AndyMan

Congrats! Awesome. Now the real fun, and the real learning starts. I'll be there Saturday for the 4 way meets, btw. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

My Epson 1280 took a dump, and I can't get it fixed so I'm back in the market for a new printer. It's been a while since we've done this, and I know printer models have changed. Is everyone still using Epson? I'm a bit hesitant to do Epson again since I'm having so much trouble finding someone to fix the one I have. Is anyone using HP or Canon? What models, why did you pick it, and are you happy with it? _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I've never been impressed by Carrie. I'm not a huge country music fan, but it's more than that - her stage presense sucks, her song choice is odd, and many of her performances are weak. I never would have guessed she'd make the final, and in this post I even went so far as to predict she wouldn't. Bo is an awesome singer. He deserves to win, and I hope he does. edit: Carrie is spelled with a 'c'. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

That "search posts" link up at the top of your screen is a handy thing... _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

One of these days I'll hear someone say: "Under BPA rules you need a B licence to take a shit before jumping". When I do hear it, I will neither be surprised nor sceptical. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I love Dan Savages column. I met him once when I was in college. It was a lot funnier when he prefaced all his questions with "Hey! Faggot!". So much of what the religious right fights against is such a no-brainer, I completely fail to understand how they manage to get support. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Craichead and I lived togeather for about 10 months before we got married, and 6 months before we got engaged. We're quite happy. If I were to guess, I'd say that relgious people not beliving in divorce are skewing your numbers. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Remember, even 80 knots is 92mph, and a hundred knots is 115mph - not that different than normal freefall. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

It's not black and white, because some people just don't know how to lose weight. Turn on your TV late at night, and you'll see hundreds of ads for "weight loss products". Some people fall for these scams, and are trying to lose weight by buying magic pills. Other people turn to the government, pick up a copy of the Food Pyramid, eat exactly what they're told they should, and still gain weight. Thankfully the government updated it, but it still needs work, and it still will make people fat if they follow it to the letter. Another group of people buy products that make them ill, like the ephedrine products. When they have a heart attack, sometimes they're smart enough to quit taking the product, at which point they put back on every pound they lost, plus interest. Another group listens to all the media reports, tries to be smart about it, and decides "a low fat diet should work!", and proceeds to go grocery shopping for every "low fat" product they can find, most of which are all very high in sugar. Again, they find themselves putting on weight. Another group decides that instead of changing their diet, they'll try going to the gym. So they start lifting all these weights, and find that instead of loosing weight they're gaining weight. They're smart, so they understand that this weight gain is all muscle, so they should stick with it. Finally they notice that even though they've gained all this muscle, their waistline has not gotten smaller, but they're heavier and bigger. They finally give up, and all that muscle they gained slowly turns back to fat. In the end they're bigger than when they started. The fact is that America has a serious problem with obesity for a reason. There's so much bad advice out there that I can completely understand how someond can get frustrated and give up. I also understand how someone who's tried 18 different ways to lose weight and failed at each of them (for perfectly natural reasons) will get depressed. Thin people complaining that they're not running fast enough is simply not going to help. It's too easy to blame it all on Fast Food, or laziness, or living in the 'burbs, or the car culture, or lack of education, or depression. Addressing a serious weight issue usually means addressing at least 3 of these, not just one. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

"They" do. The Southbeach diet is very similar to what you've described. Craichead and I are both on it. I've lost 15 pounds and she's lost 10 in the last 3 monthes. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1579546463/qid=1116449290/sr=8-1/ref=pd_csp_1/002-3858493-3529649?v=glance&s=books&n=507846 The weightloss industry is certainly an example of "buyer beware". There's a lot of crap out there... _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

It happened at Skydive Chicago years ago. Somebody who's been around longer than I can tell the story. Roger Nelson was the pilot, and he used to love telling the story. I don't think it's actually killed anyone. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Casa's and Skyvan's will have a large painted line accross the center of the aircraft. There's a big sign painted on the wall that says "No more than XXX jumpers aft of this line". If you put too many jumpers aft of the red line (say, at exit time...) the aircraft stalls. What does stall mean? The plane stops flying. literally. The plane suddenly tips nose high, which causes all the occupants to fall out the back door. The plane then slowly starts to pivot downwards, going into a steep dive - coliding with the jumpers who just fell out the back, until it gains enough airspeed to level out. Not cool. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

greenie-fight? _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

So, no. You don't have anything better. Gotchya. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

You have something better, then? _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Not only that, but if you take his conclusions to be "a lot of very normal people do a lot of very kinky stuff", well - now that's undeniable. The only part that's debatable is in defining "a lot". Until somebody comes up with a better study, Kinsey and Masters & Johnson are the best we've got. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

A tandem passenger harness wrapped around a Sigma??? _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Remember to consider the speed of the plane. Horizontal speed is no different than vertical speed, when it comes to opening a parachute on the hill. Some airplanes (like King Airs or Caravans) will fly faster, some planes (like Otters) will fly slower. Faster planes may be flying as fast as 120 knots. 120 knots is 138 MPH - meaning a faster than normal airspeed. Don't assume that just because you're pulling on the hill your deployment speeds are slow. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

The fact that it's exceedingly dificult for jumpers to stall an otter, combined with the brutally strong tail, STOL, and fixed gear make it an ideal jumpship. Every other plane out there has significantly more risk: King air: risk of gear up landing, tail strike. Caravan: tail strike, stall characteristics PAC: tail strike, stall characteristics SkyVan: stall characteristics (the painted red line) CASA: stall characteristics (the painted red line) Some of these (like the risk of gear up landings) are concerns only to insurance companies and plane owners. Others (like the stall characteristics on jumprun, or a tailstrike on exit) need to be at the forefront of jumpers minds on every skydive. If I'm going to spend 5 hours each weekend flying in a plane, I want it to be in one where the pilot has to try hard to screw things up. That means an Otter. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Interesting reply from the FTC. Where did you submit the complaint? _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I was responding to a post about tandem mode. Activation in planes has only happened with Student Cypres's, not tandem ones. This makes sense, since the deployment speed for student Cypreses is 25mph, or 2,200 feet per minute. 2,200 feet per minute is much more likley than 6000 at firing altitude. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Well, I guess it comes down to what you want to do with it. I do a lot of first person video too, most of the video I do for shits & giggles, maybe hopefully I'll sell a few prints. At the end of the year I like to make a 'year end' video. When I bought my first camera I was nowhere near ever getting paid to jump video, I was in a position a lot like you are. I had a few hundred jumps and wanted to start exploring video work. I bought a good camera. I'm still jumping that same camera. For me, I take pride in the work that I do, even if for the most part I'm not doing it for a living. When I do make that end-of-year video, or when somebody wants a dub of a dive, I want it to look good. On the odd occaision that I get pulled into doing tandem work, I want gear that's up to the task. For me, that camera is completely useless. For the same money, (or less!), you can buy a perfectly good Sony HC20 that is almost just as small, but with a far superior image quality that I would not be embarassed to put my name on. Don't fixate on the handful of features that makes that camera attractive to you. Look at the whole picture, and compare it to other products on the market. To me, choosing to pass this one by is a nobrainer. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

They can, but remember the activation altitude of 2000 feet. Pilots are generally thinking about a landing pattern at that point, and have aborted a steep dive long before then. Somebody correct me, but I believe the Vigil is only really a problem when it's set to student mode, and needs to be turned off. This is comparable to a Student model Cypres. 78 mph is 6,864 feet per minute. I don't know many pilots who are still decending at a rate of 6,864 feet per minute at 2,000 feet. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I'll take a minute to mention that every year, Chicagoland Skydiving Center Chicagoland Skydiving Center has a Skydiving for MS fundraiser. After a few years, it's now grown into a pretty big deal. It's amazing to see the event, because the DZ usually does take quite a few MS quads for tandem jumps as well as raising a truckload of money. It's compelling to watch these people do tandems, to catch a whif of true freedom for a fleeting moment. This years Boogie/fundraiser is being held on June 25th. http://www.skydivecsc.com/zone/calendar_detail.php?event_id=372. A $20 registration includes a t-shirt, dinner, drinks and live music. The fundraiser is run in association with the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, Illinois chapter. http://www.nationalmssociety.org/ild/event/event_detail.asp?e=456 _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Arivanusa.com says the max takeoff weight is 4000 lb, and the empty weight is 2200. That gives a useful payload of 1800 lbs. I don't know about where you jump, but in Illinois 10 jumpers with gear + fuel = a lot more than 1800 lbs. By my math, the airvan could only hold 7-8 jumpers. Also, the climb rate is weak. 788ft/min when loaded to max. The stall speed is delightfully low, probably due to the fact that it can't carry much weight. http://www.airvanusa.com/specifications.asp _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.