lurch

Aw come on, Ed, I even spelled "paradoxically" correctly, something half the population couldn't do without computer support. Besides, I was moved to wax lyrical by the sheer awesome deletedness of the suit. The void moved with it, like the Tiny Plaid Ninjas. Its like a portable hole, you can hang it on a wall and it becomes a Drake-shaped hole in the wall you can step through. I just sort of wonder, if you step through it, can you reach back through the wall and pull the suit through after you? Reminds me of a thermometer display at a bank I saw on a cold day once, it was so cold it read "-0" which I thought was awesome... it wasn't just zero, it was so fucking cold it was -Negative Zero-. Seriously Brian, its a sharp looking suit... hows it fly? Whats it roughly equivalent to performancewise? And do the grippers flap when you let go of em? -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Drake, that is the most Ninja wingsuit I have ever seen. I can't actually see it. I can only infer your presence in the photo by eyeballs and a couple of stripes. Its addition by subtraction, like deleting a chunk of reality. The nothing left behind is something, itself. That suit is actually darker than black. In flight, you're going to be paradoxically extremely visible because the eye is drawn to the yawning empty black void surrounding you wherever you fly it. From now on, every photo with you in it is going to look photoshopped. Like the bugs bunny run-through-the-wall schtick, you'll leave behind a Drake-shaped hole in reality. That thing is so dark I bet its even got its own gravity field and probably runs on Antibatteries. Wicked. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

What in the name of Lord Rayden's left testicle are you talking about? Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

1. Purple Mike 2. Michal M 3. Obama 4. J-Sho 5. Andreea 6. Dan M -- no handlebars 7. Stu 8. Scott Gray 9. Chris Gray 10. MonkeyBoy 11. Taya 12. "One Ball" Rick 13. "responsible" Phil Peggs 14. Mark K. 15. "irresponsible" one and a half ball "Stoney" 16. Lurch "Most stylish debris cloud in history" Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Hmmm, lets see... Romans 3:10 As it is written: “ There is none righteous, no, not one; Romans 3:23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, Romans 5:12 Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned— Romans 5:8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 10:13 For “whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved.” Romans 10:9,10 that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation 3:10.... I doubt that very much. I know a great many good people. 3:20... This whole "sin" idea makes me itch. I'm not able to worry about going against the will of yet another god.... if I worry about offending yours, I've got to worry about pissing off Lord Rayden, Vishnu, Zeus, et al... Fall short of the glory? Again, not worried. Wasn't trying to be as glorious as your deity anyway. I'll settle for being as good of a human being as I can, and let it go at that. 5:12... Death spread to all men? Nonsense. It didn't "spread". This is written from an assumption that at some point in the past, men didn't die. All organisms die. Yes, us, too. 5:8... Huh? I've heard this one for years. Still doesn't make any sense. Whether your prophet allowed himself to be killed or not doesn't do anything for us. "Died for our sins" is the usual line. Even assuming I grant any validity to your idea of "sin", theres no connection between his death and anything I may do wrong in life. If he can die for our sins, can I do whippets for breast cancer? 6:23... Since we're all going to die anyway, how bout I sin as much as I want? Besides, "Life in jesus christ" just doesn't sound appealing, let alone forever. In any case, again, everything dies eventually. I'm currently enjoying my time in the light. When its over, its over, and I'll be happy to dissipate back into the component elements and energy from which I came. Your prophet really can't do much about that one way or the other. In any case, I do not want eternal life... imagine how bored you'd get with whatevers on TV.... 10:23.... I tested this one. Didn't work. I was already experiencing the real analog to what you call "heaven", the state of pure joy I experience when wingsuiting down a cloud with all my friends. At the end of the flight, I pulled and got massive line twists that started to spiral. I said, "CHRIST!!!" and waited a bit. Nothing happened. I figured if hes gonna save me he better get on with it, cause I'm running outta altitude. Got sick of waiting, fixed the line twists and saved myself. This christ of yours is unreliable. Good thing I've got airbags. 10:9-10... Oh, wait...I had to -really- believe, AND "confess with my mouth?" Thats kind of redundant... what else could I "confess" with...my anus? Usually when I speak with THAT, I just get this honking sound and people get mad and tell me to get the fuck out of the plane, plus theres this nasty smell.... In any case, the only believing that will ever save me is my belief in my own ability to get myself out of whatever precarious situation I've got myself into this time. Its not like that hasn't happened before... And confessing anything was the last thing on my mind at the time. I was saved anyway, by my own action. Looks like I can skip that step in the whole "salvation" chain of events. I like to scientific about orchestrating events, and if it doesn't have anything to do with dealing with the situation, I leave it out of the sequence of events. Usually theres time concerns, and confessing stuff in a crisis, or at any other time actually, just doesn't help. Can you suggest something a little more practical next time? -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Just when I was still laughing from Tom's answer, I got the Ren and Stimpy reference and just completely lost it. Must...stop...laughing.... -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Uh, WTF, over. Fantastic! Incomprehensible, involuted to the point of communicating absolutely no coherent information unless you already know the back story, but it reads like poetry! Its like stream-of-consciousness with a dash of industrial pollution, and even more entertaining than the religious posts in here. Reminds me of signposts to the highways in hiding, lunatic fringe americana Stephen King spoke of, instructions written in spray paint on concrete walls in alleys frequented by the desperate and the damned. Rock on, Slyde! This is ART! -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

I've been expecting that. Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Thanks, man. Just doing what I can to promote mental hygiene... I just remembered a bumper sticker that sums it up nicely in a lot less words than I just used: People who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

This is what I was talking about. No matter how many different ways I read it, the answers I just got simply don't make any sense. Logic and rationality are the tools with which I process the world around me. The answers I got have so many unfounded assumptions and damaged code I can derive no useful information from them nor process them in a way that results in any actual meaning. Second sentence for example: Replace god? I haven't got one to begin with. Insert ourselves as creator? Again, context and concrete reference to any sort of reality lock are absent. I've made no claims to be "creator" in the context in which I think the word was just used, ( I create stuff all the time, I'm a tech, thats what I do, but I don't think making technology is what he was referring to) and I can't, by any leap of logic connect that to the second half of the sentence...deciding right from wrong? This is said as if there was something wrong with using your own mind to decide right from wrong. Deciding right from wrong is a basic function of the mind. Personally I run on a rationalist morality guided by empathy for others. If it harms others its wrong, if it helps, it isn't. The underlying assumption under the statement seems to be that I'm not supposed to think, just let someone else dictate right and wrong FOR me, and obey without question as if using my own judgement is somehow a bad thing. To me, that IS wrong. The only person capable of deciding right from wrong is the individual currently experiencing the situation in which such a decision needs to be made. We are free minds. It is our duty to ourselves and others to use our best judgement to decide right from wrong and act accordingly. Turning the decision over to someone else or some ancient writings from primitive neolithic galileans who knew nothing of the universe beyond the few square miles around them makes no more sense than having a child decide over the phone whether or not I ought to change lanes on the highway right now. The only one fit to make the judgement and in posession of enough information to be making the call at all is the person behind the wheel. I hate to be negative, but we don't seem to be speaking the same language here, guys. I'm not capable of abdicating basic judgement functions nor believing there is anything wrong with using such judgement. Its what the mind is FOR. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

The baroque and complex illusory structures I always see christians talking about just do not process at all. WTF is a "sin barrier?" Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Like I said, arm wings open wide. The conditions necessary to produce the effect are 1: being head-high or at least flat and level 2: asymmetrical tailwing applying a strong sideways force to just the lower half of your body This is why real flatspins are fairly rare and most spins are diving spirals. Usually with tailwing wide in the middle of a roll, you don't have enough wing open up top to stay level and be spun on your center axis, so most such maneuvers immediately turn into the diving roll you spoke of. This is also why flatspins tend to occur during acrobatic maneuvers. Lets say you just did a steep headdown dive and are now flaring out of it. As you flare out of it your head comes up and feet go down, your "rotation" is that of an aircraft lifting the nose to take off. Pitching up. Once the pitching up is underway, you have enough momentum to stay head high even if you fold an armwing or two for a second. And if you happen to get just your feet kicked sideways at -just- that particular moment, BAM, you spin out. Cops use this in pursuits all the time, bumping a car's rear end sideways, its called a PIT maneuver. Best police chase I ever saw, was a guy in a Mustang who knew what he was doing. The cops PITted him, and he anticipated it, steered with it to catch the car on the far side of the spin, did a neat 360 at highway speed. The spin stopped on-heading with the car facing forward and the guy kept right on going. This is also why you seldom see the more experienced pilots get knocked spinning. They recover inside of one rotation even when taken out by someone that just flew into their burble and landed on them. Around my home DZ we've got enough highly experienced pilots to play games with taking each other out on purpose when we're in a rough-and-tumble sort of flying mood. Reed's still trying to figure out the angle he's gonna have to tackle me from to bag me, and the last time I tried to take out Justin with an unexpected scary roll, he took the surprise shock loading to one wing without a wobble, I lost my grip on his wing and the only thing I took out was myself, to everyone's amusement. Do enough acro so you flip and spin without getting disoriented and the much-feared specter of the Flat Spin just sort of vanishes like an illusion. It just won't happen to you because you stopped it before it started without even having to think about it. If you've already built up enough experience to recover automatically, it may -never- happen to you, and since you compensate automatically, it can be hard to try to get into one deliberately. Its like trying to deliberately lose your balance and fall over-once you've got the reflexive recovery instinct hardwired to the muscle memory of the act, its difficult -not- to stop the spin in half a twist. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

I can sort of relate to the sarcasm here... Had a guy once start enthusiastically telling me he got into a flat spin under canopy. This just made him sound like he had no idea what he was talking about, I told him thats a wingsuit thing and whatever rotation he was doing, it wasn't a "flat spin" if he had a canopy over his head. Misuse of technical terms bugs me. To the original poster: A flat spin is rotation around your center, as if you were belly down on a creeper and someone spun you. Its hard to get out of because in a true flat spin all your control surfaces are being hit with wind at 90 degrees to normal airflow and almost none of it is flowing in the usual way from head to tail so none of the usual control inputs work. Like trying to fly a plane sideways with the left wingtip leading like the nose is supposed to, or trying to steer a skidding car. Car can't steer at all, if the steering wheel is centered and its skidding SO totally sideways that the tires aren't even turning. To deliberately get into one, try doing a barrel roll while keeping your tail completely open, and your armwings as well, so you stay head-high throughout the roll. If it doesn't spin you during the roll to your back, the second half of the roll, about at the 270 degree mark when the control inputs are reversed both upside down and backwards, will. Because thats the place where the control inputs are going to be least familiar and and you're not likely to have an instinctive muscle memory for the airflow at that time. I did that once by accident while trying for an under-the-flock video shot, and when my tail caught air at a 45 degree angle it applied a strong sideways input, spun me like flicking one end of a pencil on a table with your finger. WEEEE! My head and tail abruptly switched places and just kept going. I didn't pitch over head-down...stayed level, but head and tail kept switching places every half a second or so. Took me a couple seconds to get it stopped and half the remaining flight time to catch up to the flock after. Fly long enough and eventually flat spins just won't happen to you anymore, if they ever even did, because anytime you even get close to getting into one you'll instinctively compensate with a preventive/recovery move, counterinput. Cocking your tail in the opposite direction, for example, or digging in with the trailing armwing to act as one-sided brakes. Its all about the ninja tricks and muscle memory... build a big enough library of em and get so familiar with weird flight modes that you use the ninja tricks without even thinking about it and you'll never spin unless you intend to. No mystery in flat spins, once you understand exactly what is happening and why. Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Um, no. They're the only kind I'm attracted to. And they're few and far between, I've all but given up looking. I know they're out there, but the rule seems to be, if they're badass enough to attract me, they're already attached, usually to some schmoe who doesn't appreciate just how badass his woman is. I LIKE intimidating women. Since I don't intimidate easily, if I find her to BE intimidating, thats a MAJOR attraction. Starts the relationship off with excitement and respect. The lace curtains makeup and fashion obsessed types just leave me bored. I'll take the ferocious, bold, intelligent go-forth-and-conquer warrior chick anyday. One who does not demand that I provide for her needs, because she was providing em for herself just fine before I came along anyway, but doesn't mind if I open doors for her and give her stuff from time to time just because gallantry is a thing a guy ought to practice with women who appreciate it. I'll know her when I find her because she'll be a friend who just falls into place by my side like she'd always been there, more interested in being with me than getting stuff from me. Oh, and theres no such thing as "overly independent." Guys who reject women for that characteristic are way too insecure to deserve the woman they're rejecting. If shes independent as hell it means shes probably NOT the clingy needy type who would demand that I account for my time for every minute I wasn't around her. A friend of mine married a girl like that...she uses his phone like a leash to keep track of him. Ugh. I'd rather be alone. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Who, me? You gotta be kidding me. I'm the same guy that smashed Scotty B's bite switch with a hunk of concrete, (no matter how many times I explain that one, it still doesn't make any sense) took out Ed Pawlowski at one of the FnD events, and was insane enough to make a biker jacket into a wingsuit. If you're gonna party with me, bring body armor, rescue flares, a fire extinguisher, a cellphone and a sponge. As for the rest of you, all I gotta say is wow. You've taken the whole beat-on-the-newbie thing to a whole new level, and he ain't even a newbie yet. Aren't you supposed to wait till AFTER he starts skydiving? I mean, come on. If you drive him off before he starts jumping, the beating is short and you don't get to enjoy it. Once hes in and hooked, THEN you start in on him, and the beating lasts a lifetime. So far, the only one to provide usefully crafty advice that shows evidence of careful planning for future beatings is Chuck. Never start with the head. The victim gets all fuzzy... Amateurs. Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Hey. I've been wingsuiting since before it was cool. Its worth whatever effort it takes to get there. The experience of working your way up to it, then learning to actually DO it, and the adventures you'll have and the people you'll meet and the places you'll go and the sights you will see will enrich your life beyond any standard of measure you can imagine. The thing to ask yourself is: How bad do you want it? Itll take an ungodly amount of hard work and dedication but if you want it bad enough, you can do it. The first time you bodysurf down the side of a majestic white puffy cloud 3 miles high with your friends, screaming in pure joy as you go, you'll know it was worth it. When I started on the path to wingsuiting I was a bit of a loser. Semiprofessional tech hack, biggest distinction in life of holding a job travelling a bit and owning a beat up 4x4 warwagon. I got it by arranging to live and work within 15 miles of the DZ so I could be there, often, quickly. Got a factory job nearby that pays fairly well compared to, say, flipping burgers. Went prolonged periods spending no money I could avoid spending. Worked more 12 hour days under brutal workloads than I care to remember so I could rack up the cash to do it. Just getting qualified to even TRY a wingsuit is an incredible epic journey in and of itself, man. A whole lot of unbelievably intense shit is going to happen to you one way or another on your way there. Believe me, don't worry about it looking like such a long hard road to get there. It won't feel that way when you're ON that road. You'll be far, far too busy trying to stay alive and learning to get bored, man. Then, just when you realize you're badass enough to have survived 200 skydives and started to get a little bored with freefalling straight down in its many varieties, you put on a wingsuit and suddenly one step takes you two miles. All those canyons in the clouds you always wanted to explore... now you can. You jump out the door, spread your wings and just stop...falling. You're still going down, but now you can GO somewhere. 2 weekends ago at Jumptown I was test flying a big yellow suit. First time out the door with it the guys still in the plane hanging out the door told me they saw me go up. When I looked at the plane 5 seconds after I got out, I was still on level with it and could see the guys still in the door. I hadn't lost any altitude yet. You have any idea what that feels like? Drunk on freedom, man. Ridiculously prolonged freefall and 100-mph mobility in the sky will blow. Your. Mind. Let your enthusiasm guide you. Work your ass off. Make friends along the way. Take care of your own and they will take care of you. You have no idea how many good people you will meet in the sky. The same people you're helping out today are the people guarding your back in the sky tomorrow. You have a huge family you haven't met yet of people you'll find it a privilege to know. Forget about how long the road is. The road is everything. It is the life itself. Every skydive is the most important skydive of your life. Its the one you're doing right now. Live that life long enough and you can fly a wingsuit. Now get going. We'll be here when you get here. Split a cloud with ya someday. Fly safe. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

You know, I sat down and had breakfast once in this little nook restaurant somewhere in San Francisco. Had a window seat, just ate my eggs and watched the street. Saw this guy in a parka go by pushing a shopping cart. The parka stood out, since it was fairly warm and sunny. But this was not all. He also had on a knit cap, and ski boots open at the front to allow him to walk in them. The shopping cart was full of whatever stuff a homeless guy in ski boots pushes through San Fran. He had on a headset. He was talking animatedly into the headset the whole time as he walked past. The headset was self-evidently not plugged into anything. The cord and plug were just dangling near his waist. "Hm!" Thought I, watching him go. A few minutes later he walked by again, going the other way. With no shopping cart. Finished my coffee, paid and left, and as I was leaving, he passed the doorway again, with another shopping cart. Still talking a mile a minute. Watched him go, looked past him and finally understood his mission. The voices must have told him he must move all his stuff and it must be done in a particular way. He must push one cart a few hundred yards. Go back for the second. Push it past the first. Go back for the first. Push it past the second. Go back for that. Ad infinitum. He had abandoned cart 1 maybe 500 yards up the road and had just passed it with cart 2 when I left. For all I know he had already leapfrogged this way across half the city. I have no idea where he was from or where he was going. I don't know if he knew either. It didn't seem to make much sense, but it must have meant a lot to him, for him to be willing to do it in ski boots. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Liven got it...Matrix reloaded. The 100 Agent Smiths fight. Story of my life back in high school. The nurse reference was cuckoos nest. Lets see, I'll try talking to Spot in painkillerspeak, he ought to be able to read it sooner than anything else in the thread. Yo Spgot! Yobr Brgothhrs ahr rooting for ya. Flintstones chewable morphine... assk for it by name! Hey if ya heal up in time for the next Elsinore bigway event I promise not to burble you this time ok man? -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Perry's back in the game! Woot! Wish I could make it out there. If you're gonna be anywhere near my neck of the woods this season lemme know ok? We got partyen to catch up on. Fly safe brother bird! -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Thanks, man. Bonus points if you recognize what famous movie fight its from. Spot, if you get Nurse Ratchet and she gives you a hard time, tell her you got hurt shaving the cat. With a lawn mower. Remember if you can't beat em, confuse em. Shes probably gonna want to know what kind of cat it was. When you're back on your feet and ready to pick up where you left off, if you need any help with the cat, lemme know. I haven't got a lawn mower, but I can loan you a purple and green chainsaw named Wild Thing. Just get the fur out of the chain before you send it back to me ok? Makes me sneeze when I trim my nose hair. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Spot, you biffed? Damn brother, heal up fast ok? Take care of yourself. If you need anything, ask. And, uh, careful with that ipod, man, I hear those things cause...uh...somethinorother I can't pronounce. But it has a scary sounding latin name. And its really icky. Peace. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Fascinating. A guy in a Blade who hasn't the faintest idea how to use it, and a camera guy that doesn't know any better. Interesting progression they got there. We usually don't start buzzing each others deployments around here until after we've spent a couple hundred flights mastering essential survival skills like the ability to deploy. Not to mention trivialities such as flying a consistent heading. I'd suggest a first flight course. Before somebody dies. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Sangi. I read this book once where this guy was writing about truth. People get all wrapped up in the search for it, then it shows up and says "Hi, I'm the truth" and the people searching say "Go away, I'm looking for the truth" and so it goes away. Theres a reason we call wingsuits "nylon crack." There is a particular feeling of flight you are looking for. Sometime as soon as youve flown wingsuits enough to be able to surf any cloud in range at will, something like this'll happen to you. Jump story: We had, what, a 4-way I think. 5. Me, Joner, Skwrl and Ron, plus Rick on camera if I remember right. Joner and I and probably Skwrl had our cameras as well just for the hell of it. The surf was looking good so we had something of a dual dive plan. Rons new and just wanted to work on getting to and staying with the group. Joner wanted to try a bit of backflying in the first half. Skwrl didn't seem to want to do anything in particular except surf whatever cloud we could bag. Being senior bird on this flight navigation and getting us to a good surfable puffy if any were in range was my job. Pick us a good puffy, they said. Joner told me if I buzz his field of view during the cloud surf he'll try to get a good shot of me surfing it. You never know what the sight pictures gonna read like until you actually get to the door. And although the wingsuit will let you fly a straight line shot several miles back to the DZ if you wait too long in the door, you don't have all day to pick your surf. You have to step to the door, eyeball the important cubic miles of space you know you can reach, visualize what flight path will get you to a ramp shaped cloud surface, and how to get there. You got to try to be considerate of the other birds and pick one you know is in range for everybody, if they don't all fly megasuits they might not be able to get there. Its bad form to pick a cloud you know you can reach and ditch the other birds to go get it. Unless you're near breakoff in which case anything goes. Sometimes me and my hardcore surfing brothers do it anyway. Cause sometimes, that cloud is just way too tempting. There are often these incredible surfable valleys, canyons and caves, holes and ragged paths, inside of clouds that you can't see until you turn a corner and actually fly right up to it. Regular skydivers fall right past it. With a wingsuit, you can duck inside and go adventuring. This time, I got to the door and got a pretty good sight picture. We were already about a mile or so upwind. Sparse cloud deck at about 4, going up as high as maybe 5.5 to 6. The biggest cloud within reach was also the perfect distance upwind and dead center on the wind line. It had a perfectly ramp-shaped surface pointing straight back to the DZ. We could surf it, come off the bottom at 4 and almost any altitude any of these guys pull at will be an easy shot home. Bottom of the ramp was maybe 2 miles upwind and by the time we reach it, it'll be more like a mile and a half. It'll look like we're a bit far out at low altitude when we get there, but we'll cover the distance in seconds and it'll put the newer birds exactly where I want em in the sky at the end of the flight with almost zero risk of landing out. I hate leading a flight to a marginal spot. I feel like such a dink. Got to the door, looked at the picture, got the birds' attention, pointed at the cloud, made a sweeping circle gesture leading from our exit to the top center of the chosen puffy to indicate the flight path I had in mind, and exited. One of the better flights of the season. If the exact details matter, I recall Joner backflying under in a couple of rolls, I think I flew over to Skwrl for a bit just to say hi and see how he was doin', do a dock or two while I was at it. Made first turn and split my attention between Skwrl on my right and Ron below and back a ways. Noticed we'd burned off a little over half the descent necessary to reach our puffy and that we were gonna have to make our next turn soon if we were gonna hit it. I can't remember if I docked on Skwrl and turned him 90 to point us at the cloud or if that was another flight, or just turned and went for it or what. Coming up on the surface I remembered Joner wanted to get a surf shot so I looked at where he was and it all lined up... if I was gonna hit the surf just right I was going to have to sacrifice altitude anyway, and I LOVE a good steep plummet-dive. Flying down the ramp of that cloud was about as glorious an experience as anyone with a love of flying would expect. The airport dead ahead but a long way out, a distance we'll cover in seconds. A big, wide open rampy flight surface just below us, leading right to it. I threw my wings back and dived for it. Reached the surface of it, popped the wings to max and turned all the speed I'd picked up in the dive into lift and forward speed. Totally ruined the shot, so much for looking cool on camera. Ask me if I give a damn. Combined with every low fallrate ninja trick I know done all at once, the carving dive turned into a planeout that delivered the brief vertigo-stomach feeling you get that makes you think your fallrate mighta hit zero for a second or two, there. It made me disappear up and out of the video. Oh well. I was too busy flying to care. Came off the bottom of the cloud doing 100+ forward and just kept going. Looking around I was aware of the other birds deploying behind me but focused mainly on trying to fly as perfectly as I could to go as far as possible and get every bit of speed and time out of it as I can. Theres a "fast" sweet spot in flying where you're going as fast as you can with as much wing area out as you can. Any more and it'll slow you down, costing you lift and time, any less and you'll sacrifice needless fallrate and not get any speed out of it in exchange, and you're wasting it. I can't really tell you how to do it, but I can tell you that you have to point your toes really hard back, make yourself long and skinny and stick your neck as far forward as you can to find it. Anyway I sure found it on that jump, covered the remaining distance back to the DZ in less time than it takes to tell it, pulled at about 2, couple quick spirals and landed. Sure felt like flying to me. You gonna tell me it wasn't? Accept the fact that you can't go up, then enjoy the flight. There are limits on how far you can fly. And its a pain in the ass having to borrow someone else's plane every time you wanna be up there. Deal with it. If you could fly like superman anytime at will, what are you gonna do, fly to Albuquerque? With what luggage? If you could do it all the time as casual as walking, it'd take all the magic and joy out of it. Trust me on this. My dropzone is actually within flying distance to the factory at which I work, barely, if I asked for a really long spot in a weird direction. I could fly to work if I really wanted to. If the wind direction was right. Somehow, if I ever did it, I'm pretty sure it'd feel fairly ordinary except for being embarassed at having arrived in such a needlessly flashy fashion that I'm going to have to explain somehow to my employers, and without my toolbag. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

That was AWESOME. That guy sounded so happy. Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Eh? "Its a fun video..make it about that." Whos making it about anything else? Reason its up here is for people to laugh. I don't care if we weren't the first to do it, I just wanna see how the others turned out, might pick up a few pointers for the next time I try it. Before this was posted, so far as I knew this might have been the first midair-assembled rodeo, since I'd never heard of it being done before, but I also figured (correctly, as it turned out) that when it was posted here, someone would pop up and say its been done, and when. Although I'm fairly well-informed, I've only been in the sport for 7 years or so and I'm quite certain theres an awful lot of cool stuff thats been done before I came along that I've never heard of. Almost everyone thinks their new idea of the week is original, and almost everyone is wrong. I DO know it isn't commonly done, so I'll just second whats already been said here and urge anyone else thinking of trying this to just be careful think it through, wear a helmet and use an AAD. -B edit: Things to consider for any newer wingsuiters who want to try this: Do both wingsuiters have AADs? Have you flown in and around burbles enough to be able to get out of a burble cleanly or avoid getting sucked into one? And do you know exactly how hard you're going to hit the other guy when you fly into his burble and from what height? I did that from an altitude of about two feet above Reed and even from that close, it was almost enough to take us both out and send us spinning. If I'd done that from 5 feet, it could have broken his spine or my neck. From 7 feet it could very easily have killed us both. Suit style: What are the odds you're going to dislodge the other guy's wing cutaway handles? Gear in general: What if you bump his hackey and stuff it into the pouch with your knee? Or dislodge it and either entangle with his bridle or deploy him while you're still on his back? All I'm saying is consider all the weird stuff that can happen trying stuff like this. Reed and I spent quite some time working out plans for various possible outcomes and complications. If you don't coordinate with your wingman in advance, when things don't work like you expect them to, neither of you is going to know what the other bird is going to do. Finding yourself backflying next to your unstable wingman with his bridle wrapped around your neck and his fallrate about to drop to 50 mph because you just fell off his back is not the time to realize you do not have a plan for this and in the 3 seconds you have before his bridle strangles you he is unlikely to think of folding his wings to drop with you and give you a chance to get loose or for him to chop it. So please plan ahead.