NWFlyer

Not the point I was trying to make, but thanks for playing. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/30/carolyn-moos-jason-collins-fiancee-gay_n_3186736.html http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nba-ball-dont-lie/jason-collins-former-fiancee-carolyn-moos-had-no-170001023.html Comes out in 2013, broke off romantic relationship with the white woman in 2009. Sounds like we have a different definition of "cheater." "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

I feel your pain, I was that bastard myself earlier

Annie's on #2, so I vote for her. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

It would seem on a hot day that "less is more" but I've found that the times I've stripped down to shorts & a sports bra (no, I'm not going without a shirt entirely, though since you're a guy, that might seem logical). What I found is that is an open invitation for the spandex on the back of my jumpsuit to glue itself to my back and actually make me feel more hot and uncomfortable than if I had a t-shirt as a layer underneath. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

I know nothing about US Cellular, so it's hard for me to make a comparison. I've been with Verizon for over four years now, and the biggest plus I've noticed with Verizon is that the coverage area is extremely wide. They bought up a lot of the small rural carriers, so I'll often find a Verizon signal much farther out into the middle of nowhere than I expected (and if I'm around people who have other carriers, I usually have the better connection, if they even have it at all). "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

Nah, you did the right thing; you just got lumped in with a recent bad trend. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

Except for Keith, of course. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

This one's legit - an active user did a search for a topic rather than starting a new one. However, the majority of the thread necromancy lately has been by a disgruntled banned user who keeps creating new identities and bringing up old threads (or starting new ones) to "punish" (???) the mods for their "misdeeds." Most of them get cleaned up pretty quickly, but if someone responds before the mod cleanup, then the old thread is staying revived. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

I know you asked Bill, but I'm the original "wind wuss" and will chime in with what I look for. 1) Wind speed. I typically try not to go over 20 MPH, regardless of any other circumstances. 2) Wind gusts. What's the differential between the high/low winds? More than a few MPH and I'm watching very carefully because that tends to create some weird air. 3) Wind direction part 1. Is the wind coming over obstacles that can create turbulence well into the landing area? 4) Wind direction part 2. Is the wind direction fairly consistent? If it's changing frequently, it can create some weird air and/or put me in a position where I'm setting up to land into a steady wind and end up landing into a steady crosswind or steady downwind. 5) Observations part 1. When I watch other people land, what are their canopies doing? Are they coming in nice and smooth, or are they buffeting? Are cells even collapsing? Are people who are normally smooth landers having hard / weird landings? 6) Observations Part 2. Do I see any evidence of turbulent air, such as dust devils? 7) Other known quantities. Does this dropzone always get weird winds at a certain time of day or a certain time of year? Does the weather forecast say a storm's brewing? 8) Who's sitting down? Last but definitely not least, pay attention to who is jumping and who is sitting down. If most of the people on the jump are working jumpers (tandems & videographers) and guys with under a few hundred jumps, look around for the rest of the folks. Chances are they'll be hanging out in a comfy chair by the landing area, watching other people get "experience." Go hang out with them for a while. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

he had a third choice - life his life as he sees fit. no need for fanfare, just live his life the best he knows I see that as the same as my second choice. But because he is a public figure, he also chose to break the "news" on his own terms. I get where you're coming from - that this really shouldn't BE news, but right now it still is. An interesting comparison in the "public figure" realm is how Hollywood/media folk are addressing it lately. It used to be (and still is for some) that coming out required a People magazine cover and an official announcement. Now, it's just as likely that someone will live their life openly but never make any official pronouncement; instead, they might just make a casual reference to their partner in an interview, or bring a same-sex date to a red carpet event. That area of "public figure" (Hollywood/media) is farther

Unfortunately, we still are at the point where a professional athlete in a major revenue sport in the U.S. being gay is news. Collins had two choices; continue to live his life closeted, or live his life openly. Being a public figure, making choice #2 then offers him two more options. Wait until some news source decides that they're going to make it "news" and does so on their terms, or choose the source, choose the message, and make it a positive discussion on his terms. I rather liked his approach, because if you read it, it's actually very personal and low-key and he underplays the "hero" role quite credibly. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

I laughed, so I didn't consider it twaddle. But thanks for sharing. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

Just in case you missed it... Spacey did a brilliant spoof for the WH Correspondents Dinner called "House of Nerds." He has a LOT of high-profile help. https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=dCzI521sgqE#! "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

He's getting a lot of high-profile support, too, which I think will go a long way for helping get this to the point where a few years from now we'll all wonder what the big deal was after all. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're saying, but it seems like you were looking at the wrong piece of hardware. If your problem is that one leg strap is looser than the other, the problem wouldn't be in the elastic band (which is there to keep excess leg strap from flapping around) - it would be in the friction adapter that actually holds the leg straps in place. Advice? Have a rigger look at the friction adapters before you make another jump on that rig. (And if it's rental gear, call the DZ and ask them to pull that rig for inspection). "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

SkyDance actually puts students & rental gear on a wind hold at the same time. Keeps the post-AFF students down (which I think is really the dropzone's responsibility), and it keeps the rental gear safe (and by extension, keeps at least some of the freshly-licensed safer while they build up their own judgment to know better). Just an alternative to consider. (BTW, for all the noobs reading, a student/rental gear wind hold is usually when I, with 1000+ jumps, start to think seriously about sitting down, too, depending on wind direction and gustiness). "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

1:4:1 The "notable event" (and beer) was earning my WSCR at Bay Area Skydiving (Byron) on Saturday. We had a great group out for 4-way scrambles, and pulled eight women together at the end of the day to do a WSCR on sunset load. We had a few men who came joined us as well, but unfortunately, we built it late enough in the dive that they weren't able to dock (we actually built with plenty of time, but wanted to be sure we held our 8-way with just the women for 5 seconds to be sure we had it, THEN we were going to allow the men to come in, but we signaled for them to join us just at breakoff time. Still, really cool to be part of the revival of this piece of skydiving history! "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

There's a reason those of us who've been around a while call those "500 jump maximum" loads. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

Mad John - thanks for inspiring us to get the first WSCR at Bay Area Skydiving (Byron) today! It was a whole lot of fun, just wish we could have gotten you yours today. Next time for sure! "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

Off the top of my head, here are a few references. These are a bit outdated, but most of the formations are still the same. Good tool for visualizing and learning 4-way specifically. http://www.teamfastrax.org/4way.html You could also go to the USPA site and download the Skydivers Competition Manual; yes, it's specific to the U.S., but since the USPA generally accepts FAI competition rule changes, it's a good reference. There are some general introductory chapters in there that describe the disciplines & rules, as well as the dive pools. http://www.uspa.org/USPAMembers/Downloads/tabid/84/Default.aspx Last but not least, there are several great articles on this very site: http://www.dropzone.com/safety/Disciplines/Relative_Work/index.shtml "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

One of my favorite science teachers in high school was my physics teacher, who was a longtime engineer in the Navy who picked up teaching as his second career. His enthusiasm for the subject was infectious! "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

Wait, kids still actually want to earn money these days? "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

I'm surprised to see some of these numbers, but then again, it's probably just a difference in markets. IIRC I paid $70 about 10 years ago in Seattle for a relatively small lawn. But, that was probably a supply/demand thing - after calling around to a whole bunch of services and having them either not respond at all or say they were completely at capacity, one finally referred me to a guy (white natural-born US Citizen, btw) who was just starting out his business, and I used him for 3 years (till I moved to a townhouse without a lawn). I'm pretty sure by the end there he had enough business that he could charge more in the $100 range, but he kept mine at the original rate since I was one of his first customers. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

Because I'm not sure how an island nation in the Mediterranean will help me if I'm unable to deploy. "There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke