Category Archives: Weird

Business, General, Law, Social Commentary, Technology and Society, Weird

Am I “Able” to Open the Exit-Row Door?

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OK, this post reminds me of a conversation I had Friday night on the flight I managed to escape to (not “from,” despite the movie) LA last night.

I’d gotten the ticket with miles, because the last-minute prices to DC were nuts, the only way to do so was to (a) go out of IAD instead of DCA and (b) fly into SNA (John Wayne Airport in Orange County) instead of LAX. Thursday, I asked American if I could change it by going same-day standby, and they said, sure, if you want to burn more miles. So I was resigned to going to Dulles, and flying into Orange County, and Patricia picking me up there, with at least a 45-minute drive each way.

Fortunately, God (or whoever controls the weather) intervened, and my flight from IAD was delayed sufficiently that I missed my connection to SNA, and managed to get reassigned to a flight that went to LAX, with no penalty.

So I’m in an exit row on the flight, and the flight attendant comes by with the usual FAA-required question: “Are you willing and able to assist in opening the door in the case of an emergency?”

I’d been asked this question before in similar situations, but this time, I realized that I couldn’t say “yes” with any honesty. Because I had never actually opened an emergency door. Sure, I’d read the instructions, but had I ever done it? No.

So I said to the flight attendant (because I can occasionally be a pain in the ass from my pedantry, and it had been a long day), “Well, sure, I’m willing, but how can I know that I’m ‘able’? I’ve never done it before.”

There was an American captain sitting next to me, dead heading, and I said, “I’d bet no one in this row, except him, has ever opened an emergency door in an aircraft, so when you ask us if we’re able, there’s no way for us to know.”

The flight attendant is now flustered, and asks if I want to be moved.

“No, I’m sort of kidding, but it’s not a useful question, despite the FAA rules. What you should be asking is if I’m willing and have sufficient strength. I am and do. But none of us know if we are able, and we all hope that we don’t have to find out.”

Administrative, Health, Social Commentary, Weird

My Close Call With The Ambulance

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Anyway, feeling much better today. Just sore left arm, like I’d been overdoing something with it yesterday. Which in a sense, I had been.

Business, Popular Culture, Science And Society, Social Commentary, Technology and Society, Weird

Sexbots

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The technology continues to improve:

Realbotix has recently fitted its Harmony models with a new “vaginal sensor”. This enables the machine to respond to tempo and pressure before producing its own response. Brick previously told us: “Now they have developed a vaginal sensor for inserts they put in to the doll, the robotic body, and now as you thrust into the sensor when you’re having sex the sensor is a reactive strip, that sends the stimuli to the brain, to tell it how deep you’re going, how hard you’re going and how hard you’re thrusting. “Now you have all of that information coming into the AI and it’s calculating and responding appropriately.”

What could possibly go wrong with that?

Business, Media Criticism, Science And Society, Technology and Society, Weird

MH370

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Five years later, the clue that all the investigators overlooked.

Interesting.

[Update a while later]

I just RTHT:

“The essential trail is the Inmarsat data,” Wattrelos said. “Either they are wrong [in their analysis] or they have been hacked.”

If the latter is the case, the ramifications are scary. Whoever took MH370 was determined, aggressive, and far more sophisticated than investigators have been willing to contemplate. They have also succeeded in fooling officials, the public, and most of the press for half a decade. That’s an uncomfortable prospect, and one that many people would prefer to ignore. But if it’s true—or even possibly true—then it’s something that needs to be dealt with expeditiously. Because that could mean whoever took MH370 is still out there…and nothing whatsoever has been done to stop them.

It is disturbing.

General, General Science, Science And Society, Weird

Ashe And Ember Update

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Remember the sister kittens we adopted just before Christmas?

Kittens

Well, we took them in for their third vaccination yesterday, and (SURPRISE), it turns out that Ember (the one on the right) is not a sister, but a brother. The other couple who adopted the other two of the litter discovered that they had one of each, which meant that we did as well, and upon inspection, yup, things are sprouting down there that were less obvious when they were six weeks old.

So we’ve been misgendering him for several weeks; hopefully it won’t give him a life-long complex.

We’ve decided not to rename him; it’s not clear that combustion byproducts of wood have a gender (though they probably do in German), but now we’ve got to get used to saying “him” instead of “her,” and “he” instead of “she.” Fortunately it’s not a long-held habit. We’re looking at him with new eyes now. It’s funny, because he’s the smallest (he was probably the runt), but he’s fearless, and loves to attack his big sister.