Eternal because it will live in memory forever. A song can outlast the most familial memory. Some people remember their children’s names by remembering songs. Other people even name their children after a song, their favorite song. And then there are those who name their pets after songs, or even artists, they like. There are many dogs currently out there named Gaga and Swift.
Temporary?
How a piece of music is temporary varies with each style of recording. For instance, with vinyl, the process of listening is performed by dragging a diamond needle across plastic. Diamonds can cut glass. It only makes sense that the vinyl would eventually be worn down to nothing.
For cassette tapes, the tape is recorded magnetically and read magnetically. Listening involves dragging the tape over a piece of metal. Eventually the magnetic properties diminish.
In digital music, the code isn’t necessarily degradable, but the file storage is. Hard drives, USB drives, and SD cards are all made of degradable stuff. So, eventually….
The beautiful thing is, in everyone’s mind, there’re thousands of songs, right there where the music will never die.
The first qualification should be if someone is already a pilot. Having a current, up-to-date pilot’s license is a definite benefit for anyone wanting to fly a flying car. All the technics and experience will only add to the skill of a flying car pilot.
The first disqualification may seem a bit off-topic, but it’s not. As you’ll see. It has to do with visibility. Anyone who partakes of “smokeless vapors” or “vape” should be disqualified. I’m sure every reasonable individual out there will see the reasoning for excluding anyone who would willfully reduce their own circle of visibility by spraying a mist of oil into the immediate vicinity of their face. If you can’t see, you can’t fly.
Speaking of visibility, anyone who can drive a car well at night should be given good marks toward flying. Accurate eyesight in general is a benefit, though that doesn’t mean those who require eyesight correction of any kind should be excluded. On the contrary, correction of any kind should be smiled upon.
Those who consistently run red lights should not be allowed to fly. Patience will be needed for take-offs and landings in particular, though other instances will crop up, such as traffic delays and mechanical issues. The convenience of much quicker commutes will only increase the impatience of those who are already impatient. Those who run red lights already show a disregard for other people’s lives. If they’re given access to flight, they will endanger those in the air AND those down below.
The ability to identify landmarks will be a critical skill for those who fly. Granted, the flying will be lower and closer to the ground than airplanes fly, but it will still be useful to be able to find your way around by sighting down on familiar territory from an unfamiliar angle. Of course, a Global Positioning System is a wonderful asset. GPS should never be the only method for navigation.
Another exclusion regarding people’s driving habits should regard the habit of driving with lights on—in the daytime. This shows that the person driving is oblivious to how the machine they’re operating works. This sort of disconnection would be a hazard for those who fly. Anyone who flies should know how their vehicle works, how to repair it, and how to make it work better.
A good skill to have will be the knowledge of weather and how different weather patterns affect flight.
Age related reaction times will have to be taken into account. This doesn’t only mean the old. The young as well will need to be monitored, even excluded, until their reflexes are good enough for flying. If you’re one of those who can’t dodge an albatross, should you be flying a car over everyone’s head?
Knowledge of redundancy and its benefits on a marvel of engineering will be a boon for anyone wanting to fly. Redundancy will be necessary for safety features, so those who can comprehend this will have a better chance.
Mental illness restricts people from buying a gun. It should restrict them from operating a flying car also.
Anyone who can build their own should be allowed to fly it.
If someone builds their own and wants to fly it, but they have one of the disqualification traits above, they should be restricted on where they can fly it.
Lack of self-respect should be a consideration against. For instance, anyone with a PhD in Marketing will be a questionable candidate for a pilot. For another instance, anyone who eats at Del Taco, has a dubious amount of self-esteem. This could lead to other problems while flying. (See #10 above.)
Those who eat healthy will have an advantage over those who do not.
For more on flying, check out Flying Dream, the new novel.
Adam Bahn is a scientist and a pilot working on a prototype hovercar. When a militant group forces their way in the lab, seemingly intent on stealing the experimental craft, Adam steals it himself to keep them from getting it. Pursued by the militant group, he crosses the country trying to lose them. Secrets are revealed, about his former employer, about his experimental craft, and about his origins, as he flies from one point to another looking for somewhere safe. Safe places are not abundant for those who steal from the government, even if the theft was justified at the time.
Breathe new life into your conversations. Learn what 4th order communications are and how to avoid them. Learn how to communicate closer to the higher 1st order.
Have you ever sent a text message telling someone you’re sick and they sent you a thumbs-up in reply? They were operating under the 4th order of communication. They “liked” your message without realizing that they were liking the content of the message and consequently liking that you are sick. Maybe they hope you will die. If so, it’s time for some new friends. All it takes to bring that thumb-heap up to a higher order of communication is for the thumbs-up person to think before they send anything. A lot of people are in the habit of sending the reaction emojis in reply to everything without thinking about what the reaction means in the end. Do they really like it when someone else is sick? Do they really approve of the sickness? Are they the Roger Ebert or the Gene Siskel of viruses? Probably not. At times it might even be better to just write out what you mean to say. Instead of a vague yellow thumb, send a quick, “My thoughts and prayers for you. Get well soon.”
Have you ever had someone ask a nebulous question like, “What are you doing with this thing?” Perhaps the thing in question is a unicycle. The unicycle is horizontal on the floor of your warehouse apartment. You haven’t ridden your unicycle in a while so it has a thin layer of dust on it. You notice a single string of a spider’s web extending from the seat to the floor, which prompts you to be clever with your response. “I’m raising spiders.” The person who asked gives you a sour expression and says, “That has nothing to do with my question.” So you apologize and tell them you aren’t really doing anything with it since you have a two-wheeled machine in mind and that two-wheeled machine takes up more of your time than any other vehicle at this juncture in your life, though that may change if you happen to want to join the circus and pick up the skill of juggling while riding the unicycle or perhaps riding the unicycle on a high wire. The person gets really frustrated then and claims you never have a straightforward answer to a question. You might admit they’re right and then you’ll ask, “What kind of answer were you aiming for anyway?” Then they tell you they just wanted to know if they could ride it. You slap your forehead and ask, “Why didn’t you ask that in the first place?” The answer, we know, is because they were operating in a lower order of communication, weren’t they? If you want a direct answer, ask a direct question.
Have you ever received a business email and then someone in your office resends that email to everyone? Aside from making everyone on the list wonder what exactly the job description of the email resender is, there is a measure of frustration because it looks like a new email, but it’s only a repackaging. Maybe you start reading—only to find you’ve already taken in the information. This is a lower order of communication, but it’s also a resource draw. It creates inefficiency. If you’re the boss, you need to discourage the email resender from resending.
Have you ever spoken to a homeless person and they replied to your normal conversation with a siege strike of profane proportions? It’s not the words which are conveying the message here. It’s the emotion behind the delivery. The person would probably be more civil if they didn’t have so many worries and struggles and trials. Their entire catalog of possessions is currently in a pack or a cart. Their bed is generally not in a permanent structure, nor is their bathroom. All of the bottled frustrations come out whenever they try to communicate with anyone. We might not blame them for the outburst, but we can definitely learn from it. Heavy emotions don’t often let anyone convey the real message. Instead of, “$@*!,” we mean to say, “I’m hurt, I’m tired, and I’m scared.” To get to a higher order, though, may require getting through the initial outburst.
Bentonville Arkansas is the so-called “Mountain Biking Capital of the World”. Let’s check out the claim, made by some residents of the town.
What would make a place the capital of anything? Well, the capital is where the president or the governor resides. Maybe even a senator might reside in the capital, or possibly work there. But then we’d have to ask: what exack-ick-ly is the president, governor, or senator of mountain biking? I know plenty of beer-drinking fools who would claim to be the Presidential Elite of Mountain Biking, but giving yourself a title doesn’t necessarily make it fact. Calling your pet dog “Pig” doesn’t make it a pig.
Is there another kind of capital? There’s the kind of capital in which something dominates. Like how France is the cheese-eating capital of the world. Apparently they eat lots of cheese there. I haven’t personally seen any French cheese-eating festivals or competitions or even daily feasts. I’ve only heard through people who have visited, or lived there, that France is where people consume and consume and consume cheese as if they were required by law to do so.
Let’s take that second one into account. The idea that Bentonville, Arkansas has some attribute making it the dominant place where mountain biking exists.
If you have read my recent post on trail names, you’ll already know I claim some authority in the arena. Maybe I am the President Elite of Trail Names—in my own mind.
So, trail names first then. Bentonville has some good ones. There’s Thunder Dome, Victim of Gravity, Schoolhouse Rock, Conjunction Junction, Interplanet Janet, and Dragon Scales. Most of the trail names are mediocre, such as: Master Plan, and Bone Yard. And then they have a lot of lame trail names, like: Bushpush and Tech Hub Connector. Schoolhouse Rock may not even be original or clever, but it’s a refreshing new way to use the overused word ‘rock’ in a trail name.
We’ll grant Bentonville six good/great trail names. That’s not a lot.
In contrast, let’s travel north and west to British Columbia, Canada. We’ll take our bikes along and we’ll look for interesting trail names to determine which trails we ride. We’re not going to ride all of BC, since it’s bigger than Europe, so let’s just focus on Coquitlam. Coquitlam mountain bikers, or at least the people who named the mountain bike trails there, have an obsession with therapy. Some examples: Couples Therapy, Psycho Therapy, Shock Therapy, and Massage Therapy. Those are fun by themselves, but they have more great names that make you want to see what the trails are all about. They’ve got a Mama Bear and a Papa Bear. They have a localized name: Coquitlam Crunch, which I love. They have El Dingo Blanco, Four Lost Souls, Loosey Goosey, Manhandler, Shaloam, Tom Janks, Voltage, Woodburner, and The Dentist. That last one makes me clench my teeth in fear, by the way. But these aren’t even my favorite names. They also have Bullet Dodger and Misery Whip—two trail names that roll off the tongue with sheer frisson.
To sum up, good/great trail names in Coquitlam, Canada: 14; Bentonville, Arkansas: 6.
As far as trail names are concerned, Coquitlam wins twice over and then some. Now we need to look at the actual, physical trails.
We’re already traveling on our imaginary bikes, but we can at least check out some YouTube videos to get a view of the terrain. First we’ll go to Bentonville and see Dragon Scales, then we’ll go to Coquitlam and see Bullet Dodger. Be aware that Bullet Dodger is only part of the second video.
The last video is just a bonus view. It shows more trails in Canada. Now that you’ve seen three trails to make a comparison, you can be as much a part of the judgement as me. What did you think?
For some facts and stats on the trails, Bullet Dodger is around a mile, while Dragon Scales is closer to half a mile. Dragon Scales, according to Trailforks, has a berm, a jump, and a rock garden. Bullet Dodger, again according to Trailforks, has a berm, a jump, a gap jump, a bridge, a log ride, a rock garden, and a skinny. What that means on Trailforks is there is at least one of each of those things. Obvious in the video are, in most cases, multiple instances of the features listed. The steepness of the grade for each is Bullet Dodger: -34 at its steepest, and Dragon Scales: -18 at its steepest. Bullet Dodger is called a double black diamond, while Dragon Scales is called a single black diamond. Bullet Dodger’s elevation above sea level, at its highest, is 1,299. Dragon Scales hits 1,239 feet above sea level.
These comparisons aren’t perfect, but I feel they’re close enough statistically to show whether one or the other could be located in the “Mountain Biking Capital of the World”. I’m going to ignore the black diamond rating since it seems too subjective for any kind of judgement. One person’s black diamond is another’s green. For instance, Bentonville has seven total double black diamond trails. Coquitlam has eight. But if we got into the average steepness of the trails or the number of actual features on the trails we would see that Bentonville is nearly flat, while Coquitlam trails are built like bobsled racetracks. The reality of the difficulty is in the eye of the resident.
What is the point? The totals just don’t add up to let me leave the claim alone, made by someone in Bentonville, Arkansas, boasting Bentonville as the “Mountain Biking Capital of the World.” Naming your dog “Sparrow” won’t make it fly.
Lastly, in case you heard the marketing for Bentonville in which they list the total miles of trails (150+), then you might want to understand Coquitlam has about the same total (153 miles, according to Trailforks). I didn’t even mention Whistler, Canada (’til now), but they have 160+ miles of trails. So if the total miles is how it’s measured, I’m sure Whistler has the upper hand, or should we say, the dominant attribute.
The final word here is definitely undecided since it would take some serious investigation to find the Mountain Biking Capital, but it’s not likely Bentonville Arkansas.
Xenosthesia.com 