The Silence is Broken

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Why I haven’t written a blog entry in over a week.

My last blog entry was dated 12/22. It’s now 1/4. Where have I been?

First of all, you need to understand that I do my blogging in the morning, while having breakfast with my bird. I’m normally awake sometime before 4:30 AM and, while Mike continues to sleep and then gets up to do his morning thing, I’m downstairs at the kitchen table with my PowerBook, typing away. Like this morning. Alex the Bird has his breakfast and is eating quietly, dropping scrambled eggs all over the floor by his cage. In a while, Jack the Dog will come by to clean it up. Meanwhile, I just type away.

Trouble is, I don’t always finish before Mike comes down for breakfast. That means I’m still typing away while he’s sitting across the table from me. And he doesn’t like that. He wants my full attention.

He deserves most of my attention. (I don’t think too many people deserve all of it; there’s really not enough to spend on any one person.) So I’ve stopped blogging in the morning. And since I don’t do it then, I don’t do it at all.

I’m not too happy about that. You see, I like writing these blog entries. It gives me a chance to write what’s on my mind and what’s going on in my life. It’s like a diary that just happens to be public. It’s not the public part that I like so much. It’s the discipline of writing on a schedule, of regularly documenting things that are part of me. The benefit: looking back over these pages, I have a record of what’s been going on in my life.

So this morning, I’m at it again. It’s 5:15 AM and Alex the Bird is asking me if I want to go upside-down. (He’s also calling me a goober and asking if I’m a duck.) Mike is upstairs doing his morning thing. Jack the Dog is somewhere, avoiding being turned out in the rain. Life goes on.

Dining Out Can Be Stressful

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We try to enjoy a dinner out but are foiled by bad service.

My friends John and Lorna, who spend their summers in Maine and winters in Arizona, were extremely helpful today. So helpful, in fact, that I wanted to buy them dinner.

We decided to go to a local restaurant called Sangini’s. I happen to be very fond of Sangini’s pizza. They make a thick crust pizza and the crust is good. Other pizza places in town make thin crust pizza. That’s fine, if you like thin crust. I don’t.

John and Lorna like Sangini’s Hawaiian pizza. For those of you unfamiliar with this culinary delight, it’s pizza with ham and pineapple on it. Yes, I did say pineapple. I haven’t tried it yet. I’m afraid to. Where I’m from, the words pineapple and pizza are never used in the same sentence, let alone put together on a menu or in your mouth. Hawaiian pizza is a west coast thing.

Anyway, we all met in Sangini’s at 6 pm. The main dining room had a few people in it and, as we waited to eat, it filled up. Business was pretty good for a Wednesday night.

I examined the menu. I usually eat pizza or perhaps a calzone. But I decided to try something different. I wanted to think of Sangini’s as something other than a pizza place. The only way I could do that was to order something other than pizza — and like it. I decided on the chicken scaloppine.

Trouble started when Mike, my significant other, asked for vinegar and oil on his salad. The waitress, who was probably about 19 years old, looked at him as if she hadn’t heard him correctly.

“What did you want on your salad?” she asked.

“Vinegar and oil.”

“I don’t think we have that,” she said.

“I’m sure you do,” Mike replied.

She went away looking doubtful.

The whole thing reminded me about a breakfast we’d had in a small town restaurant one day. Mike says the restaurant was in Wickenburg, but I don’t remember it that way. Anyway, blueberry pancakes were on the menu. Mike asked the waitress, who was probably still in high school, how they were. “Very good,” she replied. “The blueberries are fresh. We just opened the can today.”

(To those of you who don’t get it, fresh blueberries don’t come in a can.)

Oddly enough, I had just told that story to John and Lorna earlier in the day. I repeated the punchline: “The blueberries are fresh. We just opened the can today.” Then our conversation turned to young people who grew up in Wickenburg and had no idea of anything other than what they saw in town. And how limited that was. And then about young people in general. We were sounding like a bunch of old folks, which is very discouraging when you’re still well under 55.

The waitress came back. “We have balsamic vinegar,” she reported.

“That’s fine,” Mike replied.

When she returned with the salads, mine came with bleu cheese dressing, as requested. Mike’s came with a little plastic container filled with what looked like balsamic vinegar. There was no oil. But before he could ask, the waitress disappeared. She then somehow imagined to avoid making eye contact for the next five minutes. Finally, Mike got up and went to the kitchen. He came back a moment later to tell us how crazy he was. He’d asked for olive oil to go with his vinegar and they’d told him they didn’t have any.

Now this pissed me off. I’d read the menu and I distinctly remember reading a description that included olive oil. Virgin olive oil, if I remember correctly. So either they were lying about not having any olive oil or the menu was misrepresenting one of the dishes.

Mike poked at his salad, but didn’t eat much of it.

Then came the very long wait. I’d say that we waited for at least 45 minutes from the time we placed our order until the time the food finally appeared. Meanwhile, the restaurant filled up and just about everyone else was fed. Some people who came in after us got their checks. We couldn’t decide whether we’d been blacklisted because Mike had asked for vinegar and oil or whether ordering something other than pizza was a mistake.

The food came. It was interesting. Although mine was good and it met the description of what I’d ordered, it wasn’t what I expected. Still, it was good. And although the plate was cold, the food was hot. So I was happy.

Mike’s on the other hand, was nothing like any of us expected. He’d ordered sole parmesan. What came was some fried fish filets with the same lemon sauce that was on my dish, along with some grated parmesan cheese. Parmesan — at least the parmesan I know from being half Italian and from New York — means the meat or fish is covered with a tomato-based sauce, melted mozzarella cheese, and a sprinkle of parmesan. Still, it must have tasted okay because he ate it all.

John and Lorna had Hawaiian pizza. They were happy.

We waited a long time to get the check. And then, once we had the check, the waitress neglected to come by to take my credit card. Finally, Mike, John, and Lorna got tired of waiting. They left and I went to the cash register to pay.

I looked for the owner in the bar on my way out. The place was surprisingly full of young people. In fact, I think everyone in town between the ages of 21 and 28 were in that bar. There may have been some imports, too. I didn’t even know we had that many young people in town. But the owner wasn’t among them.

It’s hard to get good help in Wickenburg. The labor force simply isn’t very good. Mature, was the way someone I know put it. The young people have no work ethic, no experience, and a poor attitude. The older people don’t really need the job so they’re not reliable. Employee problems are what drove me out of the airport fuel business back in April. Employee problems have hurt quite a few local businesses. They certainly didn’t help Sangini’s today.

The way I see it, dinner out is made up of four components: atmosphere, service, food quality, and value for your money. Once you’ve lowered your standards enough to deal with the limited choices in a small town, you don’t mind going out to eat in a place that’s only going to score high on three of these four components. But when a place scores poorly on two or three components, you simply can’t go there anymore.

I’ll still eat Sangini’s pizza. But until the service problem is resolved, I’ll take it to go.

And for the record, Mike and I eat at home more now than we ever did in our lives.

January 4, 2009 Update: This restaurant went out of business at least 6 months ago. A “For Sale” sign is on the building, but no seems interested in reopening it.

Anticipation

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I feel like an expectant father.

Those of you who have been following these blogs closely (I’m impressed but somewhat concerned about you) know that back at the end of June 2004 — on my birthday, to be exact — I placed an order for a brand new Robinson R44 Raven II helicopter.

The great thing about ordering a helicopter from the factory is that it’ll be exactly what you want when it arrives. You get your choice of everything: exterior color (red), interior (beige leather), type of windows (bubble observation), instruments (vertical compass, artificial horizon w/slip-skid indicator, digital clock), avionics (Garmin 420 GPS, Garmin 330 Mode S Transponder), cockpit cover (yes), fire extinguisher (yes), Bose headsets (yes) — well, you get the idea. Heck, you can even pick your own N-number (N630ML). You load it up the way you want it and the helicopter sales guy does some fancy calculations to tell you that it’ll only cost a small fortune (rather than a large one). You sign on the dotted line, give them a check for $25K, and you wait.

And wait.

And wait.

You see, Robinson is the top-selling helicopter manufacturer in the world. Robinson, in fact, makes more helicopters than all the other helicopter manufacturers combined. It has a factory in Torrance, CA that was recently almost doubled in size just to handle the volume. But despite this increase in capacity, there is still a five to seven month wait for a helicopter from the moment it is ordered to the moment it is ready for delivery at the factory.

A few weeks after placing my order, I was given an estimated delivery date of mid-December. At first, I thought that was great. Then, as December got closer and I realized that some property I needed to sell probably wouldn’t sell in time, I went into panic mode. Where would the money come from? I had already arranged for a loan, but I didn’t want to borrow any more than I absolutely had to. I hate being in debt. My goal was to keep my monthly loan payments about the same as they were for the R22.

I sold the R22 in October and delivered it to its new owner on November 1. I got almost as much as I wanted for it. I took the offer because I didn’t want to be stressed out worrying about selling it. It’s a good thing I sold it when I did. The other day, I got a letter in the mail from Robinson stating that all main rotor blades of a certain series (the series installed on Three-Niner-Lima) were being recalled. The blades had to be replaced by June 30, 2005. The cost of this recall: approximately $25K. Ouch. I feel really bad for the new owner; the one reason he hesitated to buy the helicopter was because there was only five years left on the blades. Now there’s only six months. But although I’m sure he’ll be very unhappy about the situation with his new helicopter, I also think he can afford an expense like that more than I can. Heck, he paid cash for the darn thing. Didn’t even need a loan!

The bad part about selling Three-Niner-Lima is that I haven’t flown since November 1. But I cover that frustration in another blog entry.

About two weeks ago, I was given a revised delivery date of January 7. (Robinson is closed for a week for the Christmas holiday.) But last Tuesday, Tristan called to tell me he saw my helicopter flying at the factory. A few frantic calls later got me the information that there was a lot of test flying and inspecting to do and that the January 7 date was still the safe date. Lots of apologies from my helicopter sales guy. But apologies don’t fly.

Still, I had high hopes of being able to pick it up before the factory closed for the holiday. All I had to do was get the insurance and money in place.

So that’s how I spent the last five business days. Wiring money to the insurance company, giving them an insurance effective date that would satisfy the lender. Signing loan papers and FedExing them to the lender. Wiring my own money, scraped together after jumping a few financial hurdles, to the helicopter dealer. Faxing ferry qualification forms to Robinson and my helicopter dealer. Getting and receiving phone calls. Trying to understand how things would flow. Trying to coordinate, like an orchestra conductor, the actions of people all over the country — and beyond.

Today is the day. It’s Wednesday, the day before the last day the factory is open before the Christmas holiday. Today’s the day I could get the phone call that says: Your helicopter is ready. Can you come pick it up tomorrow?

I’m ready to go get it. I’ll hitch a ride down to Sky Harbor with Mike and we’ll hop on a Southwest flight to LAX. Robinson will send a helicopter to LAX to pick us up and take us to the factory. Then we’ll look things over, sign some papers, and take off. Two and a half hours later, we’ll be in Wickenburg. With luck, we’ll get home in time for dinner.

That’s my fantasy, anyway. Reality may differ. For example, the phone might not ring today. Or the weather tomorrow might be so bad that visibility makes it impossible to fly away from the factory. Or we might not be able to hop on a flight to LAX at all. (We do have plan B, which calls for some friends of ours to fly us to Torrance in their Mooney.)

Meanwhile, I can’t think of anything else. Work is impossible. I’m mentally pacing, rubbing my hands together, looking at a clock. Like a soon-to-be father in a waiting room. (Yes, I know fathers wait in the delivery room these days, but I don’t think Robinson would let me camp out on the ramp near the factory door.)

And it doesn’t feel at all like Christmas.

What will happen? Stay tuned to this blog and see.

Writing about Tiger

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I begin work on my Mac OS X book revision.

I started working on my Tiger book this week.

So far, I have three of the 21 chapters done. I skipped Chapter 1, which is about installation and configuration. I always do that one last. Instead, I dove right into the Finder chapters: Finder Basics, File Management, Advanced Finder Techniques.

I added some new information to the File Management chapter about a new and undocumented feature called burnable folders. This was a challenge. Although I could figure out how to use this feature and write sufficiently about it, there wasn’t a single mention of it anywhere in online help or Apple’s Tiger Web pages.

What burns me up about this is that although I couldn’t find any official documentation about the feature, there was an article, with screen shots, on someone else’s Web site. Why does that burn me up? Because I had to sign a nondisclosure and swear up and down that I wouldn’t share anything about Tiger — especially screen shots — with anyone until the software was released. Technically, if my husband looks over my shoulder while I’m writing, I’d be in violation of this agreement. So that prevents me from giving my readers a sneak preview of the software and getting them all fired up for what’s to come. Yet someone else can publish articles on the Web, for the world to see, without getting in trouble. Does that sound fair?

Anyway, about burnable folders, to make matters worse, since I’m working with pre-release software, the feature isn’t perfected yet and is a bit buggy. Or perhaps it just set up conflicts with my screen shot software. In any case, my eMac was acting up and had to be restarted periodically. So it took me the better part of an afternoon to write two new pages and rewrite two others.

The Advanced Finder Techniques chapter was completely reworked. I pulled a lot of material out of this chapter to make a new chapter (Chapter 6) about customizing the Finder. This required complete renumbering of all figures throughout the chapter. A tedious task, but someone has to do it.

Next week, I continue writing with a brand new chapter about Apple’s new Spotlight and Smart Folders features. I hope to be able to knock that one off in two days.

If It Ain’t Broke…

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I relearn something I’ve been telling people for years.

My production Mac, a dual processor G5, started acting up yesterday. It decided, out of the blue, that it would either restart or shut down whenever it felt like it. It seemed particularly fond of doing this right after I’d revised a page of my manuscript but before I’d saved that page to disk. At least that’s how it seemed. It got to the point that I stopped using it. I’d just let it run and start up programs, one-by-one, to see which of them would trigger the problem.

But I think I caused (and then resolved) this problem. I’d been playing with Nicecast (covered elsewhere in these blogs) and had discovered, by looking at the Console log, that some piece of software was unsuccessfully searching for a piece of hardware, in the background, while I worked. It wrote an entry to the log file once per second. That couldn’t be good. It must be using processor power. So I had to make it stop.

I began my witch hunt with a few messages to programming types like Dave Mark (author of a great C book) and the makers of Nicecast. They are obviously better with Google than I am, because they both came up with a Web page that pointed to my problem: a Canon scanner driver. It seems that when you install the driver for the LiDE scanner, two drivers are installed. One driver runs the scanner. The other driver spends all its time looking for a scanner that isn’t attached. Now what rocket scientist at Canon thought that up? So I attempted to delete the drivers, just to see if I could get the log messages to go away.

That’s where I screwed up. I somehow managed to drag a driver from its folder without disabling it. Every time I tried to drag it to the trash, I got a message saying that it couldn’t be dragged to the trash because it was open. I tried restarting my Mac. I tried renaming the file. The damn file couldn’t be deleted. In the old days of Mac computing, you’d occasionally get a folder like that. We called them “folders from hell.” This was a file from hell.

Eventually, I gave up and went back to work. And that’s when the computer started acting up. The first time it shut down, I’d stepped away from my desk to retrieve something from the printer. I thought I’d somehow used the shut down command. I mean, who expects their computer to just shut down by itself? But when it started doing it while I was working, I suspected a problem. It was a windy day and I thought that maybe the wind was causing power problems. Although the computer is attached to a UPS to prevent power problems from shutting it down, I thought the UPS might be dead. They don’t live forever, you know. Of course, nothing else was shutting down and not everything in my office is attached to a UPS.

After fiddling around with the UPS for a while, I started to suspect a hardware problem. Not what I needed. The G5 is less than two years old. None of my other Macs have had serious problems, and I’ve owned at least ten of them since 1989.

Then I started thinking about that file from hell. Perhaps it was triggering something really nasty in my computer, something that would bring everything down. I became determined to get rid of it.

I tried starting the computer with the Mac OS X 10.3 Panther install disc. I used Disk Utility to repair the disk (no problems) and permissions. Of course, there’s no access to the Finder when you start from that disc, so I couldn’t just drag the nasty file to the trash. When I restarted from my hard disk, the file still couldn’t be trashed. So I opened Activity Monitor, found the file’s process, and terminated it. Then I dragged it to the trash, emptied the trash, and restarted.

The computer behaved itself after that. I’d like to think that that was the problem and that I’d solved it.

So let’s review this: I find an error message in my Console log, which I really shouldn’t be looking at in the first place. I act on what I’ve seen and cause a problem that causes spurious restarting. I lose about three hours of work time causing and then resolving the problem. And now I can’t use my scanner until I reinstall the driver(s). The moral of this story: don’t look in the Console log. Or, better yet, the golden rule of computing: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.