tbrown

First of all, congrats for 5800+ with no cutaways ! My good friend Joe Wasser has 4000+ with no cutaways and he's the best I know personally. You and Joe are doing something right. I want to add a disclaimer to my numbers here - I had 3 cutaways 1974 - '80, with older gear and a young & stupid attitude. Since returning in 2003, I've had one cutaway in 446 jumps, after blowing up my main with a slammer opening on modern gear and a much wiser old fart's attitude. 59,161 + 1012 = 60,173 112 + 4 = 116 60,173/116=510.54 Still not the advertised "one in a thousand", but two in a thousand is not at all unusual with most people I know. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

I've only ever made one visit to Lodi, where I made 3 jumps. But I learned really fast what's needed to land there. Not only did Bill personally welcome me and take me outside to point out the pattern, but the people I jumped with gave me another briefing with the aerial photo. Then again on the ride up, they took the time to point out the dropzone and surrounding features (hint: the airport is located exactly where 99 takes a slight dog leg). My personal impression, from one short visit, is that Lodi jumpers are some of the most pattern disciplined canopy fliers I've seen anywhere. They're also quite comfortable with flying in close together on final, because they need to be. I decided to trust the locals and was not disappointed. But Lodi's not "that" tight either, there are some large flat fields on the airport surrounding the dropzone that offer perfectly safe outs, if your pride can handle missing the dropzone itself. While I'm at it, Merry Christmas to all of you up at Lodi and thanks again for my short but fun visit. I've still got a ticket burning a hole in my pocket ! Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

An open reserve is a beautiful sight, especially if it's over your head. Someday you'll know. In the meantime, anytime and every time you see one over somebody else, it's just the same for them. It means we all live to see the rest of our lives. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

I disagree with the low pull anology. Low pull contests were just a foolish game of chicken. Swooping, especially competition swooping, is a highly disciplined and exacting competition event. And unlike a low pull contest, it's a real art form to watch. Nobody who's ever seen the PD Factory Team make one of their group routines can honestly say otherwise - they're the "Blue Angels" of skydiving. Is it dangerous ? Sure it is. One small mistake can kill you before you can even react. But nobody makes anybody swoop. I don't swoop (or BASE jump), but that's my personal choice. And I believe strongly in keeping swoopers seperated from the main pattern and landing area. But ban swooping because it's dangerous ? You might as well ban skydiving and be done with it. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

My dad was a midshipman back in the forties, and his cousin was a cadet. We've still got a picture of the two of them outside the stadium in their dress blues and grays. President Truman attended the game & sat on the Army side that year and I think Army still had their formidable "Four Horsemen" backfield. When I was a kid we used to watch the games on TV, back when Roger Staubach played for Navy. JFK would attend and sat on the Navy side those years. So who won anyway ? Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

Yes, if it's ever available. I'm not in any of the high risk groups, so I'll man up and wait until the kids & pregnant moms get theirs. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

And I'll swim all the way to bloody New Zealand with my wife on my back - she can cook for the two of us with a Coleman Stove while I do the swimming. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

Really seriously, "back in the day" would at least have been before the gear revolution of the seventies. The early seventies began with people jumping rounds, chest mounted reserves, capewell cutaway systems, motorcycle helmets, and big heavy boots. By the end of the decade most people were jumping squares in piggybacks with 3 rings, (even a few square reserves), hockey helmets or those stupid leather caps that hold your brains together after you die, and sneakers, sandles, or even barefoot. All the new gear since 1980 has really been a refinement, the real revolution was in the seventies. I suppose you're REALLY baaaaack in the day if you turn the clock back before the first low porosity sport canopies of the early sixties. Then it was all military surplus - and a lot of the reserves didn't even have pilot chutes - they were the "toss and pray" type. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

I usually manage to watch about 20 min. of early morning movies over breakfast, before I have to leave for work. This week I was enthralled by about 20 min. worth of "Pierrepoint: The Last Hangman" on the Sundance Channel. It stars Timothy Spall (better known as the cowardly ratfaced Peter Pettigrew in the Harry Potter films), as Albert Pierrepoint, once Britain's "hangman to the stars". Spall is an amazing actor when given a serious role. Pierrepoint was a real guy (1905-1992), a grocer and barkeep who made extra income by expertly dispatching some of the most infamous murderers of the 20th century, including over 200 Nazis at the end of World War II. The film is by turns ghastly (tons of hangings), and yet riveting as you're drawn into the life of this really very nice and ordinary working class bloke. Juliet Stevenson ("Truly, Madly, Deeply") gives another of her usual incredible performances as his quiet and loving wife. The film was a total commercial flop, it showed for one weekend in exactly 3 art house theaters in the US, but has found its way onto DVD, and apparently some of the artsier cable channels. Not exactly what I'd call a "date film", but well worth checking out. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

Back at Seneca Falls we had two C-182's, then later on a DHC-1 Beaver was added. Experienced loads were generally to 7.5 for 30 seconds of freefall. If we completed a single point 4 Way round we knew we wuz baaaad. For you younger gen AFF trained types, those were the days when breakoff for up to 8 or 10 people was at 3500, with a pull at 2000 - 2500 ft. We NEEDED to make the most of our limited freefall time. Of course our canopies also opened faster and with considerably more "spirit". There were occasional formation loads for the local gods to attempt an 8 Way from 10.5. The Beaver would occasionally go to 10.5 when the gods wanted to flail around for 50 seconds. My first load to 12.5 was from a DC-3 (4-0-Tango) at the Z-Hills Easter Boogie in 1977. After that I jumped at some dropzones with Beeches that would generally go to 10.5, sometimes 12.5. But a half a minute of freefall was the going thing at most Cessna dropzones in the seventies. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

566 jumps, 1974 - '80, 3 cutaways. One was for suspension lines knotted together, one for a jammed brakeline that wouldn't clear on a very gusty day. One was a textbook streamer malfunction. Gear was a 7 cell Pioneer Viking Superlite main, packed in a Hanbury rig with 3 ring release, and a Security 26 ft. conical reserve. 446 jumps since 2003, one cutaway. Slammer opening blew my 210 ft Pilot canopy to rags. It actually opened and was stable, but one look told me I wasn't even going to try landing it. Reserve was/is a PD193R (a really SWEET canopy by the way). Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

I think it would make for bad politics and give the administration an unnecessary mean & petty image. Best to just wipe the egg off their face and learn from this mistake. Besides, there IS a side to the American character that appreciates this kind of fooling around. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

I agree that she has a better stage presence. But voice quality? Can't agree there. I'm a big Ann Wilson fan myself, saw her once singing Hendrix songs with Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell (RIP to them both...) at a Seattle Bumbershoot festival. But actually, Janis could and did sing with a very pretty voice when she wanted to, i.e. "Summertime". Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

The Salahis are a wealthy, polo horse owning couple from the genteel Virginia countryside. They know how to dress (she really was stunning), how to behave, and love a good party. In other words, they blended in perfectly with their surroundings. I have read that they could face charges of trespassing, but I hope that doesn't happen. They went through all the security checkpoints, metal detectors, etc. for weapons and were in fact there to party at THE bash of the year and nothing more. A valuable lesson to the Secret Service and a wonderful bit of fun for the rest of us. Goes to show you can get away with almost anything if you just do it with confidence. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

I imagine the forum rules are "flexible" for those who pay enough for their advertising space. Realistically, dropzone has already been cut loose from its corporate owners due to the current economic situation. Somebody has to pay the bills. I have gone to Tim's website and having determined he's an arch conservative Republican, I simply cannot support his candidacy. I am an Obama Democrat who believes we cannot bring enough "socialist legislation" down the pipeline quickly enough. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

Top of the heap has to be Janis Joplin. I actually saw Janis once, when I was thirteen years old. She was like a human tornado, I could feel the little hairs on the back of my neck standing up. When she stomped her foot down on the stage, you could feel it right through your seat. Nobody else can even come close. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

I go for single payer - i.e. shitcan the entire health insurance industry and turn it over to the government. That would mean paying for it with taxes, but consider this. I currently pay $127 a week for insuring myself, my wife, and one daughter and I still have to deal with the bullshit insurance company. That's over $6300 a year (they don't take a deduction for any fifth week in a month, which happens maybe twice a year). So what's the fucking difference if I pay it as taxes or premiums ? I've got a non-cancerous tumor in my head that needs attention on an annual basis. I really can't tell from one year to the next if I'll be employed, or with who, or if their insurance is worth a shit. Or if my tumor would be a pre-exiting condition. All I know is the damn thing won't go away if I lose my coverage. I'm willing to accept a "public option" as a compromise, but there I draw the line. Any plan without a the public option can go fuck itself ! Wake up people, the rest of the world sorted this out years ago. The rest of the world is HAPPY with their government plans - just asking any visiting foreigners at your local dropzone. The ones I talk to at Perris cannot believe that our health insurance is so fucked up. These people are Europeans too, they're not from some mud hut Third World country. Their standard of living is better than ours, and their health insurance is a part of it. It's time America wakes up and getswith the fucking program ! Period. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

Needs a bumpy. We'll be there ! I might add, without meaning to be dramatic, that this is a fatal children's disease. Children do not survive, so this is something that needs work. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

That about says it all right there, that and all the complaints about Tempos having built in turns and little or no flare. If you want to comparison shop for a new rig, compare the Opti with the Smart. But most importantly, get a reserve that's big enough to put you down safely, especially if you're already injured. That may be a problem with the Opti, as PD still can't get a TSO on the larger sizes. So if you need something bigger than a 143, consider regular PD reserve. Aerodyne obvioulsy decided they needed to come up with a better reserve and I know plenty of people who are happy with the Smart. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

I think the guy could be excused for getting a firearm out of his trunk and going "postal". Whether he used blanks or live rounds would depend on how dry his own sense of humor is... Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

Have you considered just skipping the test for once ? I know at first impression that sounds like a "quitter's" approach, and to be honest there is some risk of it turning out that way without some discipline a few months down the road. But maybe you just need to distance yourself for one cycle. Either skip this test (unless you've got money down for taking it). Or, give this test your best shot with a decision to let it go the next time and wait a year before taking it again. Maybe you'll just pass and you won't need to skip anything. I know skipping or waiting a whole year can put a lot of your career and life on hold, but you may need the year to decide for one thing if this is what your really want. Maybe you'd rather work in a paint store, or get a grant from National Geographic to study bats in belfries. Times are tough now and a job is a job, but is accounting REALLY something you want to do for the rest of your life ? Maybe it is, but maybe you haven't really asked yourself if there isn't something else you'd rather be doing. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

A First Lady is the wife of the President. As such, she's not required to "do" anything. Though most First Ladies in fact oversee the social affairs and dinners, etc, there's no requirement that they "do" even that (though obviously, good politics demands it). Fact is, if the First Lady wants to sit on her ass eating ice cream, drinking beer, and belching & farting all day, she's perfectly free to "do" that too. I don't recall either of the Bush first ladies "doing" that much. Nancy Reagan bought expensive dresses, hired an astrologer, had private lunches with Frank Sinatra, and told kids to "just say no" - now there was one BUSY woman. Betty Ford got strung out on pills and booze, then went into rehab. Hillary Clinton got very busy with her failed attempt at healthcare reform - and "ducking sniper fire" in Bosnia, or Kosovo, or wherever it never happened, and has been vilified for all of it ever since. So, uh, what's your beef with Michelle ? What do you think she SHOULD be "doing" ? I'd love to hear. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

You're mischaracterizing some people's reasons for opposition to the death penalty. I do not trust the government with the power of life and death over the populace. Given that, I do not trust the government to put citizens to death (for any reason). I fully believe he's guilty. I think that locking him up somewhere for the remainder of his days is sufficient to remove him from circulation, cheaper (generally) than a death sentence, and most importantly, doesn't give the power of life and death to an institution (the government) that I mistrust deeply. Exactimundo !! Couldn't have said it better myself. Emotionally, I could give a shit about the guy and don't mind seeing him executed, even though I am opposed to the death penalty in general for the above stated grounds. Also felt the same way about some sonofabitch who was hung in Washington state back in '94 - we all wore neckties to work (evening shift) to celebrate the night of the hanging. If that sounds contradictory, well human behavior often tends to be that way. But worth considering is what some of Charlie Manson's girls have said about life in prison. They had originally been sentenced to death, but commuted to life in 1972 when CA banned the death penalty for several years (since restored). They said they were ready to die and in many ways wish they had, because it would have been so much easier than having to live with confinement and their own consciences for the last forty years. In Susan Atkins' case, her sentence has now been completed with her death from brain cancer. She couldn't even get a compassionate release with terminal cancer and an amputated leg. So Patricia Krenwinkel and Leslie Van Houten must be bummin' as they realize they haven't got a snowball's chance in hell of ever being released. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

The Wonderhogs in the pics are all modified to either BOC or ROL p/c pouches. The earliest models in the mid to late seventies mounted the p/c pouch on the dreaded belly band. The earliest models I ever saw also featured a blast handle reserve ripcord and 1 1/2 shot Capewells. Saw some prototypes of what was called a "3 Ring Circus" cutaway system that had a hard orange piece of tubing for a handle instead of the pillow handle. (I remember wondering where in hell you were supposed to hook your thumbs into the rigs to cutaway.....and I am NOT making this up...). The Wonderhog sold for a princely $320 at a time when about $240 was the average price of a rig. They - and the SST Racer - were considered the two cutting edge rigs in the sport. And they were. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

Chasing a main is fine for a handful of jumpers, but I'd wouldn't reccomend it for most. If a jumper takes a look straight down after their reserve opens, they can use that info get a good idea of where the main will be. Most jumpers have little no experience flying their reserve canopies, or any 7 cell canopy for that matter. If they can make it the DZ, that's where they should go. That's where they planned to land, and they should stick to the plan. If they can't make it, the alternate LZ should be selected for being the safest choice, and not it's proximity to the main. Again, it's good for some people, but for most just making a safe landing should job #1. The main idea is to not get hurt. May be'spensive, but you can always buy another canopy if you have to. Once knew a woman who chopped and lost a brand new Stiletto. It sort of depends on the terrain around the dropzone, whether you're on the edge of town, around forests, corn fields, rivers, lakes, all that happy stuff. At Perris, we're blessed to be out on a lot of flat & sparsely inhabited desert. We're also SUPER blessed with a fantastic recovery crew ! If you cutaway, or land out, or even at a far corner of the DZ, a pickup truck will come and get you in minutes. Their recovery rate for cutaway mains is almost perfect and they manage to recover MOST of the freebags. From what I've seen at other dropzones, they don't seem to give a crap. You cutaway and land a half mile out, you - and your gear - are completely on your own, unless you brought some good friends with you. Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !