When Warren Ellis isn’t spouting paranoid, perhaps drug-induced, fantasies of cyborg-monkey rape gangs, he’s actually remarkably clear-eyed. His comments on the religious overtones of the Singularity are spot on. And I agree with him on Mars. But what do you expect of an atheist with a moon base?
Bruce Schneier spends some time talking about the fairly obvious dangers of the You’ve Been Left Behind web site. I assume these guys are crooks who are promising to “send documents by the email” to those left behind by the Rapture, but really are planning to pocket the subscription fees (or raid the assets of) the gullible.
“The gullible” sounds like I’m picking on people for believing in the Rapture, but I’m not particularly. I’m picking on them for poor asset management.
Think it through. Even if you believe the Rapture is immanent, isn’t it kind of presumptuous to decide you’re going and someone else is staying? That’s going to be a fun moment when Mom gets that “sorry you didn’t make the cut, but here’s my savings account” e-mail. It’ll be especially interesting if you didn’t make the cut either, and you have to race her to it.
If you think the Rapture is upon us and you have word from on high that your reservation is confirmed, hand deliver your assets.
I spent some time this weekend keeping IFR current with Mark Zorn on Saturday and then having lunch Sunday with our respective sweet babies.
Saturday was a good day for IFR procedures. We shot the ILS into Chino and then did the hold on the missed in VFR conditions. The place was fairly packed with people up doing the same sort of thing, but we were able to get our stuff done. The only real downside for the day was that I managed to wind up way high on the ILS and chasing the glideslope from above. Not good procedures, but an interesting control challenge for training.
We broke for lunch at Maniac Mike’s Cafe at Upland’s Cable Airport. The cafe is a fun place to hang out, with good inexpensive food. Mark and I talked airplanes and flying all lunch and then stopped off to see 8-10 Ford Model A’s that were parked off the ramp. Apparently the local Model A club was having a get-together. I’ve seen these guys before at Camarillo, but it’s always neat to see the beautiful restorations. We also ran into this plane on the ramp. Just what the world needs: a flying boat produced by an Italian motorcycle company.
After lunch at Mike’s we shot the VOR-A back into SMO, and Mark got to see some of the excitement that is daily operations at my home field. A 360 on final to squeeze a departure out is surprising to some people, but I like the fact that there’s never a dull moment.
Sunday morning we were hoping to go up to Santa Maria for lunch with our SO’s, but the weather was somewhat uncooperative. Low ceilings in the morning and forecast high winds in the afternoon kept us closer to home. Off to Chino again for food at Flo’s Airport Cafe.
Flo’s has good food and Chino’s airport ambiance is tough to beat. I finally got to see Mark’s new Bonanza – which is gorgeous – and the pilots at Chino kept me entertained. While we were there we saw a flight of Texans, an old bomber (I think it was a B-25), and a couple one- or two-seat jets go out. Another fun day. Brenda took some pictures and I’ll put some up here when I see them.