Nataly

Meh... That picture is the ONLY good picture of me ever taken and it looks NOTHING like me... Remi will vouch for the fact that I totally fit the "bland accountant" profile/stereotype... "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

Huh... That does sound strange but at least I will smell good!!! Will try that

Actually I think this misses an important part of the lesson that could be learnt. Doing gear checks with the wrong mindset is as bad as not doing them at all. It's interesting how 'obvious' things slip past us - a brilliant example is this experiment http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJG698U2Mvo Nthr gd xmpl s tht y cn prbbly rd ths txt vn thgh ll th vwls r mssng... Jst gs t shw hw gd w r t sng wht w wnt t s... "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

Analyze and don't repeat. Posting on DZ.com is a mixed bag. You can get valuable feedback if you can filter through the noise and you can share an experience that others can learn from. You can also elicit the ire of other jumpers who can view your post as over-dramatized or self-aggrandizing... it's a difficult medium for communication. I could have created a thread about the "near death experience" I had today... no shit...I really thought I was going to buy the farm, but my mistake was on the level, worse actually, of misrouting a chest strap...noob. But, just like a misrouted chest strap there is not much to be learned by the "community" from my experience. I knew exactly what mistakes I made that lead up to that "near death experience" and that was enough for me and the other jumper who I endangered. That said, don't take the heat from the post seriously. Anyone who is prone to posting online is going to get flamed from time to time. You like to blog and that's cool, you just have to consider your audience... at least one of your respondents did almost die in a "no shit I woke up a month later" kind of way and I don't recall them posting about it on DZ.com. There are A LOT of incidents, if not the vast majority, that never made it on this board and most here are aware of that fact. Again, consider your audience.... In the end though, it's great that we are reading this "over dramatized" thread instead of reading an incident report.

Yep. I have seen bats flying circles over my house at sunset for years, no doubt devouring the mass quantities of mosquitoes in the skies here on the lake. They are fun to watch. Had one even make a close pass over me. So I should get a pet bat?? "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

Cool - let me know how the coke-bottle trap works out - might have to try that out myself

Seems fairly simple to me... Flip a coin once and you are likely to get heads or tails and almost no chance of any other outcome... Flip it ten thousand times and it has a good chance of landing on its side at least once (ie: neither heads nor tails). Or another example: play russian roulette once - walk away unharmed. Play 100 times and it's bound to go *bang* at some point. Both are not great examples, because they are mostly random... however they do show that over time, if you do something dangerous, even though you can become more skilled and more aware, it remains dangerous. To me it's more surprising that some people get to 1,000 jumps without ever having run into any problems... "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

But... it has to be true if they put it on the Internet!!!??! She's not really a French model bro. She is when the lights are out! "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

Can't stand them... And believe me the ones over here are NOTHING like as vicious or plentiful as my native New Brunswick... But DAMN they irritate me!! Can someone tell me what the fuck purpose do they serve?? Specifically?? Why have we not come up with a way to kill them off forever?? And finally, would we really miss them if they were gone?? If you have "home remedies" for getting rid of mosquitos, please share!! (I have bug spray... It doesn't work ) "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

I will answer that, since I was one of the people who audibly tutted and rolled my eyes when I read what constitutes as "almost dying" according to you... I have had my share of moments when I thought "holy shit that was close/stupid/lucky"... I've scared myself a couple of times enough to seriously ask myself what I'm doing in the sport and whether it's "worth it"... I suspect most of us on here have... However, I suspect that most of us would be more cautious about making wildly exaggerated claims like "I nearly died"... Jeb Corliss flying off Table Mountain - he had a brush with death. Don't get me wrong... It's perfectly ok to think "oh my gosh I could have died". Such a reflection is normal, healthy, and part of your natural survival instincts. What I *don't* like is the attention-grabbing title you chose to describe what is essentially a non-event. I understand it may have been what you *felt* like at the time, but there is a HUGE difference between being scared shitless of a *potential* consequence compared to an *actual* near-death experience. I think some of the people who snickered at your post did so because some very humble people have had REAL brushes with death and have never once felt the need for such outrageous hyperbole. I'll be honest: I was so put-off by the gross exaggeration of that statement that I found it hard to take anything you wrote seriously after such a bad start - I had to force myself to read the rest of your post. It's like when they described the movie "Open Water" as "nerve-shredding terror"... It wasn't. It was three hours of obnoxious characters being predictably eaten one by one by sharks. I was only at the edge of my seat because I wanted so badly to leave the cinema (but I'm a cheap accountant and by principle I feel the need to watch the entire movie I just paid for no matter how awful it is). Nevertheless, I will give you this: had you said "I misrouted my chest-strap," most people would never have read your post. (Just like I never would have gone to see a movie about 10 stupid people stranded at sea.) And finally: just because I have never used the sentence "I nearly died yesterday" does not mean I do not fully realise the implications of similar mistakes I've made. It also doesn't mean I haven't reviewed my mistakes, learned from them, thanked my lucky stars nothing bad or worse happened, and talked/listened to others about what I should have done. I don't believe that not being a drama-queen means you are incapable of self-reflection and just "brush off" your mistakes... I think some people are less prone to making a mountain out of a mole-hill. Does that answer your question? Ps- I don't know you well enough to simply assume you are a drama-queen... Perhaps you just overstated one thing based on your reaction and/or how scared you felt... However, it was a pretty MASSIVE overstatement... Pps- Don't just assume that only the positive feedback is worthwhile... If you care about getting your message across, sometimes you have to choose your words carefully. Perhaps you wanted to be provocative. I, personally, was put off by it. But that's just me. "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

Just goes to show you have to take what you see/read from the news with a pinch of salt "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

OK, that actually makes a lot more sense... Her profile *does* say in the sport 15 years... However it doesn't take a maths genius to figure out that I joined DZ.com in 2004 and I think I haven't changed my profile stats since something like 2005...! Anyhoo, the OP has now learned 2 valuable lessons: - 1. Do a proper gear-check - 2. Use the sentence "I scared myself today" instead of "I almost died today" "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

+1,000,000 I almost died today... I went to cross the street and a car whooshed by at what seemed like 50 mph... At that speed, if it had hit me, I would have turned into yet another statistic... Good thing at the last minute I realised I needed to look both ways before I stepped into the death-trap that people call "a road"... ... Remember people... It *could* happen to you... Be safe PS: I know, I know... I couldn't help myself!! Do check your chest-strap - it's important. Don't talk about it like it was a near-death experience... It wasn't. On that basis, almost anything could be a near-death experience. "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

N/A

I think alcohool is an excellent example. A lot of people who demonise weed drink alcohool on a regular basis... They also regularly consume coca-cola, eat at mcdonalds, et cetera, et cetera... All quite likely to kill you (albeit less dramatically than a malfunction!!). ETA: I wasn't trying to contradict you - just building on your points, like you said "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

My work has approved 3 weeks off in September (they don't care if it's the first or last 3 weeks). Was thinking of going jumping. Been to Empuria - LOVED it each time. Great planes, good packing area, great restaurant/canteen, awesome vibes, excellent facilities, fantastic coaches... However, the last time I went I bought a block of 25 tickets (2, actually as I was with another jumper)... Unfortunately there were bad weather days and most of those tickets have since expired... A big dent in the wallet with almost no jumps to show for it... Not criticising their weather (!) or ticket expiry policy - I knew when I bought the tickets they were non transferrable/refundable and eventually expired. Anyway, I am considering trying Skydive Spain. Read a few reviews and it seems like a decent spot. Planes go to 15,000 ft, good facilities, canteen, coaches, tickets don't expire and block tickets become significantly cheaper than say Empuria. I don't want to base my decision purely on my wallet, but it is one factor. Has anyone been to both facilities (Empuria and Skydive Spain) and can you give me your opinion of both please? Preferably experienced jumpers... Thanks in advance.

The fact is that a lot of people died developing the technology that now allows for (relatively safe) skydiving... What they were doing was EXTREMELY risky. Testing new equipment, designing new suits, et cetera... The first to do it is always taking on an exponentially bigger risk... The pioneers of our sport were practicing some very extreme jumping, and comparatively, it's not that risky nowadays. HOWEVER, the reality is that skydiving is a totally avoidable activity that is purely for fun and involves a very real potential for injury and death. That is what most people think of when they say it's highly risky... If you compare that to a different past-time like reading a book or watching television, it obviously seems A LOT more extreme (because it is)!!! ETA - most people don't consider driving to be a very extreme activity because they have been exposed to it so much... In the same way, you have been exposed to "risky" activities and knowing/understanding the real risks makes those activities seem less extreme to you. The reality is probably somewhere in the middle... More dangerous than you would like to think, but less outrageous than whuffos imagine. "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

Saw this a few of months ago: http://www.ted.com/talks/mark_shaw_one_very_dry_demo.html "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

"FlyingRhinocerous"!!! "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

This is not bad logic... Think of all the morons on the road...! "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

I am certain some people *can* be rehabilitated but do they *deserve* to be set free?? Your response to this question depends on whether you think a sentence is meant to be punitive or simply to protect society... I personally don't feel I'm well-placed to pass judgement on this but I can't help but think of the victims and their families... THEY will never get a second chance... Death tends to be pretty final... "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

I just saw this now for some reason!! Nah. I don't post anything here that he would be surprised to read about (or hasn't actually read over my shoulder!!!). I think when you start sneaking around it's not only a lack of trust but also a lack of respect toward your partner. If it bit you in the arse because you wrote something on here you wouldn't have (or hadn't) said to her face, I'm not surprised she went ape-shit!! "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

I have watched nearly every episode of "Faites entrer l'accuse," which is a series that ran for 10 years in France about some of their worst criminals, how (if) they were brought to justice, et cetera. One thing that I saw again and again and again is the willingness to consider that the person may be rehabilitated and released, only for the person to become a repeat offender. A lot of the crimes are pretty extreme, and it never fails to amaze me how a serial killer could be let loose EVER... I don't even care if he (and it usually is a he) behaves perfectly well in a prison... None of the people he killed ever get a second chance - why should he? I know, I know... It is very expensive to keep a person in our overcrowded prisons... Still... Does the cost of detaining a prisoner outweigh the value of an innocent person's death??? I'm certain it's not so black and white... And I'm sure some people *deserve* a second trial (because they must get it wrong sometimes)... But I still can't wrap my mind around being released after 7 years or 15 years or 25 years when you have KILLED someone. "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

Yup. "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss

The fact is that people's past inevitably affects their decisions/actions/reactions. That's all I'm saying. On that basis, your future is inextricably connected to your past. Is a drug-addict more likely to fall back into addiction than someone who has never been an addict - hell yes. Because when presented with the opportunity to take drugs, the addict's brain knows what being high feels like whereas the other person can more easily dismiss it without a second thought. So presented with the same thing (ie: drugs), their past will affect the decision they make - it's not simply a yes/no 50/50 random result that will come out like flipping a coin... As for "never having that feeling again"... I don't think that is so pessimistic of me. You know, even long-standing couples lose that "passion" over time (as the relationship grows, changes, matures, deepens, et cetera). And christ, it's not necessarily such a bad thing - if I fell deliriously in love every time I met a great guy, I would be an emotional wreck every time it didn't work out (and lots of relationships *don't* work out - even some good ones!). I'm not revisiting the past and thinking "what if"... Nor am I thinking "doom and gloom" about my future... It is what it is. Something in my past that I don't think I will ever feel total indifference about (I'm not a robot!). "There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse." - Chris Hadfield « Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. » - my boss