An Eclectic Mind

I get to work on my second book revision of the summer.

One of the drawbacks of being a freelancer is that you spend part of your time lining up work but have very little control over when that work needs to get done. As a result, your life can be a mixture of large blocks of time off with large blocks of time working your butt off.

This summer is a perfect storm of work. Not only did I manage to get nine weeks of contracted cherry drying work in Central Washington State, but three of my books came up for revision at almost the same time.

Fortunately, cherry drying is mostly a waiting game. Although I’d like to see more rain (and, hence, more work) in the area, the waiting time can be easily turned into working time for my book projects. Once I get motivated, that is.

I spent much of July working on the biggest of those three projects and got it off my plate right after starting my last contract of the season. When it was over, I was burned out. I couldn’t start the next project until I had beta software to write about anyway, so I took five days off.

Then the software came and I took another five days off.

I am a procrastination expert. I can find anything to do other than work when there’s work to do. Yesterday, I even paid my bills — that’s something I usually put off doing. You know you’re grasping when you start using the things you don’t want to do as procrastination tools.

But today, I get back to work.

One of the tools of my trade.

While I’m not at liberty to discuss the software I’m writing about, I can say that the software revisions should make the project a bit more difficult than a straightforward revision. I’m expecting about a 25% change in the content of my book. I’m not doing layout, which is a good thing. But I do have to come up with plenty of fresh examples and hope I can get all features working properly in my limited setup here at the motel.

So I’m diving back in today and will keep myself productive by turning off Twitter and my e-mail client and my Web browser. I’ll set achievable goals for each day’s work and knock off chapters, one after the other. The book has 23 chapters. I’m here for the next 10 days. Two or three chapters a day and I’ll have the book done before I leave.

I probably won’t be blogging much while I’m on this crazed schedule. I’ve found that if I blog in the morning, it sucks away some of my best working time. (I’m a morning person.) And by afternoon, I’m too burned out from the day’s work to write any more. But we’ll see. This revision might just go better than I expect.

Summer Jobs, The Writing Life careers, freelancing, writing

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Another small space.

I spent the first seven weeks of this summer living in a 21-foot travel trailer parked in a golf course RV park. When I got a late-season contract in Wenatchee, WA, I had to move. Although the folks who hired me had no problem with me parking my camper on their orchard, there was no A/C (alternating current) power and thus, no AC (air conditioning). With temperatures reaching record highs in the area, I wasn’t about to rough it. So I moved into a motel.

I’m staying at the Inn at the River in East Wenatchee. The folks here gave me a good long-term rate, making it quite affordable. My room is small (see photo below), but has the features I need: WiFi, refrigerator, microwave, air conditioning, and a window that opens. There’s even a pool and free breakfast (which I don’t usually take advantage of). And, of course, I have the usual motel creature comforts, like a television with more channels than I can flip through.

The bed does have a bedspread, but I took it off. And yes, that’s my bicycle next to the bed. Every morning, I carry it down and then up the stairs for a 6-8 mile ride on the great biking/walking trail they have nearby.

The view sucks. I look out to the east at a pine tree, major roadway, and mall parking lot. Fortunately, the window has a generous overhang that shades it after 10 AM or so, so I can keep the curtains wide open. The window is pretty big and lets in lots of light most of the day. Part of the window opens, so I can get fresh air in, but I have to leave my room door open for cross-ventilation. The motel folks were thoughtful enough to provide a doorstop, so I can keep it open as much or little as I like.

I wish the view looked west so I could see the weather out toward my orchard. But then it would get brutally hot in the afternoon and I’d have to keep the curtains closed. This is probably better for me, especially since weather doesn’t seem to be a factor.

I have entirely too much junk in the room. That’s my fault, not the motel’s. But I keep it neat and orderly.

The motel has other, bigger and nicer rooms — including rooms with private balconies. But at the rate I’m paying, I can’t really expect to get one of them. As it is, I think I’m getting an excellent deal.

I’ll be here at least another two weeks. Then I’ll make the trip home.

And if you’re ever in the Wenatchee area and need a place to stay — long or short term — I hope you’ll give the Inn at the River a try.

Summer Jobs, Travels with Maria travel, Washington

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My helicopter, at the orchard.

Yesterday, after doing some cleanup in my camper, which is now parked at the orchard near my helicopter, I took a drive up the hillside behind the orchard. The road winds up and around, though thousands of acres of fruit trees. When I reached the tall antenna with its scary guy-wires, I spotted a trail from the main road. I parked the truck, grabbed my camera, and went for a tiny hike.

The goal was to shoot the orchard from the hillside behind it. I found a perfect spot and took this photo.

In the foreground, you can see the orchard’s upper reservoir. Farther down, beyond many cherry trees, is a smaller, algae-covered pond. There’s a parking area on the close side and you can see my trailer parked there. On the far side is a tiny, bright red speck. That’s my helicopter.

To be fair, my helicopter’s cockpit cover is on it, so it’s not fully exposed. I assume it would be a lot easier to see with the cover off. Before I relocate, I’ll pull the cover off, drive back up to this spot, and get a shot. Hopefully, it’ll be a crisper day and I’ll get up there while the light is still good.

In the close-up, you can see the taco truck that arrived not long after I left the orchard. The folks quit working at 10 AM (they start at 5 AM) because of excessive heat. It got up to 107°F in Wenatchee yesterday; I assume it got up to at least 100°F at the orchard some 1500 feet higher in elevation. The guys — mostly Mexican farm workers — were quitting for the day. The grower offers them soda pop and beer at day’s end; I assume they get lunch from the truck.

The helicopter is parked at the edge of the pond with one skid on the gently sloping embankment. A nice easy slope landing site. (And no, it won’t fall into the pond.) There’s a road between it and the shelter (dark reddish). They use the area for staging the cherries — loading them on a flatbed truck for transport up to the chillers and refrigerator truck in the main packing area. I’ll probably get some video footage of the operation later in the week for anyone who is interested. It’s amazing how much work goes into bringing cherries to market. Hard to imagine how anyone can make a profit with prices this year as low as $1/pound.

About the Photos, Flying, Summer Jobs, Travels with Maria cherry drying, helicopters, photography, Washington

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A pleasant surprise; but my book work continues.

Last week, I was very surprised to get a phone call from a grower I’d contacted back in May and June about late season drying. I’d called him several times to leave messages and managed to connect with him sometime in June. At that time, he said he was interested in hiring me for about 10 days starting at the end of July. Then nothing from him at all for weeks. I assumed he’d either changed his mind — we had a long dry spell here — or that he’d found someone else. So you can imagine my surprise when he called last week and said he’d like to sign me up for three weeks starting August 1.

Yesterday morning was overcast here in Washington. My phone rang at 6:55 AM. It was the grower. He was certain it would be raining over his orchard within an hour. Could I start that day?

I could. Technically, my other contracts in Quincy had all finished. The last one had ended the day before, although that grower was still picking. I wanted to keep myself available for him that day, but I’d go where I was needed. I was thrilled by the idea of my contract starting a week earlier.

So I suited up, grabbed my paperwork, GPS, and a book to read during downtime, and headed out to Wenatchee airport in the helicopter. I landed by the fuel pumps, topped off the tanks, and looked out toward the hills where the orchard was. No rain. I called the grower to let him know where I was. Then I grabbed the airport courtesy car, drove down to McDonalds, and grabbed some breakfast at the drive-thru. (I don’t eat much fast food, but I do like those damn bacon, egg, cheese biscuits.) By the time I got up to the airport, there was sun out toward my orchard. I checked the radar. The big cell that had worried the grower so much had drifted due south, missing his orchard by about 2 miles.

I waited while the weather cleared even more. Back at my trailer in Quincy, my computers were cued up with the software and files I needed to complete my work on Chapter 19 of my Snow Leopard book. At the Wenatchee Airport, I was completely unproductive. And a deadline clock was ticking.

When it became clear that no rain was likely fall within the next two hours, I called my grower and left him a message, telling him I was flying back to Quincy. I told him I could be back within 20 minutes if he needed me. Then I took off, overflew his orchard to get a GPS fix on it — I’d forgotten to bring my GPS when I got an orchard tour during the week — and returned to Quincy.

I spent the entire day working on Chapter 19 and watching the weather radar. My new orchard dodged the bullet (so to speak) at least five times. I can’t tell you how many times I almost suited up or called the grower. A storm cell would approach and then either go around or dissipate before reaching the orchard. This happens to me all the time. I joke with my growers that putting me on contract is better than getting cherries dried — it virtually ensures that it won’t rain on the trees.

The orchard is 86 acres in the hills. This GoogleMaps satellite image doesn’t clearly show the hilliness of the area. The two red outlines indicate the blocks of trees. There’s a small one to the southwest but most of the trees are in a series of blocks all bunched together around roads, buildings, and irrigation ponds on the sides of hills. This is not the easy rectangular blocks of uniformly sized trees I dried in Quincy. This would be more challenging. Not only would I have to come up with a dry pattern that was efficient, but I had to make sure I didn’t miss any of the blocks.

The red X in the image is where I’ll be parking the helicopter. After about seven weeks living in my trailer at the golf course, I’ll be relocating to a motel in East Wenatchee, not far from the bridge I’ll need to cross to get to the orchard. It would take roughly the same amount of time to get to the airport as it would to get to the orchard, so I decided to base the helicopter at the orchard. There was a nice, flat grassy area that would make a perfect landing zone. It was far enough away from the packing area, trees, and roads to ensure that heavy equipment wouldn’t be a threat. The grower agreed to let me park there. In fact, I think he was glad I’d have the helicopter on-site.

I’ll also be bringing my trailer up there, parking it nearby. I have to park it somewhere and I rather like the idea of using it as a base near the helicopter. On a day when rain is very possible, I can drive up there and settle into the camper for the day, getting work done on my book projects while waiting to be launched. I’ll stay warm and dry if it rains. I can be airborne within 5 minutes of the launch call. But what’s more important to me is that I won’t have to wait around in my truck, bored out of my mind, while waiting for rain to come or stop. I can be productive, listen to music, even watch DVDs from Netflix on a laptop if there’s no writing work to do. I won’t extend the camper’s beds, but I will put out the slide-out to make room. I’ll have access to a clean bathroom, refrigerator, and stove if I need it. The microwave and A/C won’t work without an electric hookup, but the solar panel on the roof should keep the batteries charged enough to power my computer(s) with an inverter.

Meanwhile, Alex the Bird and I will move into a motel in East Wenatchee. I’m really looking forward to a shower that lasts longer than 5 minutes. I got a great rate on a room at a nice place. There’s WiFi and a pool. Free breakfast, too. I’ll be there for three to four weeks.

In the meantime, today’s goal is to knock off Chapter 20 on my book. I’ll finish the remaining chapters — Chapter 25, Appendix A, and the Introduction — on Monday or Tuesday. The book is scheduled to go to the printer on Wednesday. Talk about taking it right to the wire!

Summer Jobs, The Writing Life cherry drying, helicopters, Washington, writing

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It’s supposed to be cooler with at least a slight chance of rain here.

Just compared the forecast here, in Quincy, WA:

to the weather back home, in Phoenix, AZ:

Clearly, I won’t be drying cherries anytime soon. In fact, if I could be used to cool cherries (which I can’t), I’d be in high demand.

The one thing I do miss being up here and not back in Arizona is the monsoon storms. Not only do they bring cooling rain, but the violent storms are amazing to watch. The steamy humidity that comes before and after, however, is something I don’t miss at all.

Days in My Life, Summer Jobs Arizona, Phoenix, Washington, weather

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