September 2009

(Tim) Interesting information on patents Apple's been granted for what many think will be a new iPod video headset. Just what we need...

Ho! Every one who thirsts, come to the waters; And you who have no money come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk Without money and without cost. (Isaiah 55:1)

(Tim) Under "Save your church money...," David Ker, a Bible translator and blogger of Mozambique, commented on the lockdown the Portuguese and Brazilian Bible Societies have put in place denying Portuguese Christians access to Portuguese digital versions of God's Word.

In a blog post titled, "Illegal sources of the Portuguese Bible in digital format," he writes:

While every other major world language has multiple versions of the Bible represented online, Portuguese has not one. To paraphrase Emerson, make the Bible illegal and we all become criminals*.

The spirits of John Wycliff and Brother Andrew hover over this shameful situation compelling us to act. If the enemy forces were a state religion like the Church of England or an oppressive government like China or Iran we would think nothing of risking our lives to bring the Bible to those who can’t access it otherwise. But in this case because the bad guys have the words “Bible Society” in their name we’re supposed to sit on our thumbs...

(Tim) At times, it's helpful for customers to tell each other the good and bad of customer service. This enables us to make better decisions knowing other customers' experience. I've told the good of Apple Computer. This post is the bad about U.S. Honda.

Mary Lee and I bought a new Honda Odyssey in 2001. About 80,000 miles, the transmission started having trouble shifting. We took it to our dealer and they couldn't reproduce the problem. Once or twice again we had it in but they couldn't find any problem. Then, the transmissioin failed at 111,000. Because the warranty was over, we paid the labor. Because Honda was having a lot of problems with the transmissions on its Odysseys, they paid the parts. A few months later, they acknowledged these transmissions are bad and extended their transmission warranty to 109,000. But despite being only 2,000 miles beyond that limit and having had the car in several times prior to 109,000 with documented shifting complaints, Honda was unwilling to reimburse my labor costs.

This past weekend, Mary Lee, our daughter Michal, and Michal's one-year-old son Zion, made a quick trip to Pittsburgh to do some work cleaning up a relative's house. On the way home, 10 PM Friday night just outside Wheeling WV on I-70, the Odyssey's transmission went out once again and left Mary Lee, Michal, and one-year-old Zion on the side of the road...

by John DeWalt

Here's an introduction to John DeWalt. This is the third and final installment of a three-part series on Army helicopter school (Introduction, Part One, Part Two, and Part Three).

SOLO

The big milestone in flight school is the first solo flight. The instructor finally thinks the student can survive a few minutes without the instructor at his side to prevent fatal blunders. This generally occurs soon after the student grasps the input-out principle and stops over-controlling the aircraft. The day of the student’s first solo, he goes through an initiation ceremony: he’s flung into a swimming pool (they let you remove your wallet and watch) by all the other students. Every student has pictures of that event: the wind-up, the flight, the splash, the proud, grinning, drenched student climbing out of the pool.

GROUND SCHOOL

Half a day of classroom instruction began the first day and continued throughout flight school. But the army did a surprisingly innovative thing. It used “programmed texts.” The format of these texts was to provide a page or two of information followed by several pages of multiple-choice questions. Each question was followed by instructions. If you answered a, go back to page x of the text. If you answered b, go back to page y. If you answered c, go back to page z. If you answered d, you answered correctly: proceed to the next page.

The army didn’t have much confidence in the intelligence of its students. Each new page of information was a mere nugget, and you’d have to be a moron to give a wrong answer to the multiple-choice questions. I never had to return to a prior lesson and was able to whip through those books in no time.

Did I say that half a day of classroom instruction continued throughout flight school? It didn’t, really. After about a month, we’d still spend half a day on the flight line, but we were released to do our classroom work at home with “programmed texts,” and given credit for half a day’s work.

From that point on, I had it made. Half a day flying and fifteen minutes studying. We’d be tested every day on the previous day’s homework before being released to go home and do it again; I always got 100% on the daily quiz. Then I’d have the rest of the day to explore huge distances around Fort Wolters on my Beamer. I was having the time of my life...

by John DeWalt

Here's an introduction to John DeWalt. This is Part Two of a three-part series on Army helicopter school (Introduction, Part One, Part Two, and Part Three).

U.S. Army helicopter flight school was an absolute blast―except for the first week or two.

I was fairly well coordinated and very highly motivated to learn to fly helicopters. But for the first couple of weeks, I began to think I’d wash out of flight school, that I’d never master the basic skills, that even though thousands of others managed to learn, I’d be one of the dolts who couldn’t fly a chopper...