Tony,

Thanks for your response and the others so far. My checkride was easier
than I expected. Not because it was short or less thorough, but because I
had created scenarios in my mind of an examiner asking questions about some
fine detail that I forgot, or that I would make some stupid mistake while
flying, like forgetting to make clearing turns or something. It turned out
that once I got into it the examiner was just a regular guy, imagine that!
I had no problem with the oral or practical once I just relaxed and treated
the oral like I was having a discussion with another pilot, and the flight
like I was flying with my instructor. It really is true that the examiner
doesn't expect you to be perfect, and he actually takes the opportunity to
teach. The parts I didn't expect were having to go do touch & goes at a
large (class Charlie) airport. Luckily the cross country flight plan he had
me prepare took me near this airspace and I had all the frequencies handy.
The other thing was the "simulated" emergency landing, we were flying along
at about 2000' AGL when he pulled my throttle and informed me we had lost
power. I set my glide speed and did the usual engine failure checklist. I
had picked out a landing site and circled around it, lining up perfectly for
final at my desired airspeed. The site I had picked was a grassy field
about 100 feet wide and around 2500 feet long lined on each side by trees,
and had an uphill slope in the other direction (I was landing uphill). As I
got lower I kept waiting for the examiner to have me perform a go-around. I
got lower, and lower, and lower. Finally I said "are we going in here?"
and he said "yep, we're going in here". Now, at this point I have to make a
decision. As the pilot of this airplane I have the responsibility to decide
if it is actually safe to land, or if I am going to ignore what he is saying
and perform a go-around anyway. Luckily I didn't have to make that decision
because he then told me this was a private turf strip that he was familiar
with, and that he would help me if I needed it. I got it landed and stopped
in a fairly short distance (my home airport runway is only 2550). I taxied
uphill and used short field takeoff technique. I was surprised at how
little distance it took to get off the ground with the help of the slope,
and my main focus was trying not to drift one way or the other due to the
trees. After that he had me do the usual maneuvers and some soft field
takeoff and landings back at his home airport, and that was it.
I think if I had anything to tell other students it would be that the
checkride, like any other big, stressful event in life, turns out to be much
less of a big deal than we anticipate.

Greg M