Real Estate Photos

In mid-June, we invited two real estate agents to look at our house and discuss options for making our house stand out in the market. Several outdoor items were very clear: trim the bushes, bury the antenna wires, clean up behind the shed, pressure wash the house. One of the big labor-intensive choices was whether or not to paint the interior of the house. It was clear to me that we really didn't have a choice - the interior was in dire need of a fresh coat of paint.

For several weeks in July, Susan and I worked on the paint project. It didn't start out as smoothly as we had hoped. We bought three gallons of an off-white paint and painted the guest closet. The next morning, we were shocked at how bright white the paint turned out. We decided we needed to rethink our color choice. Back at the hardware store, we were told that they couldn't accept our two gallons of paint for return, since it was already mixed. Oh well. We bought one gallon of our new, softer choice and tried it out. This was a winner, so we bought several more gallons and got busy painting.

We started the painting in the guest bedroom and short hallway, then moved into the dining room. The dining room was a serious challenge because we first had to kill the existing green paint. We ended up putting on two coats of Killz, then two coats of paint. Next was Andrew's room, then the wide open space of the living room, and finally the kitchen and master bedroom. We touched up in the two bathrooms and called them good.

I must admit that we didn't do it all alone. We had some help from some friends. At one point, one of the agents and her husband stopped by to help paint. At another, Susan's friend from church took Andrew for about six hours so we could paint without interruption.

When we were finally finished painting what needed painting, the agents came back to take some photos for the sales page on the Internet and the flyer. I had a bad feeling about the quality and care of the shots, and my fears were realized when the agent pulled out a tiny point-and-shoot digital camera and started snapping shots willy-nilly. A week later, the shots were posted on the web site. Susan and I were taken aback by some of the photo choices. We decided that we needed to be proactive and take our own photos.

On August 24, we went to Costco and bought a Canon Rebel XSi digital SLR. I played with it for a few days, then started taking new pictures for the web page. Below is a collection of the photos I took.

Front yard

Back patio

Main living area

Kitchen

Dining room

Main living area, kitchen nook

Master bedroom

Master bathroom

Bedroom

Bathroom

Commercial Training - Day 21

Summary
Scheduled Time: 3:00PM - 5:00PM
Actual Hours Ground: 1.5
Actual Hours Flight: 0.0
Total Hours Flight: 12.3

The weather was fantastic, but it didn't matter this time. This was a ground lesson. We covered many areas during the lesson, including equipment lists, commercial regulations, and airplane systems.

Commercial Training - Day 20

Summary
Scheduled Time: 6:00PM - 8:00PM
Actual Hours Ground: 0.0
Actual Hours Flight: 0.0
Total Hours Flight: 12.3

Wow, this was unexpected. The weather has been nice all day, but the wind is gusting up to 30 knots at Paine Field. Oh well, another canceled flight.

Commercial Training - Day 19

Summary
Scheduled Time: 6:30PM - 8:30PM
Actual Hours Ground: 0.3
Actual Hours Flight: 1.1
Total Hours Flight: 12.3

Yesterday was another good day of training. The weather was once again questionable - overcast at 2,500 feet with light rain - but the flying went very well.

We started the flight by heading northwest towards Port Townsend to do some 8s on pylons. Once there, I found a tower on a hill and used it as my first pylon. Unfortunately, every potential pylon nearby was hundreds of feet lower than the tower, making for a bad pairing of pylons.

We continued to fly around a while before finding an east-west road with two intersections about the right distance apart. With these points as pylons, I was able to successfully demonstrate my ability to fly around pylons.

We then headed back to Paine Field for some more landing practice. On the way, Brian asked me to demonstrate the gear failure procedure. Although uncomfortable with pulling circuit breakers, I agreed and went through the checklist items one by one. I was able to get the gear down and locked using the emergency handle. It took 32 pumps to get the gear out and locked. Once complete, we quickly reset the circuit breaker and raised the gear.

Back at the airport, we practiced 180 degree turns to landing while aiming at the 1000 foot markers on 34L. We had the runway to ourselves, so there were no distractions. Slowly, I think I'm learning the descent characteristics of this airplane. The first attempt came up short, but it was interesting to see the affect of dumping all flaps while in ground effect - the plane floated over the runway much farther than I would ever have believed possible.

So, it looks like we'll try one more training flight, then move on to some heavy duty ground instruction in preparation for my mock oral and practical exams. If all that goes well, I'll be scheduling my real oral and practical exams within a week or so.

Commercial Training - Day 18

Summary
Scheduled Time: 6PM - 8PM
Actual Hours Ground: 0.3
Actual Hours Flight: 1.3
Total Hours Flight: 11.2

Although the weather was less than expected for a late August flight - nearly overcast and raining - the wind was light and the flight was on. Before starting, Brian asked several questions about my history - especially regarding the incident in the Commander - and we discussed lazy eights and chandelles in detail.

Once airborne, we did the basic maneuvers - power on and power off stalls and steep turns - before moving on to the commercial maneuvers. Things went better than I expected, so we quickly moved from one to the next. As we progressed, the weather conditions continued to deteriorate. By the time we finished, we could no longer see Paine Field from south Camano Island. We tuned in the runway 16R ILS and descended to a landing.

Next up was landing practice. We did a soft field landing followed by a soft filed take-off. The next time around, we did a short field landing while aiming for the 1000 foot marker. Finally, we finished with a normal landing.

Commercial Training - Day 17

Summary
Scheduled Time: 1PM - 3PM
Actual Hours Ground: 0
Actual Hours Flight: 0
Total Hours Flight: 9.9

It's been a long time since my last lesson. I had relatives in town twice, and spent a week in Florida enjoying the sunshine and fabulous beaches. I scheduled a flight with a different instructor because Mike was out of town. Unfortunately, the wind was blowing at 16 knots and there was heavy rain heading our way. We'll try again Tuesday.