Think nothing of it Silver. I never perceived it as a snub by any means.
I'd be very happy meet up and show you around, but I'm not entirely a New Yorker. I love the city, but I actually live about 6 hours away from NYC.
By the end of it we were pulling out our hair and swearing and on the very DAY it was due, we noticed one tiny imperfection and sure enough everything worked. We got the best mark in class too.
Robots are funny things and fun to play with
Hah, I've fixed a piece of code less than
5 minutes before it was due! (Talk about cutting it close!) It's amazing how one little line of code, or one tiny variable can cause the entire machine to go nuts (and you as well
).
I partake in a thing called the FIRST Robotics Competition. I have been a part of my school's team for the past 4 years (and will probably continue into college next year as a mentor for a team). It's one of the most amazing things out there in the field of science and technology.
The Official FIRST Website. Each year we get a new game to play using a robot, we have 6 weeks to design, build, test, re-build, and program a robot to be used in a competition. The season starts in January and runs through February and March (the build season stops in February, and is followed by the competitions obviously). Every January, each team watches a live web broadcast which explains what the game is all about. We have all of the documentation before hand, but FIRST has sponsors such as NASA working on their encryption and security features so no one has yet managed to open the Game Manual before FIRST gives us the password.
Here is the official animation explaining last season's game.
Here is a video I slapped together of my team's regional competition in Rochester, New York. It's not my best work (I have since upgraded my editing suite) since I didn't spend too much time perfecting it. I love our robot in this video (it's the boxy one with orange and green bumpers). The drive train was so maneuverable, and the thing was a BEAST! We could swap between 4 wheel and 2 wheel drive, we could shove almost ANY robot out of our way (I was one of the two drivers for my team, I've never had so much fun). We clocked the robot at a top speed of 22 MPH (we used a radar gun), and I almost knocked over the huge Lexan/diamond plate shield you see in front of the driver stations (I wasn't even going full speed, it was completely accidental).
While in the U.S. I would suggest going to one of these competitions, they are absolutely crazy! Loud music, thousands of dollars worth of hardware and software clashing on the field, brilliant minds pitted against each other, and a feeling of excitement that is hard to match.
I think we will get along swimmingly #he says as the still smouldering remains of his house sits in the background#
Hmm, it would appear that you made a slight miscalculation.