Bob_Church

And you can never beat the food. Always thought the portion sizes were a little small. Little cracker and a sip of wine if you are lucky. You have to experience a Methodist or Baptist feast to believe it. The spread at Leon Wv when I'd jump for their Ultralight Weekends was close, but nothing quite matches a Methodist pot luck.

Two minutes on CNN and other so called news sites and I can predict almost exactly what you might post here That's nothing. When the OU Skydiving Club was going I'd give students a ride to the DZ, about 60 miles away. At every town we went by we'd pick up another radio channel but this one young woman could tell us what song would be playing as we went by based on the time of day and channel. And she was almost always right. The same girl was trying to make a halloween costume of Cat Woman. Halloween is a big thing in Athens. She told me that she was using vinyl but it kept ripping. It was one of those times when you think "I hope I didn't groan out loud just then"

Uber fatalities so far Careers of actual taxi drives next People who made money driving for Uber I wonder how fervent all the arguments from Uber drivers defending scabbing Taxi drivers out of a job are now?

Yeah I mean what the fuck. If you feel something happened but aren't sure what, stop anyway and find out. I've driven through places where if I hit someone I would immediately call 911 while driving to the nearest police station. I would not stop. And I'm not a small woman named Tran.

And you can never beat the food.

(yeah, I know you wanted to jump there anyway) That was one of the things I really like about it, it worked out well for everyone. Harry the pilot even gave me a break on the fee, $75 total. That's ferry to and from Vinton County / Albany Airport and two jumpers. Not bad at all.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/27/owls-of-laughter-as-winged-ring-bearer-attacks-best-man Have an owl fly I into your wedding and drop off the ring. What could possibly go wrong?

The marked off target was small but surrounded by acres of outs.

I'll bite, what am I missing?g Oh wait, is it a Rick Roll thing? Bob

I'll bite, what am I missing?

Since religion is being tossed around in here I thought I'd throw this in. Of if you'd prefer look at it as a community thing. My favorite jump in many years was a demo into a Bible School event a few years back. When we moved out here from Athens I noticed this Church on the way. It sits up on a hill surrounded by fields and I knew I just had to jump there. Somehow. Then one year there were signs all over the place about the upcoming Bible School and the theme this year was Flight. This was it. A friend that I worked with is an Elder there and we have lunch about once a week so I asked him about it. I was surprised at how little interest he showed. Oh well. Then as we were leaving he said "do you always have to jump at that airport?" He thought I was talking about bussing all the kids out there to watch me jump then back to the Church. When I told him that we (Scott and I) would jump at the Church he got a lot more excited about it. So here's where it gets really interesting, I think. They had a new youth pastor and this was his first year, and going by his age I suspect it might be his first job. He really wanted to do a great job with this event, it being his first and all and got to work finding something Flight related. His first try was for a hot air balloon. It turned out that even if he could afford it, (did I mention that he had a very limited budget?) they explained that you just couldn't do those things with a balloon. Ok, so then he called the outfit up at Lancaster airport that gives lessons in and rents helicopters. After they got the misconceptions worked out, no they weren't trying to sell him a helicopter, that's really what it costs to rent one for an afternoon, he knew he was whipped. He was out of ideas and he just didn't have anyway to make this particular event special. Joe didn't know any of this at the time but he said that when he got to the guy's office he was leaning back in his chair looking pretty low. dejected and his feet weren't even touching the floor. Hey, even youth pastors are human. He sort of muttered hello to Joe who then said "a friend of mine was wondering if you'd like for him and a buddy of his to skydive into your event. It wouldn't cost you anything." Joe said he somehow went instantly from leaning back dejected to standing in front of him with a huge smile. And it went perfectly. This guy was a ball of energy and a few weeks later when the time arrived he'd marked off a big square where he wanted us to land. He had each child put their name on a paper plate and these were laid in that area. Scott and I would land on one each and those two would get prizes. And they were nice ones, big electronic stuff that I wanted. And the weather, the big spoiler in the sky, literally couldn't have been better, liquid blue sky with just a few puffy white clouds to give it that 3-D look and a six mile wind in the perfect direction. My biggest problem was resisting the urge to land on the inflated sliding board. And here's the funniest part. Scott and I had just stepped out of an aircraft at 5k, went into freefall, flew around under our.. well, you all know. And yet Scott and I together weren't pumping half the adrenaline of this guy. Like I said, you can see it as a Church event or a community support thing but it was a really good feeling to help out, and all out of the blue.

And some of those weapons are really damn cool! And the girls aren't bad either. Girls??? I don't think Bob is going to the same video website we are. Probably wonders why all the videos end with the girl taking off her clothing and and they never fix the TV. Hmm I have not found that website. Not been looking for.that I guess.... This was network tv. I haven't had the nerve to search for any videos on the internet in a long long time. That might be an interesting game, try to find a google search term that *doesn't* bring up weird porn.

Yeah I watched it and I agree that the Uber car and Uber safety driver bear no responsibility in her death. That said, if this happened during the day, and you watched her on video cross into the 1st lane then enter the cars lane and get hit, would you not wonder why the car didn't even slow down when the woman entered the 1st lane? Because from what Bill V and I are saying, the car's LIDAR sensor was not affected by the dark, so it should have had given the car some warning that something was coming. In Michigan, we have to worry about deer crossing the road, or in the road. I want my autonomous car to (when it is practical and safe) to slow down if deer are heading into the road, not just smash into them like they are not even there. So the way things are at present, I am saying I want a Google Car not an Uber Car. It would be nice to get a video of what the car was seeing and when. When would she have moved into the field of view and how far out does it work, that sort of thing. And how much time does it take working things out. Ever since reading my first AI book many years ago I can't help but trying to analyze things when I'm standing at a corner or something. What would a computer have to scan in and how could it parse it enough to make sense of the situation. It is, to put it mildly, a lot.

I see the analogy a bit differently: In my analogy the parachutist was wearing an aad and had it turned on. Sure he didn't pull his handles, and yes he impacted on a 500ft hill, so the aad would not have saved him, but it still should have fired. Ok. And you did watch the video? If so, then we're just seeing the same thing but taking away a very different impression. Which is cool. Personally I don't see any way a machine moving at that speed had time to vary its course or speed enough to save the woman from herself. But that's just my impression.

I'm with you on that. Not a chance. The would be a dead person any way you cut it. The LA Times Article reminds me of when someone goes in. The guy had no aad and no handles pulled, no action taken. He just screwed around, lost track and impacted.It happens. "Cause of death: Neither parachute opened."

cc But watching the video makes me think that that was a no win situation for the pedestrian. If the driver had been wide awake driving a non-tech car and wired on bennies I still can't see any way to miss her. The article makes it sound like the car didn't take possible steps that might have prevented the fatality but I'm not seeing any.

I disagree. They mentioned all the relevant information: the woman was crossing mid-street (jaywalking) and came out of the shadows and the car never slowed down. They wonder with the all the sophisticated sensors on the car why it didn't react. I wondered that too in a post a few up from yours. I still wonder. They are demanding the car's sensors live up to the promise to be better than a human. I do think a mention of the limited about of time between when the pedestrian came into the lane and when the car hit them would have been appropriate, and the use of the word "glaring" may be too much, but as this is an opinion piece, I think that is allowed. Starting the whole thing wth "plowed into" seems like a harsh start. Again, imagine if this was the only thing you read or saw about the incident.

This is part of an editorial from The LA Times that ran in our local paper today. This is something that the photojournalism school would use as an example of blatantly biased reporting. Imagine if this was the only information you had about that incident. They make it sound like the car jumped the curb and went looking for blood. Someone should be ashamed of this one. From The La Times. But they still have some glaring shortcomings, a point that was underlined in tragic fashion this week. On Sunday a self-driving Uber plowed into a pedestrian walking across a road in Tempe, Arizona, killing her. A video of the incident released Wednesday shows that the woman was crossing mid-street in the dark. The car didn't slow down, according to reports. There was no braking or swerving. There was no attempt by the vehicle or the back-up operator (who had been looking away from the windshield) to avoid crashing into the woman. This is the kind of situation in which an autonomous car is supposed to perform better than a human driver. The radar and sensors these vehicles rely on are designed to pick up what the human eye may miss in the shadows. That didn't happen Sunday in Tempe. Federal authorities are investigating the collision."

Another one that I've been waiting for is "The Death of Stalin," though it's not one that I'd necessarily need to see in a theater. It's a comedy about Stalin's death. How can it lose?

Personally I vote to keep it. Russia, like the US, is a huge country with a lot more aspects to it than Putin just like there's a lot more to the US than Trump. Most if not all of the people involved in this heroic deed are dead but the memory should live on. Someday Putin and Trump will be dead and gone. All of the complaints that people are citing as reasons to reject the monument will be gone with them. The memory of the people who helped defeat the Nazis should not be gone.

A town in North Carolina is offered a monument commemorating and thanking them and the US for help in WWII. Specifically for supplying military versions of the PBY Catalina and training flight crews. The previous city administration voted to keep it but since then a lot were replaced in the city's election and the new members are leaning against. One thing I've already done is order the book they mention about Project Zebra. I just copy and past the info into an email to our local bookstore. So what do you think, keep the million dollar gift or tell them where to shove it? If they don't want it I'll take it. https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2018/03/25/596148097/north-carolina-town-accepts-then-spurns-russian-gift

I think all students should learn CPR. But it has jack shit to do with this. It's just a cheap shot by Santorum.

Thanks, Bob

This is a longshot but do any of you know the jumpers doing this demo? "Ballintogher Community Sky Dive for Pieta House" in Ireland. What I'm really trying to get is info about a photograph and there's very little out there. It's the photo that this charity was named for. Normally if you want to get a handle on how much a piece of Art is worth you look for other sales but once Benetton bought the rights it was no longer available so there's not much to go on. I'd like to find out how Benetton handles people wanting to display a copy of the photo and what I'm really interested in is its value if one were for sale, which of course would be influenced by that availability, at least a little. https://www.npr.org/sections/pictureshow/2011/12/01/142998189/the-photo-that-changed-the-face-of-aids Edit, after Therese won the contest in Paris that brought it to their attention Benetton acquired the rights to it from her with the agreement that the image couldn't be sold. I have no idea how that can be applied to something being used to sell clothes, but it seriously limits the number of prints available for sale. PS. did I mention that it's a long shot? I've been chasing this down since last century.

I don't watch many movies, but I'm looking forward to this one. Got tickets for the first showing of the movie in my area. This looks like one of those rare films that's worth going to a theater for rather than just watching at home.