doorrat

Do you have a personal opinion as to what happened to D.B. Copper? Consensus seems to be him having died after jumping but then there's things like the money that was found. Do you actually believe any of the deathbed "confessions" that have been made over the years?

Also: what's the stupidest heist that you can think of having actually worked? (In an "idiot savant" sort of way, I guess.)

Thanks for doing this.

I grew up not far from Lancaster, PA and so day trips out there with my family were a common occurrence for tons of reasons. I could ask so many questions but I'll try to limit myself here.

Can you speak at all to Amish real estate practices when dealing with outsiders? The rumors and friend-of-a-friend sorts of stories I'd heard over the years basically boiled down to a sentiment that there wasn't much that was unethical (in the sense that ethics didn't even apply if the counterparty was non-Amish) if someone Amish is buying or selling land from/to somebody non-Amish. If they could play up a stereotype, or "accidentally" fail to disclose information, etc., that made the deal more advantageous for them then it was possible. Do you think that's fair as an overall assessment? Or are the things I've heard over the years just bad rumors? Or just stuff like that has probably happened and wouldn't surprise you but is only some members doing it?

Secondly, and I'm sure things have changed a lot since 2005, what has happened in communities where having a phone - let alone smartphone - is basically a prerequisite for interacting with the outside world? I've absolutely seen Amish with smartphones when tending their shops. Do those just get turned off and ignored once the day is done? And is there any truth (at least as far as you know) to the idea that I've heard where some Amish households will in fact have a landline phone that's not allowed in their houses themselves but are instead kept in their own "phone booths" that are some distance from the house? If that actually is a thing, are there rules as to how that's utilized?

Finally, speaking of communication, whenever I am out in Lancaster, should I be saying something to the kids that work some of the booths/shops about your work? Is it even possible to bring up such a thing in the 30 seconds I may be interacting with them? Or would anything like that coming from a grown thirty something year old man just be counterproductive? And this may be a whole other giant can of worms but I've not seen it asked elsewhere: is it exclusively the girls being taken abused or do the male kids possibly need to be made aware of these issues as well?

Thanks again. I hope that your work is able to continue to make a real difference.

Hey Al-

First, I've seen how often you post free access to your course. I just wanted to say that that seems mighty decent of you. Thanks for doing it!

My question: there's been a ton of new and cool features added in the last few versions of Python. Things like the walrus operator and lru_cache are personal favorites. Do you think that there's anything relatively recent that's flown under that radar that deserves more attention?

These days, what would you say your feelings are about America in general? What about average Americans?

So I've been disabled and not working for 15 years now.

With the recent proliferation of more, better, and more flexible work from home jobs, it seems possible that I may actually be able to find something that fits my education and experience and pays enough to cover my substantial medical bills and maybe even have an income on top of those to pay for silly little things like rent.

My question is: in short, how on earth would I best go about explaining why I haven't had any formal employment since college without creating resumes that are immediately thrown out or ignored?

Thanks, Daniel.