It also has tons of tips and tricks for using Mac OS X.

Quartzsite 2005

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I spend a day in Quartzsite, AZ with friends.

I know I’ve mentioned Quartzsite more than a few times on these pages. I can’t remember if I explained what Quartzsite is. So I’ll explain here.

Quartzsite, you see, is more of a what than a where. Where is easy: it’s on I-10 about 20 miles east of the Colorado River/California Border. What is more difficult. It’s a town with a population that swells from a summertime low of about 1,000 people to a wintertime high of over 100,000 people. Most of those people show up in January. They show up in RVs and motor homes, they fill the campgrounds and the overflow vehicles park on the BLM land out in the desert.

Why do they come? For the swap meets, rock and art shows, and RV show. The whole town fills with vendors selling everything from dental picks to RV toilet systems. There are tools, clothes, RV equipment, blankets, custom license plate frames, hand trucks, scooters, dried fruit — you name it. All spread out in “shows” throughout the town on what are normally dirt lots. By mid-February much of this is gone. By March, most of it is gone. Any by April, Quartzsite has a ghost town appearance. Things don’t start picking up again until November or December. Talk about seasonal economies!

I’d wanted to spend a week out at Quartzsite, giving helicopter rides. But I was too late to arrange for a landing zone. Besides, when I was out there last week, flying over with Nancy and Bill, I wasn’t very impressed by the size of the crowd. It didn’t seem worth the bother.

But yesterday, when I rode into town in the back seat of John and Lorna’s pickup, I got a different picture. What a difference a week makes! Last year I’d guessed that the biggest week in Quartzsite was the week of the RV show. Yesterday confirmed it. There were at least three times as many RVs parked out in the desert as there had been the week before. I have no idea of where all these people came from, but there’s no denying they were there. In numbers.

After inching our way through traffic in town, we found a good parking space on Kuehn Street, which runs parallel to I-10 on the south side of the highway. That became our base for exploring two of the shows: The RV show, which John and Lorna were anxious to explore, and Tyson Wells, a rock and art show across the street.

Before we hit the shows, however, I scoped out a piece of land I was interested in leasing for the following year. I’d seen it from the air and it seemed like a perfect location for basing helicopter rides. It was 20 acres, but I’d only need an acre or two. There was a For Sale or Lease sign on it with a phone number. I called the number and spoke to what I assume must have been a Realtor. He promised to e-mail me information about the property.

The RV show was packed. Walking inside the huge tent, in fact, often reminded me of the old days, when I shuffled with thousands of other commuters through the Port Authority Bus Terminal to the subway escalator in New York. (Days I don’t miss one bit.) Everyone had something to sell, some line to try on you. I especially admired the cookware sales people, with their tiny stages and ten or so audience seats, repeating, over and over, the well-rehearsed lines that expounded the benefits of their products. Imagine doing that hour after hour, day after day, for ten days? I couldn’t.

It soon became apparent that, at 43 years old, I was the youngest person in the crowd. RVers in January in Quartzsite tend to be retired folks who are escaping from some cold climate. Some of these people will show up in Wickenburg for Gold Rush Days, the town’s annual attempt to capture revenue from seasonal tourists. Later, when we went to Tyson Wells and the Main Event, the average age dropped a bit and I didn’t feel like a young whippersnapper anymore.

One thing John, Lorna, and I agreed on: the prices of some of the RV equipment seemed very high. We talked about the average cost of the rigs people were towing or driving. A fifth wheel rig averaged about $75K while a Class A motor home (the kind you drive) probably averaged around $150K. These people obviously had no qualms about spending money to make themselves more comfortable. That’s probably why there were at least eight satellite television receiver booths, ten generator booths, and countless booths for electric massage devices and drug-free pain relief products.

We picked up a smoked turkey leg to bring home for Mike, then went back to the truck to drop off our purchases. I’d bought a five-pack of micro-fiber towels ($20 inside the tent; $5 outside the tent — I bought outside). John and Lorna had bags of product literature that Lorna said they’d probably never look at. Near the truck, John bought a battery-operated, bug-zapping fly swatter and threw that in the truck, too. Then it was on to Tyson Wells for lunch.

There were a bunch of food vendors at Tyson Wells. We looked around and found Smokin’ Willie’s BBQ. The Smokin’ Willies people had spent about a week at Wickenburg Airport, at my invitation, the year before. It was my lame attempt to find some kind of “restaurant” at the airport. They did well while they were there, but they had other gigs (like Quartzsite) where they could do better, so they left. They remembered me well. John, Lorna, and I ate at their booth.

We walked around Tyson Wells for a while. I bought two 16′ telescoping poles that I could use to hang flags at helicopter ride events. (I still had four red, white, and blue flags I’d bought for the airport but had not included in my asset sale.) John and Lorna bought some ocarinas to give as gifts. I inquired at a booth about an engraved key tag. I’d bought one at Quartzsite years ago for Three-Niner-Lima: a classy leather tag with an engraved metal insert. I wanted the same thing for Zero-Mike-Lima. We were directed to the Main Event, which is where I’d gotten the other one made. So we walked back to the truck, pulled out, and got back into the inching traffic to cross the highway and hit the Main Event.

The Main Event is probably the longest-running show in Quartzsite. By that, I mean it seems to be the first to start and the last to end. We got a good parking space on the east end (the parking gods must have been watching over us that day) and got out to walk. We found the engraving booth right away. The guy remembered me. He no longer made the leather/metal key tags, but he had some other designs. I picked one and requested that he engrave N630ML on it. Then I designed a license plate frame for my Honda that said “My Helicopter is Red, Too!” and paid for my purchases. While I was there, the booth guy and his wife told me that the Main Event was now owned by two different people. The show was Main Event East and Main Event West. Interesting.

We walked around the show and it soon became apparent that the split was quite serious. A big piece of land between the east and west sides had been fenced off and was vacant. This is the same land that had been crammed with vendors the year before. A fence with a gate let people into the west side. There were fewer vendors than I remember and the overall quality of what was offered was a bit lower than the usual low I’d come to expect. Many of the vendors were what I call “garage sale” booths — booths that seem to be selling junk from someone’s garage. But the cactus people were there, along with a few better quality vendors. Among these was the pelt and feather guy (as I call him) from Sedona. I took a moment to call Janet in Colorado and see if she needed any feathers. (Janet is an artist who paints on feathers.) I wound up buying two different kinds of pheasant skins for her. So I got to carry around two dead birds with me for the rest of the day.

We crossed back to the east side and walked around those vendors for a while. We bought some dried fruit and some other odds and ends. Then we went back to the engraving guy and picked up my key tag and license plate frame. Both were perfectly done. I told the engraver that he was an artist and I think that pleased him quite a bit.

We met with John and Lorna’s friends, Steve and Sandy, soon after that. They were camping in BLM land off Dome Rock Road. We chatted at the McDonald’s, eating $1 ice cream sundaes. By the time we went our separate ways, it was about 3:30 PM.

I was beat. I spend too much time sitting on my butt, so when I do a lot of walking, it really wipes me out. But we had one more thing to try to find. Ruben, at Screamers, had asked me to pick up a machete for him. He said you could find them “everywhere” in Quartzsite. I’d been looking all day and hadn’t seen a single one. So on our way out of town, we went to the show he said he’d seen them. I don’t know the name of the show, but it’s on the north side of the highway, at the east intersection with SR 95. The machete was in the first booth we walked into. $4. I bought it. Mission accomplished.

The ride home was long — Quartzsite is about 100 miles west of Wickenburg — but pleasant. For much of the ride, there was a rainbow off to our left, where heavy rain was falling over the Harcuvar Mountains. Centennial Wash would be flowing later in the day. We got back to West Park, where John and Lorna are staying, just after sunset.

It had been a good day and I’d gotten plenty of exercise. I’d need some Ibuprofen to help work out the aches and pains today.

Will [Try to] Fly for Food

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A full moon journey to Falcon Field is spoiled by restaurant operating hours.

The idea is simple. Wait until the moon is just about full, then take a sunset flight down to Falcon Field in Mesa, AZ, have dinner at Anzio’s Landing restaurant there, and fly back in the light of the full moon.

We’ve done it many times before in the R22. But now we had two extra seats. We could share the experience with friends.

John and Lorna couldn’t come. Lorna has the cold John had last week and she just wanted to rest up for the trip to Quartzsite the next day. So we asked Stan and his wife Rosemary. They said yes. The plan was to meet us at Wickenburg Airport at 5 PM. I’d left the helicopter out, so it was just a matter of a quick preflight and safety briefing before we loaded up and flew out.

At 4:45, I decided to call Anzio’s, just to make sure we could get a table. The phone rang at least eight times before a machine answered. The short story: Anzio’s was closed that night. It would be open on Sunday nights starting next weekend. Sheesh.

Time for plan B: the restaurant at Scottsdale Airport. Scottsdale is a bit closer, but I don’t particularly care to land at the airport there. For one thing, the tower controllers tend to be very cranky. I think they hate helicopters. Second, they don’t let helicopters park anywhere near the restaurant. So that meant walking a quarter mile or more. But the food at the restaurant there is relatively good and I could deal with cranky controllers. I’d done it plenty of times before. Better make sure they’re open.

The phone rang seven times before a machine answered. They close at 5 PM on Sundays.

Deer Valley and Glendale both have restaurants. But I wasn’t interested in eating at either of those, even if they were open. I wanted a nicer dining experience. Although Sedona is nicer, I wasn’t keen on crossing three mountain ranges in the dark for the return trip. So it looked as if we weren’t flying for food.

Mike called Stan and spoke to Rosemary. They decided on a local restaurant. With the possibility of a flight afterward, I decided.

So we ate at House Berlin, which is one of my favorite restaurants in town. I had the walleye, which was excellent as usual. Mike had the wiener schnitzel. (House Berlin is the only restaurant in town with veal on its menu.) Stan and Rosemary had sauerbraten and pork medallions respectively. Everything looked and tasted great. So at least the dinner portion of our evening was saved.

Afterwards, we headed out to the airport. It was dark, but not completely dark yet — we could still see lightness on the western horizon. The moon was out and nearly full (it fills out in two days), but there were a few clouds up there with it. They were light, thin clouds, the kind the moon could shine through anyway. I used a flashlight to check the fluids and we all climbed in. After starting up and warming up, I made a radio call and we took off into the night.

This was the first time I’d flown a helicopter away from Wickenburg at night. I usually fly back and that’s usually from Falcon Field. So it was extremely odd to head southeast, with the moon shining right into the cockpit. The moon reflected off the water running in the Hassayampa River, making it look like a glowing ribbon below us as we crossed. Once we left the lights of Wickenburg, I followed Grand Avenue and then Carefree Highway. The rough plan was to head out to Deer Valley. I punched it into the GPS so I could aim right for it. At night, Phoenix is a sea of lights and a GPS is a good tool to help find one set of lights among the others.

We saw Lake Pleasant to our left. The moonlight reflected off the water magnificently. We crossed over the dirt track near Pleasant Valley Airport and near the three dirt runways of that darkened field. The moon was lighting up the desert, making it possible to see some of the details of the terrain. But high clouds kept the moon from being really bright, so the experience was not as impressive as it usually is.

Seven miles out of Deer Valley, I called the tower and requested a transition down I-17 to the Loop 101 with a turn there to the west. The transition was approved — Deer Valley was dead quiet — and we agreed on an altitude. By that time, I’d entered the light zone and we were surrounded by light. Instead of the moon illuminating the cockpit, ground lights did the job. I followed my intended route as the controller talked to an inbound Bonanza pilot and a police helicopter that was probably on the south tower frequency. Then we were heading West, away from the airport. The controller approved a frequency change without me even asking. I wished him good night and continued the flight over the Loop 101.

During the whole flight, all of us were talking. Well, to be honest, it was mostly Mike and Stan. Rosemary was very quiet and, for a while, I thought she might be nervous. But the flight was smooth and I was flying about 500 feet higher than I fly in that area during the day, so we weren’t very close to the ground. Nothing to be nervous about, unless she’s just nervous flying at night. I know a lot of pilots who won’t fly at night. I don’t think that’s a good idea. Not only is it depriving the pilot of a wonderful experience, but it’s preventing the pilot from ever getting comfortable flying at night. He’ll never be able to fly at night, even if he has to, if he doesn’t get comfortable doing it.

Of course, I cheat. Most of my night flights are with a full moon providing plenty of illumination. The horizon is easy to see and there are usually at least some ground lights for reference. I’d have to have either poor vision or a bad brain to lose track of which side was up.

We left the lights after Sun City West and headed toward Wickenburg. I didn’t even have to punch it into the GPS. Grand Avenue was to our left and Carefree Highway was ahead of us. I flew over the proving grounds, where cars or trucks were driving around the track in the dark. That’s when I noticed that it wasn’t quite as clear as it had been when we left Wickenburg. The clouds had thickened up a bit and there seemed to be some haze down in the valleys. The horizon wasn’t the fine line it usually was.

After Morristown, we followed Grand Avenue back into town. I turned on the runway lights, made a call into the airport, and followed Sols Wash northwest, to avoid flying right over the houses. I was about 300 feet higher than I usually was, so my descent to runway 23 was a bit steep. But it was smooth and before long we were parked on one of the helipads and I was cooling Zero-Mike-Lima down.

We’d been out for about 40 minutes. It had been a nice flight. Stan and Rosemary really seemed to enjoy it.

I left Zero-Mike-Lima out for the night — it was cold and neither Mike nor I had brought a jacket. I’d put it away in the morning. We finished the evening with a drink and more conversation at Stan and Rosemary’s house.