August 30th

We went to the airport early, and convinced Todd and Randy to join us up at Auburn for breakfast.  The visibility was listed at 10 miles, but I'd say we were struggling to see 5.

After lunch we flew back, but I'd say the visibility was even worse after we'd passed the ridge by Bald Hill.  Oh well, we knew where we were going :o)

When we got back, we left Todd and Randy working on the hangar doors, and headed home so I could finish the on call work day.

Oh, I've had a response from Faceberk about my account.  I think they're upset about me calling myself Dug.  You know the name I've been using forever, that isn't the name on my state issued ID.  I've downloaded my data and skimmed through it, and can't see anything I've done that would violate their terms of service.

Your account has been disabled

You can't use Facebook because your account, or activity on it, didn't follow our Community Standards. We have already reviewed this decision and it can't be reversed. To learn more about the reasons why we disable accounts visit the Community Standards.

August 29th

I'm on call this weekend, so after clearing out the stuff that came in overnight, I found out that Faceberk had disabled my account for some bullshit reason or another.  I made a start on the recovery process, then went to the airport for the display day.

I chatted to Ken for a bit, and he mentioned maybe looking at buying my old plane, but it hasn't been up for sale for a while.  I said I still have the buyer's phone number somewhere, but decided to check the registration - it's been sold and moved to Princeton, CA, which is sort of between Colusa and Willows - maybe I'll see it flying again if we ever get to have the Colusa fly in again.

I got the plane out, and taxied down for the display day stuff - I was the first one there, so yay.  I've had a grinding noise from one of the brakes, and I thought I'd fixed it, but getting to taxi at a faster speed, I really haven't.  After the display stuff was all done with, I taxied back to the hangar and took a look at the brakes - the pads looked the same as always, but I reckon they're shot, so I put on a spare set I had from Greg at Magni.  He'd never replaced a set, so he thought they might be bonded on or something, but they came off easily enough with an Allen wrench.  The new ones were significantly thicker, and I put everything back together and took the plane out for a little flight.  While the new brakes are bedding in they don't work well at all, but they're getting better all the time - at first they'd barely hold the thing still at 2,000rpm, but now they're holding it at 2,500rpm, so they're almost normal now.

I went home and got everything up to date with work, and jumped through the various hoops for Faceberk, but I'm actually not bothered about jettisoning it if they make this too difficult - I've been reading about people who couldn't re-enable their account, and then couldn't create a new account without changing their name or something.  I'd be interested to know what exactly has caused this.

August 23rd

It's still really smoky, but Chris said he was going to fly over from Cameron Park for lunch, so I went and met him.  Randy showed up too, but we agreed that flying for the sake of flying wasn't going to be much fun, so neither of us did.

August 22nd

Thanks to all the fires, it's really smoky here, meaning I didn't get to fly - I just pottered around the house working on things.

August 19th

I woke up stupidly early, so I started the day by updating the EAA website, then after work I had the EAA online meeting.

August 17th

There was a massive thunderstorm overnight, so we didn't get much sleep.

Proofpoint had Friday off as a company holiday, but obviously the entire support organisation couldn't be off all at once, so I got today off.

Randy wasn't working, so he came over and we worked on a wooden spacer bracket for his instrument panel.  We then went back to the airport, greased the rotor bearings on both planes, and tinkered around with the new bracket.  We then went home to make a few changes to it, then went back to the airport and installed it.

I ran the engine for a bit to test one of the brakes that had been dragging.  Everything seems to be fine now.

August 16th

I went over to the airport and worked on the plane for a while, getting the flex cable all greased and back together.  It was ridiculously hot, so I ended up heading home early without flying or anything.