skykittykat

Dammit, Hewitt just lost his quarter final match against Baghandis Federer is through to the semi finals (as expected). As for Americans still at Wimbledon - there is John McEnroe, Jimmy Connors and Tracey Austin commentating on the BBC coverage Actually, I think Tracey Austin is playing in the over 35's singles or doubles. Liz

Alison Muller in particular, but if she is on dz.com, please pass this message all the way from London to her: Nathan from Launceston (and school) says Hi! Liz

I think it was more of a talking point during the 2001 interview - publicity, etc. Not quite the same thing as someone saying "you have a great face for radio". Liz

Radio Oxford may be doing an interview tomorrow morning between 7.30am and 9am about a bikini jump that was done at Weston in 2001. Apparently the bikini is 50 years old tomorrow and the radio wants something fun and different to go along with this. They remembered a live interview was done (in a bikini) on Radio Oxford's morning programme all those years ago to publicise the jump to raise money for Women's Clinics around the country. Liz

The debate between Ron and Alienangel has been most entertaining. IMHO Ron is winning as Alienangel's reply to Chris Talbot's post came across as disagreeing with what he said even though what he posted was the most QUALIFIED opinion of anyone on this thread (Chris being a world champ). Unless, of course, Aliengangel is a World Champ in 4 or 8-way skydiving. This thread has been taken over with the debate of a need for a Women's class or not (I am guilty of doing the same!!!!) rather than WHO is going to win at the World Meet. What are people's predictions? Liz LizBits on www.omniskore.com returns to reporting all the live action from the World Meet (RW and Artistic events)

My predictions are: 4-way Open - Fire or Sinapsi with Spa, the Norgies and Russia battling it out for 3rd. 4-way Women - France, UK, Russia with a big battle between France and the UK. 8-Way - Airspeed, France and Russia (although I think a jump off for one medal could happen). Bear in mind that although meet scores/averages are out there for all teams, it is the best team on the day which wins and competing at a World Meet can either bring out the best or the worst in a team. LizBits is being resurrected on Omniskore for the World Meet, so these predictions are PURELY personal and no bias will be made by me when reporting from Germany! Dan - your wooden spoon was certainly working hard over your best looking female statement Liz

Considerating your registration date... This thread is about useless parents NOT about jumpers who did the JFTC jump who smoked- nothing should take away from what was acheived. Please start a new thread on your views of the JFTC jump and "smokers". Liz

In a perfect world, I think both the US and the UK can learn from each other and implement/take away certain rules. Somehow I don't think that is going to happen Liz

Speak to the instructors who took you through your AFF or the S&TA peep at your dz - they will know what you are like as a canopy pilot and will be able to point you in the right direction and give you good advice. Being the first to land should not be a priority. Flying and landing your canopy safely in a clear airspace is a must for EVERYONE. Nobody is going to look down on you for not making it down first, but they will if you do something stupid - there is no kudos in screwing up and bouncing just to be the first down in a group. There is one other question and that is, have you read the Brian Germain article on canopy flying and downsizing? On the canopy you are on at the moment, can you do all the things that Brian says you should be able to do before downsizing/changing types of canopies? I hope you don't think I am being harsh. Happy jumping! Liz

The NSL website is probably the only place where peeps who are not "in the know" and follow RW can go to find out the latest news and read team interviews. Kurt is an excellent reporter and reports what he is told in interviews - he is very trusted and no other website comes close to his (apart from Omniskore during the last World Cup) Liz a.k.a LizBits

Why does the pot call the kettle black? I think this is a term stemming from racist days when it was bad to be black. I think this phrase is ignorant, racist, and derogatory, and should be updated to fit modern times. Why don't be change it, the sky calling the ocean blue? That is not derogatory to anyone, yet says the same thing.*** The pot/kettle saying came from at least a century ago when pots and kettles were made of iron and it had nothing to do with racism. Liz

Dan, I don't think you are stirring the pot per se. Last year, Fire were a "new" team rather than an established team, so they were basically starting from scratch and had so many months to bond and fly as a team before Nationals and to acheive their goal (which was to win). It's unfortunate that all these top athletes like Fire and Airspeed do not have the luxury of devoting all their time to training - they have to earn money in between training (oh, to be a football (soccer to the Yanks) player!!!). Most of these top teams plan their year in advance taking into account work, family obligations, rest time and the amount of training that they know as a team they need to do to achieve their set goal. Airspeed 8 has only done 1 meet this year - will that affect their chances in Germany? I don't think so... As a team Fire seem to get it together mentally on the "day". The World Cup 05 they had done no training after the Nationals until the practice jumps just before the comp and it was the same for the Shamrock meet. At both meets, they posted impressive scores and got silver medals. For a team to do that in those circumstances is pretty damn awesome, so I wouldn't worry too much about their training schedule leading up to Germany! The World Meet will be very exciting in ALL the RW classes with the level of talent out there. Liz

If you do an AFF system that requires you to do a tandem as a level or pre-level, then of course it counts. I counted my 30 tandems as jumps. I was a guinea pig for 6 peeps getting their tandem ratings. I was B licence then and rather naive.... The whole experience was a lot of fun though! Liz Traa di liooar

Chizazz, thank you for doing the attatchments! There are very few "bad" Far Side cartoons, so having a fave is very hard to do. Liz Traa di Liooar

My absolute fave is the "Midvale School for the Gifted" (a student pushing against a door with a Pull sign on it). A good skydiving one is "Trouble Brewing" - skydivers getting on a plane and next door is a crocodile farm. Liz Traa di liooar

Ha, ha. About 10 years ago, I visited a friend, who was a modern age Casanova, in the hospital and my friend who had asked me to go with him, didn't tell me what was wrong with the Casanova (both were straight, but we were all very close friends). I walk into the ward and all the nurses started sniggering when my mate told them who we were there to see. I had honestly never heard of blue balls at that time and went on to totally embarrass my hospitalised friend by asking him to tell me all the details. He said something about being out in the cold and his bollocks getting cold. Can this happen? Liz

For the second snort laugh, imagine the pink sherpherdess look complete with bonnets Liz Traa di liooar

Well, first of all request a "Men's Only Forum". Organise an all male skydive, especially if you can raise the same amount of money that women's records raise. As an aside, I grew up in the Isle of Man and there was actually a pub that barred women from the main bar - we had to sit in the lounge bar (it was a tiny pub as well). Men were allowed into the lounge bar - to cater for the bloke that took his missus out for a sherry or a port and lemon. If I remember rightly, that pub had to allow women all access from the mid-90's. Liz Traa di liooar

And don't forget that it was live, so you could flip to watch out for some drama during those frequent, annoying commercials that interrupt the program you were watching. I don't have cable Liz Traa di liooar

GQ Jumper and Tdog. They've been good friends and I feel honoured to have spent time with both of them. Whether they would have to wear dresses or not at my hypothetical wedding is not yet decided - what do you all think?? Liz Traa di liooar

You would have a bloody good laugh!!! Hell is much more fun which is why it is called Hell coz it is a place for naughtiness Liz

Your command of the English language is shocking Phonetically, it is said "wustersher". I don't have the correct dictionary definition of the phonetics, but I put it in plain English for you Yanks Either way, good luck with the record! Liz

The Gary and Mark camps are fantastic - well worth doing, but from what I hear book quickly as their camps are in high demand. Emma, are Gary and Mark available for wind tunnel coaching outside of their camps for those peeps who cannot not do a whole camp, but would like 15 mins to an hour or so? Steve H is also a fantastic coach. I could be wrong, but I think John McIver (also a top notch coach) is also based in the UK the same as Steve You guys in the UK are now getting spoiled for choice over top class coaches!!! Awesome Liz

Unfortunately, suicides are going to happen, but we should really put this into perspective - how many thousands of jumps are done per year by thousands of people around the world and how many of these jumps result in death by suicide? Unfortunately, Britain, with a smaller population of jumpers, has had in the past couple of years fatalities that were suicides. The media picks up on dramatic stories rather than feel good stories - I bet that the coverage of the World Records (women and mixed) and the British Women's records combined did not garner as many "column inches" as the suicides. I think that a knee jerk reaction of putting new rules in place to weed out suicidal people would be ineffective, especially as the focus for the skydiving community should be safety under canopy, like the BPA has done. More and more skydivers are killing themselves whilst under a fully flyable canopy. Liz Traa di Liooar

One of the victim's mother agreed that justice had been served. She stated that she was glad that there was no death penalty as if the death sentence had been served, then everyone would have to go through appeals for years to come - life impisonment meant an end to the matter. Liz