shall555

Heh. This Moravian Sugarcake. A regional favorite. shall

:1:0 Sitfly jump. Pal Matthew shot video so we could critique it. Ok, so I have a lot to work on ! A crummy note when I got down, though. As I started packing, I noticed a number of holes and weakened spots in the top three cells of the canopy. The conjecture is that battery acid from a leak last weekend may have permeated the carpet where I packed that weekend. So, canopy goes back to PD for surgery. On the bright side, I immediately got two offers of canopies to use from folks in the club. That was so great! I had just told someone this week about how cool it was that skydivers sort of look after each other... shall

It's not as "uncool" as it sounds. You can hunt around here on the forums for some "billbooth" posts where he discusses the reasons he hasn't licensed the Skyhook to other manufacturers. He also discusses why on a recent Skydive Radio interview. Booth and RWS are careful, thoughtful people. Check 'em out. Cheers, shall

Very nice ! That jaggedy, split pattern looks snazzy. shall

Just got some REI Expedition weight long underwear bottoms. Wow, they stayed warm on my recent minus-10 degrees at 10,000' AGL jump! ( I made the first/last/only load this past Sunday... frigid - but fun.) shall

You don't have an entry for "flail until pull time" shall

I remember once in around '77 or '78 the controller, on a slow Sunday morning, telling the pilot he'd tell him when the jumpers left. Sure enough, about 2 seconds after one guy exited, the controller told the pilot. Amazing that they can see reflections from harness hardware on those things. Of course, today, software may filter out the 'junk' better. shall

When I was doing photography pretty seriously, I dealt with 3 vendors that always did exactly what they said they would do: Calumet Photo B&H Photo Adorama Camera I'd add NewEgg to the list for digital cameras and electronics, too, but their camera stuff tends toward consumer-level stuff. You can't go wrong with any of the outfits listed above. shall

You know how they say "Your mileage may vary" ? My PRK varied a *lot* from Speer's description. First, while the procedure wasn't painful, for the following 24 hours it felt like someone had put a cigar out in my eye. Super knockout pills just blunted the pain. On the several followup visits, it became apparent that the vision in my "corrected" eye wasn't going to snap back the way the majority of peoples' eyes do after PRK. They typically over-correct and expect the eye to heal back to the ideal shape. In my case, the cornea healed at the point where the PRK laser left it -- 4.5 diopters in the far-sighted direction. I was about 4.5 diopters *near-sighted* before, so I now have one eye far-sighted by as much as the other's near-sighted. Makes wearing glasses impossible. Based on my experience, I can't recommend PRK. I've had several acquaintances who had great success with Lasik, though none were skydivers. I guess what I'm saying is "Be careful out there." There's a possibility that you could wind up like me, in the 1% of people that had nightmare results. Hey, this is your *vision* we're talking about. Are contacts so awful ? Cheers, shall

Here's a shot of a Silly Suit. Plenty of fabric there ! under canopy shall

Here's Don in full HALO regalia: Don in '75 shall

That's terrible news. I jumped with Don a bunch back when he was the DZO at Palatka. Great guy. He made the cover of Parachutist magazine (at least) once. It's a black and white photo of a jumper in HALO gear. Perhaps someone can find an image of that and post it here. Blue skies, Don! shall

practicing monk-i-tude:2:0 One flermy sit-fly attempt ( flermy: look it up. It's between "flailing" and "fubar" in the dictionary ). Then, one *spectacular* one. I hit the sit and could actually make controlled turns. This stuff is so much fun... shall

Those who can do a good deed 12/26 ABQ -> Eloy - shall555 12/29 Eloy -> ABQ - shall555

Why, FOPS, of course: Fallers Over Phifty Society I've always wanted to dress well enough to be called a "fop." shall

Bob ? shall

Because something cool is guaranteed to come up that requires a license. For me, it was a chance to join the team of folks doing a Ripley's Believe It or Not jump from the wing of a 1933 German trimotor. A D license was required, so I got mine. There's always something ! shall

I thought this was a post about a Tim Conway sketch from the old "Carol Burnett Show." "Hello, Misses-a Wiggins" Guess not... The hurricane support thing is cool, though. Good luck and stay safe ! shall

monk-like existence:2:0 One spazzy, sit-fly attempt ( ever have a day when things just don't click ?) One 3-RW attempt. Fooey. The good part was 100+ mile visibility and fall colors visible along the Rio Grande. Such beauty. shall

Just guessin' here (I'm not a rigger, and my TV show was cancelled), but an X-strap configuration might not provide enough tension to counter the spreading forces on the MLW in the event of a head-down opening. shall

Man, I miss the belly band on my old Wonderhog Sprint. Sure, it had the pilot chute pouch on it, but, the harness felt *secure*. When I first put on a modern rig this past spring, it felt really minimal, compared with what I remembered about my early 80s gear. Just a chest-strap and legstraps make me feel much less "contained." I'd pay for a well thought-out belly-band and backstrap mod to my new rig, that's for sure. shall

I am a highly-trained software aardvark. shall

not even:2:0 Two fun sitfly jumps, solo. The sitfly stuff is really stable, now, but getting there is, ummm, let's say, *ugly*. A pal had his first chop on one of my loads. Odd to see that reserve *way down there* when he left the plane after I did. shall

This kills me ('cause I was almost there a couple of weeks ago with a new canopy). Here's how I handled it: I. Asked. For. Help. Baggin'. The. Damned. Thing. Yep. Asked for help the first 3 or 4 packjobs. And while there *was* some low-level snickering, I got it done. Now, with 9 jumps on it, I can get it in the bag, solo. It's still not pretty, but it seems to open the same. YMMV shall

Just got confirmation from my boss for the time off. I'm gonna be there (for a few days, anyway). I'm looking forward to meeting some of the DZ.com folks whose postings I've been chuckling over for the last 6 months! Do they have beer there ? shall