sixtysevengt5oo

I'm one of those geeks banging at a keyboard for way too long, and I used the information in my Interview. I'm a clinical engineer, and they asked about my ability to problem solve, work on a team, commit, etc. all of which skydiving applies to (I didnt use it in all those examples just saying). It actually first came up on the question about a large undertaking that I have done in my life, and I talked about the creation of my universities skydiving club. It doesn't matter what the job is or who the interviewer is, it is all about your ability to relate your skydiving in a positive manner, and create a since of purpose to it for the interviewer regardless of if they see it as reckless. Nerds skydive too dam**tt

I've been out fo the sport for what feels like an eternity, actually only about a year. I'm hopping to be able to go out to the DZ either this weekend or the next, and frankly I have those first time jitters just thinking about it, excited jitters though. Anyways, to those of you that have taken long breaks and come back, what is that first jump back like, terrifying, more fun than ever, etc.?

also if you tighten the outer bolts it will make the ammount that you have to squeeze the lens slightly less, it doenst really effect the friction of the lens moving up or down either

Does anyone know of DZ's in the Caribbean, more specifically St. Maarten?

So does anyone have any ingenious ideas of how to get cable to the dropzone so we can see the Aggies BTHO of Tech. And hadnt i heard something about some other aircraft possibly making an appearance? Anyways cant wait to see everyone there, tons of fun

actually the speed of sound in the upper atmosphere would be much slower in the upper atmosphere, the further apart the molecules in the medium that the sound is passing through, the slower the speed of the sound, thats why the speed of sound along a metal pipe or a string is nearly double that of the speed of sound through the air, sorry, had to clear that up

66 hrs. because of finals, for the last 14 hrs of studying i thought that there was a homeless dude sitting next to me, and every 10 min or so i would look over there to reasure myself that it was a halucination, but then at the 66th hr., i stood up to go to the bathroom and for about 20 sec. i didnt see the room i was actually in, i saw the hanger at the dropzone where i work, with a reserve hung up for inspection (tell you what i really had on my mind). so yeah no sleep = halucinations. p.s. did you know that as per the DSM IV (the manual that defines all recognized mental disorders) if you are awake for more than 72 hrs. strait, you are considered mentally ill, and it is a legitimate way to plea insanity in a court of law, so long as the illegal act came within the period of sleeplessness following 72hrs.

thats why i said you have to potential to make... obviously if there is no one jumping you arent making any money, but how many other jobs can you say you truely enjoy the atmosphere, i highly doubt you enjoy the atmosphere of working at McDonalds

does any one use these new samsung models, and are they able to fit an external lens, i.e. wide angle just seems a camera that small would be nice on the neck

It would be one thing if your family was supportive, but you've made it clear they're not. If your nephew goes in or is permanently maimed, are you prepared for the family blaming you for it forever? When I was newer in the sport, I’d try to recruit others to join in. Not any more, especially not younger adults, i.e., the kids of friends & relatives my age. The reason is simple: shit does happen skydiving, and if something happened to one of them, I’d basically be blamed for it the rest of my life. No thanks. I've always had a little bit of trouble understanding this idea, why do we decide that we shouldnt encourage something that we believe someone else will enjoy for the fear of other blaming us. We encourage people to drive, people die driving, we encourage people to play sport, people die and are maimed playing sports, we encourage people to scuba dive, more people die scuba diving than skydiving. When you encourage something, in no way can any fault be placed on you, in the end it is the other individuals choice about what to do, whether to try it or not. Aside from all that, yeah my mom thought i was an idiot after my first tandem, and a year later she was going through tough times, and i was going again, and she decided she was going to go do something crazy and stupid, so she jumped, understood why i loved it so much and payed for my AFF 2 days later as my b-day present. Everone else in the fam still dunno what for i jump outa perfectly good airplane. My grandpaw when i showed him pictures, strait faced and seriously asked me, "what happend to the plane?"

If you really think about the pay rate of your avg. packer, say they make $5 per pack, chances are the absolute slowest they will be is 20 min, and if there are enough rigs, that means they are making 15 an hour, thats good pay in realit, esp. for doing something in an atmosphere that you like, likely being younger, no degree etc. and if you are packing tandems, chances are you've got the sport rigs down to 10-12 min, and tadems to no more than 20 min, say 5 for a sport and 10 for a tandem, you have the potential to make 30 to 40 an hour, which is amazing pay no matter who you are.

on fandango Jumpmaster: Hit your reserve MAN!!! Jumper: (procedes to punch his belly reserve) i laughed for like 10 min straight, and proceeded to watch the scene over and over again

Can anyone out there honestly say that the havent broken a law before, can you even honestly say that there is a day that goes by that you dont break atleast one law, even if its just a measly trafic violation. I doubt any of us could, chances are that if cameras were in place all over the city they arent going to try and get you for that kinda stuff, but isnt it a bit unerving that we are allowing them the power to do so. Everyday the country begins to sound and look a whole lot more like 1984 allowing the government to detain someone for an indefinate time without being told what they are charged with, or allowing then the opporotunity for bail all under the guise of National Security, allowing our words to be recorded and monitored in case we say and HOT words, being video taped so as to watch our every mistake, and no one taking a loud if not violent stand against it. We have become complacent about our government, and assume that everything they do is for our safety, but we are giving our lives to them on a silver platter, they may not come after us yet, but we have afforded them the ability to do so whenever they decide. We are constently being led astry like a flock of sheep and a herder that can do whatever he wishes. The best way to improve our government is to constantly critisize it, force it to earn its ligitimacy from us. We have forgotten that the only power the government is allowed is the power that the people afford it. And we are obligated by our founders to alter or abolish any government that abuses or steps beyond the power that we the people afford it. I dont remember ever affording them the right to have me on video survelance, yet they do any way, seems like they are overstepping a little to me, yeah?

Not saying you are wrong, but there are many sources that allude to missing russian nuclear material much of it being EU for reactors, some of it being weapons grade, many "dirty bombs" are made from nuclear waste and there are many reports that there are some being made from higher U-235 content, as for the briefcase bomb, yes we and russia mad some nuclear weapons to be that size, but the terms briefcase bomb and dirty bomb are often use sunonomously (sp?) by others, and most intel reports sugest that dirty bombs would likely be carried in briefcases. And if you know where i could read about the non-radioactive effect of a Uranium arresol inhalation please send me a link or something, i have looked for good studies on it before but always find just the effects no info about the study that concluded that. p.s. dont take that last statement as a stab, i actually would like to know where to see the info.

by non-radioactive i meant non-fissile i appologize, the fissle material is the one that emits particles at a rate high enough to cause damage from prolonged exposure U-238's half life is long enough that the radiation emitted is rarely enough to cause problems except when inhaled or extream prolonged exposure. I also remember reading an article about the dust issue with DU bullets, dont remember the credentials but it claimed that the density of the particles was more than enough to cause them to settle on the ground within a relativly short distance of the impact. Again dont remember the credentials on that one, so lemme know if thats wrong.

If taking pride in America, my country, and presumably yours is politically incorrect, so be it. If endeavoring to stay a great nation, working to correct issues, and build a stronger future for our children lables me, by you as being "hell-bent on alienating us from the rest of the world", you're wrong. America wouldn't be what it is today without the help and blood of others. We are going to "politically correct" ourselves back into the stoneage. If you don't have pride in this country, a deep pride which will allow you to shout from the mountain tops how you feel, regardless of what others think, I suggest you start working right now to change it. You, as an American (again I'm making the assumption) have the power to change it. Just to throw another pointless 2 cents in, can anyone answer me why we have to categorize our selves by a nonsensical imaginary boundary laid out on a map. I understand having pride in which ever group you wish to stand for, by why no something with more REAl cohesion like religion, or language, or culture/customs, or better yet why not work to be proud to be a human instead of working to rise abouve other humans that may be less fortunate and shout about being prod to be an american, yeah its great to be patriotic, but y try to raise up one group of people instead of all of them, whether you believe it or not we ARE all created equal and we SHOULD all have the same opporotunity to succed and prosper, just like we cant choose what color we are born as, we cant choose at what lattitude and longitude we are born, why should that become a factor in our ability to live life to the fullest. Ok carry on now

You may have hit on something. During the week I drink a lot of fruit juice at work but only rarely drink any at home. I hadn't had any all weekend, so maybe I'd better cut out the fruit juice (grapefruit, cranberry) at work during the week and just stick with water. Walt if you are drinking 100% fruit juice that havent been artificially flavored or sweetened then those are fine for carbs, fructose takes significantly longer to metabolize than does sucrose or glucose(obviously), esentially the carbs from fruit juices are still good carbs, but they are simple they make for a good quick energy boost in the morning or right before a work out. And also drinking a diet soda before a work out, if it is sweetened with artificial sweetner, i.e. sweet'n'low or equal, or some dirivative thereof, isnt likely to give you an energy boost, because those act as catalysts of sorts on the tounge, they pass out of your system unchanged unmetabolized, essentially they trick you into thinking something is sweet. They do it by magnifying your tastebuds sensitivity which is why there is also often a bitter after taste associated with them. Dunno exactly what you drink but hope that helps. Sorry i dunno how to help with the insatiable craving for breads.

Yeah its always good to get back on topic, sorry about my earlier rant, it pissed me off. Anyways, if i were the make an argument about what it is or is not, and how that matters, honestly i would focus on rhetoric, the way phrases sound and what connotations are brought with them. Civil unrest sounds less severe than civil war. Insurgency sounds more evil, all of these different words and phrases generally mean the same thing but are thought of in different ways. Civil war-A war between factions or regions of the same country Civil Unrest- typically used by law enforcement to describe one or more forms of disturbance caused by a group of people. Civil disturbance is typically a symptom of, and a form of protest against, major socio-political problems Insergency- The quality or circumstance of being rebellious At what specific point does a civil unrest become an insurgency become a civil war, no one really knows, they are objective adjectives. President Bush will mostlikely never call it a civil war, it sounds as though we threw the country into something worse than it was when we started, a civil unrest or insurgency sounds like something that can be quelled by normal law enforcement procedures. The only people qualified to say what it is are the soldiers that have been there, especially those that have been there for multiple tours to see how the climate has changed. It also carries with it a stratagy to control the situation, this is where the media and the american public do play a part really. Americans dont want to hear civil war that means that radical control measures have to be inacted, most likely meaning more troops, more time, and more money, three things we dont want, and the president def. wont say something we dont want to hear. An insurgency sounds like something that is under control and will just take a little time to quell before we can get back to the drudgery of cleanup and government building. I think its a pretty cool answer to a very good question, i've always enjoyed critiquing and examining rhetoric, and taking note of how effective changing one word in a 20 min speech can completely change the meaning of the entire thing, and if you listen to President Bush's speeches your will quickly realize that his speech writer is a lingustic genius that has his words slaughterd by who i believe to be a half-illeterate war mongrel, but thats beside the point. Keep this thread going, its pretty cool.

That's total BS. It's the liberal media making up stories to further their agenda. Our military would never do something like that. There's got to be another side to the story. Im not sure if you are being scarcastic or not but im going to assume you arent Can anyone explain to me y it is that anytime something negative is said about the war or the administration, it HAS to be because its a LIBERAL media. I honestly would think that there would be a better answer by now. Look at some news sources from arround the world many other countries most conservative news source is more liberal than any of our own. Our media is the most conservative media market in the world, it is less informative than a sheet of toilet paper. Their only goal is to make a buck telling people what they will listen too, stories are always skewed to either be more extream than they really were, or less hellaceous than reality. The media that we are givin is all filtered and approved by the FCC, it is all altered and set out in layman's terms and has no content. I dont know which way this article really went did they sugar coat the real thing or did they blow it out of proportion. And as for what our military would and would not do, trust me things you and i couldnt even fathom happen, i would be willing to bet that more than once a nervous trigger happy rookie has put a bullet between an 8 y.o. eyes, pregnant women have been killed, innocent civillians have been beaten and tortured. Not to say that this is the norm or that unthinkable things dont happen to our guys, but war is war, its very nature causes morality and law to be subverted. A soldier doesnt get the benefit of being able to assure that a target is a threat before making the decision to kill him, that means civilians get killed, it also means less of our soldiers die, tempers rage, adreniline flows, judgement gets clouded, that means inoocent people get beaten. Untill you have walked miles in the shoes of a soldier AND and iraqi civilian, dont play omnicient bystander and say these things just dont happen, its makes you sound blind and ignorant. On the topic of the thread, i think any soldier, seasoned or as green as a new twig, that beleives that immoral and improper are happening deserves to be listened to and respected. Even if someone can tough it in the war, they still know what is moral and what is right, war doesnt change what is moral. From my perspective being a bystander, i dont care how vicious the enemy is or how wonderful our soldiers are, dropping munitions for a week strait causing and entire countries infrastructure to crumble, killing at minimum 30,000 people (unknown whether they were civilian or hostile) and killing god now how many others because of the loss of infrastructure is immoral, not to menting the justification for this atrocity, we had inconclusive (and later proven false) information leading us, and an alterior or backup motive for the war that is hipocrytical. We decided to go with we were freeing a nation of people from a horrible dictator, even though north korea, iran, sudan, china, and numerous other african countries had been marked as worse human rights violators than iraq by the geneva convention. If you have to kill some to save many atleast make it the country where the most improvement will be seen. And when people critisize the war dont denounce then as crazy hippies. You know why we dont invade china, or korea, or iran, or the numerous african countries, because it would either be detrimental to us or we have no reason to other than the human rights abuses. Attack china, hell no, over 50% of our imports come from there, we would doom ourselves. Attack N. korea, hell no, they have a military 4 times the size of ours and you know what happened the last time we tried to help attack them. Attack Iran, (earlier hell no), hell no, people would say we were going after oil; now we can say we are stoping another nuclear power but thats a whole different story. Attack sudan or some of the other african countries, hell no, for one what does america care if some african tribes are being slaughtered by machetes every day, and two does that country matter to us in any other way, no. In all truth we dont give a shit whether dictators are lynching their own people, that is unless we gain something else out of taking them over. Our Government and our army are very willing to commit atrocities in order to further their ideas of imperialism. Every great empire has done it, every great empire has made enemies doing it, both internally and globaly, and every empire has fallen because of it. Unless more people like this soldier start to voice their opinions about these matters we will follow the same path as all the other great empires, the path right into the ground, hopefully i'll be dead before then, but if im not i'll be sittin there sayin, "told ya so."

For some people sports are their hobbies, competition is what i do for fun, the more chalenging something is the more fun it is. but aside from that... as was being said about the activity being cash based, i think that is what makes this one of the last TRUE sports. People play the sport because they love the sport, not because it will make them money, not because it may offer them a way to go to college, hell its more likely to cause you to drop out, not only do most of us not get paid to play but do the paying to be able to go out and play the greatest sport on earth. Baseball, basketball, football, soccer, tennis, all the sports have been corrupeted by the chance to make millions, the only one that actually play it for fun are the youngest ones, they start and they love it, and then they come to think of it as a way to get _____. So cheers to all of us that now what a TRUE sport is, and impovrish ourselves to play!

What you need is a little coaching on how to lie with statistics. A true persuasve paper looks at the arguments against your position, and give evidence to counter each of them very methodicly. If you want to convince someone that skydiving is safe you dont want to tell them that the reserve is there just incase the main fails. A simple argument blows that out of the water, the truth is that any given main can and will fail eventually and every precausion is taken to increase the probability that the reserve opens afterwards. You can just give statements that dont address the counter -argument. Lies are the easiest thing to counter, when you say that you are more likely to die playing a round fo golf, i would simply ask if those deaths are realated to the game itself, and you'd be sunk. If instead i said that while skydiving you are more likely do die of natural causes in the plain, or on the ground waiting to go up, or even in the air, than you are from a direct realation to skydiving, you wouldnt have a le to stand on. If you are able to preempt the most common arguments as to why skydiving isnt safe in the paper the less amunition someone has afterwards to still claim it is unsafe. Also blatantly lying leads to mistrust and a higher likelyhood that whatever you say subsequently would be less persuasive. Good ideas for Skydive = Safe paper: -Noting that skydiving, like every action in life is a risk calculation -Noting that most "dangerous" activities that we participate in we do without ever assesing those risks (i.e. driving a car, eating canned food or raw oysters) -Throughly explaining the extensive measures to reduce risks -explaining the cause of most injuries and deaths -then using some real would comparissons to other "dangerous activities" (i.e. scuba) this allows people to compare their own lifestyle to one that includes skydiving -a cool manipulation of statistics, even though true, just a little contorted is that there are approx. 30 deaths in the US per year recorded due to skydiving, there are approx. 3 million skydives recorded each year in the US, do the math, approx, 1 per 100,000, the avg. lifespan is approx. 70 years X 365 days = 25,550 days in a life, meaning that if you made one skydive every day of your life, you would only have a 1/4 chance of being killed by it. Yeah this doesnt take into account other serious injuries, but that is another topic of safety. -And finely for some irrefutable "logic" talk about how the real safety of a skydiver depends on how safe the skydiver carries himself, that the mitigated risks of skydiving can be further mitigated by a skydiver that always acts with descresion. you do all those things and there isnt much someone can say that would make skydivng sound "unsafe" aside from agreeing with you that safety is a risk assesment term. p.s. I am not saying that skydiving is "safe," do i think it is safe enough to take the risk and be able to know what it feels like to fly, hell yeah else i wouldnt be doing it, but by damn it could be a lot more dangerous than it is and id still be in the air. Big thanks to all of those that have worked to make it as safe as it is.

i have to admit you are a psychic, im a junior in college i understand the resouces argument, i just think that if people had more decisions about who to chose the threat of majority tyranny would be less likely, even if one of the four controled 40% and the other three only had 20 % a piece, that dominant party still cant make all the decisions, it still has to "bargain" with atleast one other party, assuring a more balanced policy making process, every decision would require atlest some discussion instead of blind passage. Maybe its eutopic, but i think any change in that area of politics would be better than what we have now.

The best answer is that there isnt one. Everything in life is subjective, we like to think that the government, and ourselves are objective thinkers, but we arent, truth is subjective. I.E. at one time our government said (not quoting) hey, slavery is ok, they are inferior and it is our responsibility to control them otherwise they would reclessly destroy themselves. Is that true, i dont think so, people then did think so, what has changed since then other than the way we interpret the idea that all men are created equal. Truth is subjective, if you think what you are told is true, then it IS true, but true to YOU, not neccesarily the guy next to you. As per conspiracies some are radicle and easily denounced, others are very feaseable and never truely confirmed or denied. Do think that there are things that the general public should know, hell yes, honestly i think there are many things that we know too much about, causing us to aimlessly worry over trivial things. On the flip side i think there are somethings that are illigitimately covered up, we are told only partial truths so that we dont start snooping for the real answers. If i were to say that i was omnipitant, i beleive that the government is lying to us in one way or another about everything, everything they say only contains half truths and whole lies, they want power and they know that if they told us everything we would be forced to alter or abolish them. I believe we are forcefed a nice facade of BS, and we self medicate oursleves with peace of mind that they know what they are doing, them is educated. Most of us blindly accept many lies as truth and walk blindly through our lives, when we should be questioning everything we are told. If we were truely smart we would revert to acting like little children, you know why they learn so much so fast, because they dont know what is true, they question everything untill they are able to formulate an answer for themselves, unfortunately somewhere along the way we were told to stop asking so many questions and just beleive what we are told, which undaubtedly we lead to our ineveitible demise. Think about that for a while.

For one thing, the press says what it think the american people want to hear, ay what they want and they will listen, america wants a win, but a win means there isnt anything to report on anymore, that is why they report about what we dont want to hear. Adie from that though i would love some elaboration on how the american pubic are a bunch of whinning cry babies with no backbone. I would personally think that if we just said you doing great Bush keep on keepin on, and not challenging what we dont agree with, or have learned to disagree with, would be more spineless, more cowardly, more weak, than actually standing and speaking for what we believe, and right now a large portion is standing up and asking for answers., they are challenging bush on his decisions cause they obviously havent worked yet, we arent saying that we wanted a miricle war that lasted 2 weeks and enstilled a credible stable government over night, most of them just want progress not regress. I also dont think that those people that believe in the war and beleive that what we are doing is right and stand for that are cowards, i think the only coward or cry baby is the one that sits by and does nothing for fear of opressinon, its the people like that that allow the government to "get away with murder." And if you want my honest opinion i think those of you that find people like me to be whinning cry babies are mindless pawns of a corrupt government that are lead astray and off a cliff by a sadistic herder. If you truely believe in what we are doing in iraq, then find a way to justify what we are doing dont try to denounce those that disagree with petty childish comments, use your mind instead. The only triumph of evil is for good men and women to stand by and do/say nothing. No one can say objectively who is good and who is evil, so everyone must stand and voice their opinions and act on those opinions or else we are bound to fall to evils plan sooner or later. Think about that for a while.

CAN'T WE ALL JUST GET ALONG? joking aside, it would be awsome if we could all unite and agree. but the one thing that has made this country great (and allowed it to be horrible at the same time) is that we arent unified, the arguments, the discussions, the clash of ideas, the differences in opinion, the two parties (though there ought to be 4) is what allows us to continue emproving and to continue doing what is best for everyone. The problem that i find with current politics (and politics in all of our history) is that the division is almost equal but just one sided enough to virtually silence the other half. We are able to argue and debate and comprimise, but when it comes to the final say what ever the right wants, the right gets, because we have shifted just passed the balance point to give them virtually sole power. This has happened before when the contry swung just far enough left to allow the left to get whatever it wanted, the reason that we are able to progress is during those short spurts as the power is changing hands to be balanced and actually progress. Sometimes the right is right, sometimes the right is wrong, sometimes the left is right, sometimes the left is wrong; thus if one side holds majority power, we are doomed to only get at best a 50 % correct score (assuming those things that are neighter right nor wrong, still arent correct) 50% correct is not a way to progress. So when we have a balence between the right and the left we have the ability to be right 100% of the time (virtually impossible but still capable). One thought, one party, one methodology will eventually lead to tyranny, that is inevitable, bickering and arguing is the only thing that allows us to stay free. Yet with our "majority rule" stance, we have majority tyranny any time either the left or the right have enough say. Yet when we have a good balance we have a efficient democracy and we progress, this is why we have times of economic stagnation and regression, and we have economic booms (economics deals with the same left right power strugle), times of political termoil, and time or political rest. p.s. the 4 party thing, this is the best solution, assures that no group would logically ever have a 51% voice. the 4 parties would be the socially and economicaly conservative, the socially conservative economically liberal, the socially liberal economically conservative, and the socially and economically liberal (republican, church, libertarian, democratic respectively). Currently we are locked into being one or the other, totally liberal or totally conservative, when in fact there are two parts to being either liberal or conservative. Being able to chose any of the possibilities would cause the progression of this country to go to heights never before seen. taking an approch from all angles to find the best one is beter than looking from one side or the other. Not to mention it would likely lead to people having to be more politically savy in order to know who they are voting for, and would, i think, lessen the "i voted for the lesser of two evils" idea. Who aggrees with me?