05-02-2010, 10:26 PM
I had a very surreal experience once when, while involved as a 'subject matter expert' for a military simulation contractor -- an rhizome of the Bolt, Beranek and Newman 'Desert Storm'/TRADOC simulators -- which was tasked with developing a virtual tabletop exercise system to teach civilian emergency managers how to respond to an outbreak of mad cow disease -- then changed to avian influenza.
Our group represented the software development sub-contractor for a lead contractor working for TSWG. When the project was canned [breakthrough interruptus], we won an opportunity to make a 'desperate plea presentation' to allow our piece of the contract to survive. The meeting was set at a small distant 'closet' within the overall structure somewhere in what is colloquially known as 'the Crystal Palace' with TSWG reps and the #2 vet from the USDA.
When we arrived for the meeting, we were sequestered first in an outer foyer and required to sign in, show identification, leave all personal/corporate/unapproved items with the receptionist [laptops, cell phones, anything electronic], sent through a mini-TSA-like screening wand/patdown and then escorted by a staff-person through a double-locked door, down a hall to a double-locked conference room that I'd guess was also sound-sealed, covertly miked and possibly filmed. The meeting was uneventful, our objective unsecured, except for the interest shown by the USDA doc in my built-in game design mechanism by which responders could be shown how to communicate and deduce more effectively to ascertain the nature of the source, fomites and vectors more readily, and for the berating I got in the car on the way back to BWI from my boss.
Post 9/11, the ride near the Pentagon and the Potomac [for some reason, I envisioned an aircraft carrier anchored there] was equally spooky.
Our group represented the software development sub-contractor for a lead contractor working for TSWG. When the project was canned [breakthrough interruptus], we won an opportunity to make a 'desperate plea presentation' to allow our piece of the contract to survive. The meeting was set at a small distant 'closet' within the overall structure somewhere in what is colloquially known as 'the Crystal Palace' with TSWG reps and the #2 vet from the USDA.
When we arrived for the meeting, we were sequestered first in an outer foyer and required to sign in, show identification, leave all personal/corporate/unapproved items with the receptionist [laptops, cell phones, anything electronic], sent through a mini-TSA-like screening wand/patdown and then escorted by a staff-person through a double-locked door, down a hall to a double-locked conference room that I'd guess was also sound-sealed, covertly miked and possibly filmed. The meeting was uneventful, our objective unsecured, except for the interest shown by the USDA doc in my built-in game design mechanism by which responders could be shown how to communicate and deduce more effectively to ascertain the nature of the source, fomites and vectors more readily, and for the berating I got in the car on the way back to BWI from my boss.
Post 9/11, the ride near the Pentagon and the Potomac [for some reason, I envisioned an aircraft carrier anchored there] was equally spooky.
"Where is the intersection between the world's deep hunger and your deep gladness?"