Wickenburg to Seattle: Day Three

We finish our journey with a flyby of Mt. St. Helens and a hair-raising (for me) descent to Boeing Field.

Other Articles in the
Wickenburg to Seattle Series:

Prepping for the Long Flight
My Co-Pilot
Day One (Wickenburg to Ukiah)
Day Two (Ukiah to Portland)
Day Three (Portland to Seattle)

We’d stopped in Portland so I could get some specialized cherry drying training in preparation for my summer job in Quincy, WA. I worked with Dave, who was kind enough to spend some time with us, on Sunday evening to cover some of the basics over dinner. We flew on Monday morning. I’ll go into detail about that flight — and even show off a bit of video — in another post.

When I was finished flying with Dave, Louis and I reloaded the helicopter and started north. We were on the last leg of our flight from Wickenburg to Seattle and had chosen a relatively direct route. Expected flight time was less than an hour and a half.

The day was overcast, with high clouds masking the sun. A dreary light illuminated the landscape. Although the temperatures were mild — in the 60s — it felt like winter. I didn’t take many photos. The light was just too darn ugly.

As we flew, we had clear views of Mount Hood, Mount Adams, Mount St. Helens, and Mount Rainier, four of the tall peaks of the Cascades. All were covered with thick caps of snow. The photo below shows the south side of Mount St. Helens with Mount Rainier in the background (on the left).

Mount St. Helens and Mount Ranier

Spirit LakeOur course took us quite close to Mount St. Helens. So close, in fact, that when Louis asked if I wanted to fly over Spirit Lake (see photo; Mt. Ranier is in the background), I said yes. Mount St. Helens, which was once just another beautiful snow-capped peak, had a massive eruption in 1980 that blew off its top and most of the north side of the mountain. Nearby Spirit Lake was the recipient of much of the ash and other debris that increased the water level and changed the look of the lake. The best views of the volcano are from the north, where you can see the lava flow and debris field. Since we were so close, it made sense to take a look. Here’s a shot looking back to the south from near Spirit Lake.

Mount St. Helens

By the way, if you’re ever in the area, visiting Mount St. Helens, I highly recommend taking a helicopter ride up the valley to the mountain. The views are up close and personal, much better than the photos here.

Mount RainierI punched Boeing Field (BFI) into the GPS and we got back on course. We passed far to the west of Mount Rainier, then headed inbound. Louis had done much of his training at Boeing Field, which is squeezed into a tight area north of Seattle-Tacoma International (SEA) and Renton (RNT), I so I turned all navigation and communication over to him.

In the meantime, I was getting seriously stressed about the amount of small airplane traffic around us, most of which was showing up as targets on the helicopter’s TIS system. We were flying up in “airplane land” — the same altitude small airplanes fly at when they’re trying to stay under the class Bravo airspace. This wouldn’t have been so bad if we were talking to a controller who could advise us of traffic, but we weren’t. I urged Louis to descend and he did. But it wasn’t until we were cruising at about 500 AGL that I felt comfortable again.

We landed at Boeing Field and set down near Pad 6. The mechanic who was going to be doing my helicopter’s annual inspection, Rich, came out to meet us. A while later, all of our gear was unloaded and they were wheeling Zero-Mike-Lima away. I wouldn’t be seeing or flying it for more than two weeks.

We’d completed the flight from Wickenburg to Seattle in about 13 hours of flight time. Louis was home, but I was only halfway through my travels.

Leopard Postponed — What's a Writer to Do?

It’s all about timing.

Yesterday afternoon, not long after the stock markets closed in New York, Apple put a one-paragraph announcement on its Hot News page. The announcement told the world (or whoever happened to be watching that page) that because Leopard resources had been used to finish up the iPhone, Leopard would be delayed. Instead of seeing the finished OS in June, we’ll now see it in October.

Why it Matters to Me

I took the news with mixed emotions. I had begun working hard on my Leopard Visual QuickStart Guide for Peachpit Press. The book will be the eighth or tenth (I’ve lost count) edition of my Mac OS VQS, which is one of my biggest selling titles. The book is important to me; the last edition accounted for half of my annual income for two years in a row. When that book is ready to write I drop everything — even helicopter charters — to work on it.

The most important part of it is getting it done on time. When Tiger came out in 2005 only two authors had books in stores beside the brand new software on its release date: Robin Williams and me. Both long-time Peachpit authors with reputations for churning out books that satisfy readers. If Robin’s book sold only half as well as mine — and I’m not fooling myself; it probably sold twice as well — we kicked butt. It was a great reward for hard work and grueling deadlines. But I have to say honestly that my Tiger book was one of the ones I’m most proud of.

This Time was Different

This time around, things were definitely different. The software wasn’t ready yet — that was obvious in the way certain features just didn’t work right. Lots of bugs to iron out, but few developmental releases. It was almost as if Apple’s Mac OS team was overwhelmed. This announcement from Apple explains a lot. Apparently they were overwhelmed, but not by the task at hand. They were overwhelmed by being shorthanded to tackle the task at hand.

Add to that the fact that my screenshot software of choice, Snapz Pro, “broke” in Leopard. Don’t misunderstand me; it did work and it took fine screenshots. But the shortcut key to invoke it did not work — even when I fiddled with Mac OS settings and tried other shortcut keys. So, for example, there was no way to take a screenshot of a menu.

I don’t know if you’ve ever seen a Visual QuickStart Guide, but they rely on screenshots to communicate information. The book is full of step-by-step, illustrated instructions. I estimate that my Tiger VQS has at least 2,000 screenshots in it. Some screenshots show windows, others show menus. Almost every single one is less than a full screen of information. Now think of how much fun it might be to take 2,000 screenshots with something as awkward as Grab or, worse yet, Apple’s built-in screenshot shortcut keys. And then manually edit every single screenshot in a graphics program like Photoshop. Not having Snapz Pro (or something equivalent, if something equivalent exists) was going to seriously slow down my workflow.

What was even worse for me (and all other writers, I assume) was the “secret features” Steve Jobs alluded to when he first showed off Leopard. I had no idea what they were. And no one else did either. What if those features changed the way part of Mac OS X looked? All my screenshots would have to be redone. And what if the features were big enough to warrant their own chapters? Or replaced existing features? That could mean significant reorganization of the book, with changes to all the chapter and feature references. I could be working my butt off to finish a 700+ page book, only to have to redo major parts of it.

So I was under a lot of pressure. I had the ticking clock that said the software would be out “this spring.” That meant before June 20. I knew my publisher needed 2-3 weeks to get the final files printed and turned into books. That meant I needed to be done writing and editing by the end of May. But not knowing what the future would bring, was crippling me, making it difficult and frustrating to get things done.

I was not a happy camper. So when the announcement came yesterday, it was a bit of a relief for me.

The Problem with the Postponement

There is a problem, however: timing.

I had planned to work on my Leopard book for April and May. Then comes my annual secret project (which I can’t talk about until after publication) for the month of June and a bit into July. Then my annual one-month stay at Howard Mesa to get some work done on our property and knock off a few articles for Informit and possibly try to reconstruct that mystery novel I was working on (which was lost in the great hard disk crash and backup screw-up of February 2007). Then we’d planned to take a vacation to the northwest to continue our search for a new place to live. By that time, it would be September and the helicopter business would be heating up again; I already have two charters lined up for that month. Also, around that time, I’d be ready to start work on my Word for Macintosh revision.

There was a plan B for this summer, too. It consisted of me getting a job as a pilot for someone else, flying somewhere other than Arizona. I could work on my secret project while I was away and escape Arizona’s brutal heat and get to fly someplace different. I have a very good lead on a job in St. Louis (of all places) and a few possibilities in Oregon and Washington. But nothing finalized.

Now these plans for the next six months of my life are completely up in the air. Assuming an October 1 release of Leopard — this is just a date pulled out of the air; I swear I don’t know anything and if I did I wouldn’t repeat it — I have to be finished with the book by the first week in September. So I’ll work on it in July and August. While I still have my secret project to work on in June, I don’t have anything lined up for the rest of April and the month of May.

What’s even worse about all this is that I can’t work on a VQS at Howard Mesa or at a summer job elsewhere — I need a desktop computer with a big monitor to do the layout — and I can’t take a vacation when I need to work on this book. (See above for how important it is.) So my whole summer schedule is completely screwed up.

And It’s a Money Problem, Too

And since I get paid advances when I work and I don’t have anything lined up between now and the beginning of June, I’m not going to see a payday until the end of June or July. Ouch. So my finances will be screwed up, too.

It gets even worse. If the book had a release date in June 2007 (with the original release of Leopard), I’d start seeing royalties at September 2007 month-end. But because it won’t be released until October, which is after the start of the last quarter, I won’t see royalties until March 2008 month-end. That’s a 6-month payday delay for a 4-month publication delay. Double-ouch.

But that’s what the freelance writer’s life is like: a financial roller coaster.

What to Do?

Today I’ll be making some phone calls. The goal is to pin down exact dates for all of my known projects so I can decide, once and for all, if I can get a pilot job according to Plan B. And, while I’m at it, I’ll try to pick up a small book project to work on in May. (Not likely but remotely possible.)

Then I’ll get to work doing other things that I’ve been neglecting — cleaning out the condo I want to rent, washing the helicopter, organizing my office, reserving rooms for next year’s Southwest Circle Helicopter Adventure trips.

After all, life goes on.

Crater Lake

The country’s deepest lake.

Although misnamed — it’s in a caldera, not a crater — Crater Lake in Oregon is among the most beautiful sights in the country. It also holds the honor of being the deepest, at over 1900 feet deep.

image

I visited Crater Lake for the second time in August 2005 during my 16-day road trip. Although I didn’t really have a reason to make the drive up to the lake, it wasn’t far off my path and it was certainly worth the drive. I had the ingredients of a picnic lunch with me and enjoyed it in the shade not far from the path along the caldera’s rim. Then I took a short hike around the main visitor area, which was being renovated.

I’ve been to the lake twice and both times it looked exactly the same. Crystal-clear blue water with a smooth, glassy surface, surrounded by mountains studded with tall pine trees. The water reflects the color of the sky, which always seems to be clear deep blue.

There are two islands in the lake — this one is called Wizard Island and it rises over 700 feet above the water’s surface. It was impossible, with my camera, to get a photo of the entire lake because it’s quite large — five to six miles wide. This shot came out best of the ten of so photos I took.

You can learn more about Crater Lake at the National Park Service’s Crater Lake Web site. I do recommend seeing it in person, though. It’s quite a treat and not nearly as crowded in the summer as some of the other National Parks.

Technorati Tags: , , ,