nacmacfeegle

Friendship that transcends geographical and political divides. -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

I propose that every friday should henceforth be known as... "Buy an engineer a beer day" -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

"On a side note fossil fuel consumption is the one thing about skydiving I feel guilty about." I wouldn't worry too much about it John, turbines are pretty efficient, besides, you keep me in work and that can't be all bad. -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

I have it, but not on this PC, try here... http://www.mav-magazine.com/Dec2002/sony_picturegear_lite_4.htm -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

Hey Skychic "Operating system Windows® Me, 98SE, 2000, NT 4.0 Minimum hardware configuration Windows Me, 98SE, 2000, NT 4.0 - 400 MHz Pentium II compatible Processor - 1x32 bit PCI 2.1 slot with bus mastering - 128 MB RAM - 4 GB AV hard disk (DMA Enabled) - 16-Bit graphic board Recommended hardware configuration Windows Me, 98SE, 2000, NT 4.0 - 550 MHz Pentium III - 256 MB RAM - 18 GB AV hard disk (Ultra DMA / SCSI ) - 50 MB hard disk space - 24 Bit graphic board - CD Rom drive" go here http://www.pinnaclesys.com/docloader.asp?templ=1051&doclink=/WebVideoEU/dv200/English(UK)/doc/techSpecs.html&product_id=16&Langue_ID=2 for more specs etc. I have a DV300 which was the 200's predecessor, the 200 is way better and much more stable. It actually ran on a 266 processor, as opposed to the 400 recommended. If none of this techno babble makes any sense to you, pm me and we can chat about things offline....... -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

I have a Sony Clie, which is a pretty good music box. Their ATRAC3 system gives better quality per byte than MP3, but its happy with MP3 too. The battery lasts the duration of a transatlantic flight...11hrs+ I can also watch wee movies (the longest I've done was about 40 mins), and have it synched with my cell phone and laptop for contact details. I also have apps on it for looking at word and excel files, and can read Acrobat files on it. It takes the same memory cards as the Sony cameras, and its quite a good picture viewer too Sure its expensive, as are the cards, but its quite a neat wee toy, uploads are via USB or IR port. I can hose in about 3 hours of music in a matter of minutes. -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

"causing the largest manmade ecological disaster in our lifeime" As opposed to what? Chernobyl? The dust bowl in midwest US in the 20's? Amoco Cadiz, Exxon Valdez? Whilst on the subject of oil nasties, anyone here seen the Niger delta recently, or have they seen the Caspian sea around Astrakhan or Baku? Does anyone actually know what happened to the sea of Aralsk? How about the disaster that is about to happen in the form of the FSU's nuclear powered ice breaker fleet in Murmansk. I agree with Bill and Harry, why hasn't the US agreed to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions? Its a rhetorical question so don't fret about answering it. What on earth can be more important than protecting our environment, and our future? Personally I see global climate change as a bigger threat to world peace than any other single effect we have seen to date. We just haven't seen the effects fully yet. -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

"I flew through the eye of a rainbow, it was awesome" Its difficult to miss! Standups into them are cool..... -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

" just believe that assuming your internal clock is a reliable reference is generally a bad idea. It's far too easy to distort your internal clock with other factors." I agree with the Riddler here. I have my eyes, my audibles, and my analogue alti, and my 'gut feeling' (internal body clock). The gut feeling has been way out more times than the other altitude management systems I use. The body clock thing is good if you are doing the same type of jumps, from the same altitude all the time. But I don't, I like to mix up my jumping disciplines, and I like to jump at different DZs frequently. Therefore exit alt. varies, as does 'time to pull' so the body clock, or sense of time, is not as useful to me as it is to others.. People used to jump with stopwatches mounted on their belly reserves by the way..... -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

"One jump I was diving out and saw my reflection in a cloud- it had a rainbow encircled around it???" Similar to this pic? The effect is called a 'glory', more discussion on this phenomenon here http://www.polarization.com/rainbow/rainbow2.html This effect has been used to explain 'The grey man of Ben Macui' witnessed by many climbers in Scotland. I've seen the effect many times skydiving, and flying commercially. But I've yet to locate the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow..... -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

Rotten silly little "French" links, I'll betcha "coalition" links wouldn't be so slack! Following applies to kill line PCs... Okay, my rigger recommended larks footing (?) a bungee on the canopy attachment ring, when your PC is cocked, s-fold the security line and retain it with the bungee. This means you actually have to look at the attachment ring (and the french link) every time you pack, and the security line wont 'grab' a bunch of canopy topskin during deployment. And hey, its a free mod you can do yourself, so it gets a thumbs up from me.

"Did you know that you can tell from the skin whether a person is sexually active or not?" Looking at the palms of my hands....Yup. -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

I'm envious of you guys with access to DC-3 s, I've never jumped one. The oldest airplane I've jumped I'm guessing, would be an AN2, just like the ones noted above. But I've been in a few Cessnas of dubious vintage.. As a general rule of thumb, I like to have a parachute that is younger than the aircraft I am leaving..... -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

Nobody mentioned his Royal Aero Club Bronze medal yet? "Big up Al" and to all at Langar who had the skill and determination to help him. -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

"I also have what's considered to be a black sense of humour (as NacMac could quite possibly confirm... but WITHOUT the example please). " Blackness confirmed. I reckon if people are being truly offended by some statements here and and in other forums (incidents?), they should take issue with the poster via the PM system. Otherwise, we see flame and counterflame, which serves no real purpose. There are also cultural differences at play, which may also require a little thought, eg we might not want to hear shuttle tragedy 'jokes' but it may be 'okay' to make jokes about the French, Iraqis, etc...... I think this is worthy of some thought on all our parts, as we are about to enter an extremely sensitive period in world affairs. I'd hate to see damage done to our little community because of some humour failure, or insensitive posting. -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

"But sadly, there will be some who think it is, somehow, our fault. " If that is the case, they must think that the 'Great Satan' has very long arms indeed.....LOL I don't think anyone with half a brain cell would take such a claim seriously. It does seem to be stirring up a 'they said what? grrr" type reaction though.... Me?, I blame the Ayatollah, if the Shah was still in power this would never have happened. -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

"I have read through the logs with morbid fascination" Likewise, scary stuff. I think I'll stick with what I know...... -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

Shouldn't the title be Bawdy Paint?

"In what way would the inspections be closer than they are now?" Yes, this aroused my curiosity too, I'm used to a 180 day cycle (UK), but the last couple were done in the US, so would be interested to hear what they 'haven't been looking at' for the 120 day cycle. Any riggers care to enlighten us? -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

Horrific, more than half the occupants were casualties. I thought you guys had quite strict building codes and fire standards to meet...NFPA etc. Clearly they either don't work, or were being flouted? Thoughts with the victims and their loved ones. -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

Well, I do occasionally get the odd raised eyebrow etc, I'm a safety consultant in the oil industry..... Whenever this happens, I try to direct the conversation to the 'good points' of skydiving. Something along the lines of what sort of skills are required and instilled such as....teamwork, forward planning, attention to detail, self reliance, setting and achieving goals, developing a sense of awareness, competitiveness, etc, etc, etc.....You know all that good stuff you see on 'motivation' posters at work.... -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

Dunno if you've already read it, but try and get hold of teh book Freefall by Tom Read, its worth a glance as it describes his abortive efforts to do this type of jump, anongst other things. -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

I've heard some horror stories about Dell chipsets. Make sure any card you buy will be compatible with a Dell..... Or Dude, your going to go through hell... I use an ADS 'Pyro' PCMCIA card on my IBM notebook laptop. http://www.adstech.com/products/PYRO1394DVForNotebooks/intro/API601intro.asp?pid=API-601 I have no complaints -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

Looks like Chris' hair, beyond that.....who knows? -------------------- He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

"i felt that by passing it along i could ease my own pain. " Insert pic of fat old hairy Scotsman in his thong bikini..... "now there's a picture i could do without. " Karma!.