Just wondering... by everyworldspinnin

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Just wondering...

POSTED BY: EVERYWORLDSPINNIN
UPDATED: Thursday, June 2, 2005 20:14
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Thursday, June 2, 2005 1:05 PM

Not much for getting into deep discussions on religion. There's rarely a common frame of reference.

As for what I do for a living: I’m a Threat Analyst for the Military.

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Qui desiderat pacem praeparet bellum.

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Thursday, June 2, 2005 1:24 PM

THESOMNAMBULIST

Zoid that's a superb story, one that I hope you'll include in your autobigraphy should you come to write it, and I sincerely hope you do :)

Y'know you're slowly adopting the features of one 'Chris in the morning' from Northern Exposure. Celebrating life both for it's failures and it's successes for they both play a part in shaping us.

Nice tale Zoid, cheers for sharing.

Ric

www.cirqus.com

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Thursday, June 2, 2005 1:50 PM

CLJOHNSTON108

Quote:
Originally posted by zoid:
I'm an air traffic controller. I sit in a tower all day trying -- to paraphrase whedonesque -- to convince pilots that they really don't wanna die on my shift.

What did you think of the movie Pushing Tin?

I was generally impressed with how the actors handled the techno-speak, and very impressed with that sequence where we get inside Cusack's head, and see how he builds a 3D representation in his mind from the 2D radar scope! That alone was worth the price of admission!

The threat to a person standing at the runway threshold in the path of an inbound 747, due to the MASSIVE downward vortices it generates, is something you wouldn't expect a screenwriter to know about, much less the general audience.

That they would make it a "test of will", so that we could see an accurate depiction of the consequences (like being caught in a horizontal tornado), REALLY impressed me!!

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"Slideshow... Boring... Losing consciousness!"
--The Tick

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Thursday, June 2, 2005 2:02 PM

CHRISTHECYNIC

Quote:
Originally posted by cljohnston108:
The threat to a person standing at the runway threshold in the path of an inbound 747, due to the MASSIVE downward vortices it generates, is something you wouldn't expect a screenwriter to know about, much less a general audience.

Flipped a taxi once.

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Thursday, June 2, 2005 4:00 PM

CLJOHNSTON108

Quote:
Originally posted by TheSomnambulist:
Is there such a thing as bad sex?..... Or am I just too keen, that I make no distinction?

"Sex is like pizza: When it's good, it's very good, and when it's bad, it's... still pretty good."
--Bill Maher

---------------

"Slideshow... Boring... Losing consciousness!"
--The Tick

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Thursday, June 2, 2005 4:03 PM

GTMAN8503

Mechanical Engineering student at Georgia Tech. I co-op at the R&D Department of CIBA Vision.

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Thursday, June 2, 2005 4:38 PM

CLJOHNSTON108

Quote:
Originally posted by Phaedra:
Oh and keep the Real Genius shout outs coming.

http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0089886/quotes

I really need to see that again!

Chris Knight: Do you mind if I name my first child after you? "Dipshit Knight" has a nice ring to it.
________________

Mitch: The weirdest thing just happened to me.
Chris Knight: Was it a dream where you were where you see yourself standing in sort of sun-god robes on a pyramid,
with a thousand naked women screaming and throwing little pickles at you?
Mitch: No...
Chris Knight: Why am I the only one who has that dream?
________________

Chris Knight: If you think that by threatening me you can get me to do what you want... Well, that's where you're right.
But - and I am only saying this because I care - there's a lot of decaffeinated brands on the market that are just as tasty as the real thing.

---------------

"Slideshow... Boring... Losing consciousness!"
--The Tick

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Thursday, June 2, 2005 4:44 PM

CHRISTHECYNIC

Jerry: When I brought you here I thought you'd become the next Einstein, and you were well on your way but then-
Chris: I got a haircut.

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Thursday, June 2, 2005 5:39 PM

JADEHAND

this exchange reminds me of a couple of people on this board.

[In the men's room]
Jordan: Are you peeing?
Mitch: Uh, I can't start.
Jordan: Because I'm here?
Mitch: I think so.
Jordan: Weird. Well I have to go.
Mitch: Me too.

Visit WWW.Marillion.Com for a better way to live

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Thursday, June 2, 2005 6:28 PM

PIZMOBEACH

... fully loaded, safety off...

Anyone see Sith? I hear it's pretty good...

Scifi movie music 24 hours a day - http://www.scifiradio.net

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Thursday, June 2, 2005 8:14 PM

ZOID

cljohnston108 asked:

Quote:
What did you think of the movie Pushing Tin?

Well, I like John Cusack. He reminds me of one of my best friends from junior high thru high school. Angelina Jolie, nuff said (and they did the right thing and got her nekkid, if only briefly). Billy Bob, not such a big fan. Good story, but it didn't have enough to do with ATC for my tastes. People in just about every walk of life get around to making a shambles of their lives. The movie was a disappointment from that standpoint.

But they did nail the "3D representation in his mind from the 2D radar scope" aspect. Dead on the money. (NB: Although it should be pointed out that the mental image is a 4-dimensional one, as I stated in my original post on this page. If I remember correctly, they even showed the visualized blips moving to follow one another in his mind's eye, before he took action and issued control instructions.) The only thing I might've added was having him imagine the pilot's workload based on vocal stress or through hesitation or misuse of words and phrases (typically, an inexperienced pilot who might be a little task saturated and/or intimidated by the situation).

I was also a little underwhelmed by the overly glib conversation he carried on with that one GOB pilot. That's a lot of excess verbiage when other customers are waiting to talk to you. While we do engage in some banter or 'slangy' speech with pilots -- it's friendly and comforting for the customer -- the busier it gets the more terse (precise) we become. There's just not that much room on a crowded frequency for shootin' the breeze. But the proper phraseology that Cusack did use was correct and seemed very natural rolling off his tongue.

I do believe that boy could be a controller, if that whole movie star thing doesn't work out...

Evaluatively,

zoid

P.S.
By the way, if you ever get caught on a routine tape review using non-standard phraseology (i.e., engaging in witty banter over an ATC frequency with your good ol' buddy the United pilot), you will get a talking-to by somebody wearing a suit. Problem is, you never know what timeframe they're gonna pull for the review; you just hope for one where you were minding your P's & Q's. If, God forbid, an aircraft you spoke to on takeoff subsequently crashes at its destination, the NTSB will pull your tape along with everyone else the pilot talked to on the doomed flight. Better hope you were being the model of phraseology then, too. And if he crashes at your location and your phraseology was less than perfect, you could be cited as a contributing factor; then you would most likely find yourself in a world of hurt.
_________________________________________________

"Sure as I know anything, I know this: I aim to misbehave." -Capt. Mal Reynolds, Serenity, a.k.a. 'the BDM'

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