You are being very kind  I think we have an artifact of an earlier build. Before I discovered pytorch, I used to do things by manually coding everything and so this probably something I simply didn’t take out or simply forgot about. Been so focused on what we could get done I may have lost sight of some basic principles. Time to RTFM and I guess I know what I am doing with the other models…
I ran the current model without the lines you were wondering about and it seems to run fine.
BTW, the application deals with packet traffic on communication networks and seeing what we can do with machine learning to solve some problems.
And again, I appreciate the time and the clarity - if you are ever heading to Rochester I’d love to buy you a beer or coffee by way of thanks.
Bruce