Saturday
There have been three Chinooks with US markings circling overhead above my house in London for quite some time now, and for a moment I thought that maybe the rapture was at hand and they were here to air lift me off to heaven... or wherever else it is that rotorheads go when they kick off for the last time.
Actually a place with large helicopters perpetually circling overhead fits my preconception of 'heaven' rather well, so maybe the world *did* end as I was certainly watching them in complete rapture.
Result!
Hello? Is there anyone else out there?
It's because Obama is coming to London next week. They are practicing
Posted by Bob at May 21, 2011 01:56 PM
Semi-related, I always chuckle when anyone uses "black helicopters" as a pejorative against conspiracy theorists as they are quite real and used to fly over where we lived a little south of here quite often (Fort Campbell is about 30 miles north of here).
Posted by Richard Thomas at May 21, 2011 03:14 PM
I've always figured that I lived in a Heavenly place Perry, as the Avon & Somerset police Chopper is almost perminently parked over my house, living on top of a hill overlooking St Pauls and the centre of Bristol, as I do. :-)
It was so bloody loud the other week with the Tesco Riots going on, I had to shut the windows cos we couldn't hear the telly.
Chinooks are a rare sight. A week before the French, British and American attacks on Libya, two flew over my house, British markings, heading north west.
Aha! I thought, off to pick up the lads up from Hereford eh? The game's afoot! And it was of course.
Posted by RAB at May 21, 2011 03:19 PM
Nope, nobody here but you. Problem is, you have some very convincing delusions.
Posted by Alsadius at May 21, 2011 05:38 PM
It may sound mundane, but pinching yourself may provide an answer.
Posted by Alisa at May 21, 2011 06:56 PM
I saw three chinooks myself today while walking my dog. You live in North London?
Posted by Jay Thomas at May 21, 2011 07:06 PM
I am shocked, SHOCKED, that my christian friends would be so unchristian as to not be generous with their car keys in order to ensure their status among the Elect... clearly they are all going to hell...
Posted by Mike Lorrey at May 21, 2011 09:28 PM
Take a number, we'll get around to you after we process the virtuous.
Posted by chuck at May 21, 2011 09:49 PM
Actually a place with large helicopters perpetually circling overhead fits my preconception of 'heaven' rather well...
That is quite possibly the strangest idea of Heaven I have ever encountered.
Almost certainly the noisiest, too.
Posted by Rich Rostrom at May 21, 2011 10:01 PM
Almost certainly the noisiest, too.
I like to feel them overhead as well as see them... and heaven's incense smells strangely like avgas :-)
Posted by Perry de Havilland at May 21, 2011 10:15 PM
Is Bob correct about Obama? Was it it these:
First to arrive was a twin-engined Beechcraft C-12U Huron communications plane, followed by four large Boeing CH-47D Chinook helicopters. Each of the Chinooks can carry more than 40 passengers and they will be used to transport some of the large party of media and security officials travelling with the president.
http://www.herald.ie/national-news/nearly-forgot-obama-next-2651611.html
So the U.S. army is helping out with security for Obama's visit? Funny, I thought we could help out Dublin with the Queen's visit by sending in the Paras. That didn't go down well.
Posted by Crosbie at May 21, 2011 10:20 PM
It's because Obama is coming to London next week. They are practicing
Yeah, it's a tricky bit of flying. You can't lift an ego that size with just two.
Posted by Eric at May 21, 2011 10:27 PM
"heaven's incense smells strangely like avgas"
I thought it was more like napalm in the morning.
Posted by Laird at May 21, 2011 10:49 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zNdMc6wGtU
"Heaven is a place where nothing every happens." - Talking Heads
Posted by Vinegar Joe at May 21, 2011 11:38 PM
AFX helicopter
Whup whup whup whup whup whup ...
Willard [voiceover]
Camden... shit; I'm still only in Camden...
Posted by Roue le Jour at May 22, 2011 02:45 AM
2.5 hours to go at time of writing, and still no Rapture where I live.
Damn... shouldn't have borrowed all that money yesterday to spend on booze and hookers. Now I'm going to have to pay it all back.
Damn Revelationists.
Posted by Kim du Toit at May 22, 2011 03:29 AM
Obama is president and Cameron is prime minister.......maybe we're already in Hell.
Posted by Vinegar Joe at May 22, 2011 01:52 PM
Women and Minorities Most Unaffected
Posted by PersonFromPorlock at May 23, 2011 12:51 AM
Hmph, heaven to me smells like triple-base propellant and burnt DF-2, preferably on a sharply cold february morning.
Posted by jsallison at May 23, 2011 02:09 AM
Well, my alarm clock went off this morning and I am off to work. No end of that world for me, at any rate.
Posted by Johnathan Pearce at May 23, 2011 08:08 AM
I didn't even click you'd be referring to the Camping gentleman until reading the later Post about World's End.
I thought that would be beneath your wisdom but perhaps I was mistaken.
You know how liars like to caricature libertarians as right wing, racist, uncaring, fascist friends of that right wing conservative capitalist Adolf Hitler.
Enjoy.
Posted by John B at May 23, 2011 01:38 PM
John, no one was caricaturing anyone here, as far as I can see. There was a simple implication that Camping's "prophecy" was silly - which it was, as much as you are free to disagree with that assessment. And, FWIW, many libertarians often say very silly things, and it's OK to point that out too.
Posted by Alisa at May 23, 2011 03:25 PM
Indeed Alisa. I think John is reading far too much into my remarks. I have practising Christian friends, not just the godless such as myself, who have also been poking fun at this strange strange man.
Posted by Perry de Havilland at May 23, 2011 03:48 PM
Zombie put it far better than I can:
To be honest one has to also has to accept that a lot goes unsaid.
But, okay. My apologies. You are above that level of cheap thinking.
Posted by John B at May 23, 2011 05:20 PM
"Zombie has a point"? If so, as far as I could tell it was the allegation that the "mainstream media" is trying to paint this millenial fantasy as somehow a widespread mainstream Christian delusion. And I've certainly never seen that. Everything I've read portrays these folks as an amusing bunch of kooks, with no broader importance. It's a fun story for a slow news day. Methinks that Zombie (and John B) protests too much.
Posted by Laird at May 24, 2011 04:33 PM
I suspect that the media feeding frenzy … has less to do with an impulse to lampoon the ridiculous than an impulse to ridicule Christianity in general.That is precisely the point Zombie has. I can bet you money that on the same day that ridiculous "prophecy" was made, there were at least several similarly ridiculous ones made by adherents of various other religions and cults - only we will never hear about those, because they were made by members of minorities.
Posted by Alisa at May 24, 2011 08:59 PM
