An advantageous dual tensioning buckle facilitates application in sporting apparel, safety, backpacking, child safety, and various other article strapping uses and the like for variably adjusting the tensioning of articles from either end of the buckle while also providing a releasable closure. The sulfur hexafluoride or xenon is in a concentration in the mixture between about 75 mole percent to 95 mole percent. A status simulation testing system is further introduced. In addition, a method and apparatus which permits the mobile station to be directly assigned into a soft handoff state upon traffic channel assignment. Furthermore, an extension unit is movably connected to the housing in such a manner that the housing can be extended by movement of the extension unit in the direction of the distal end of the housing such that the lancet is prevented from emerging from the lancet magazine. Comparing realized to optimal stretching, we find the optimum series for all possible SMX designs to obey the universal design rule Np=Nx\u22121, for Nx=3, 6, 9, 12,.