wolfriverjoe

Well, I have to say that I'm glad that it was Bletchley Park Museum staff that got the bargain. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

The best answer is "It depends." AFF in a week is like drinking from a firehose. You will be bombarded with a lot of information and new experiences. It will be pretty intense. Some people do better under that sort of situation, others not so much. There is also something to be said for doing your training at the DZ that will be your home in the future. You will build relationships with the people that you will be jumping with on a regular basis in the future. You might go out to that DZ and find out what they will expect from you coming in as an AFF grad, but still a student. It varies by the DZ. The tunnel is an excellent training tool. It's no substitute for actual jumps, but it can be good training for control and movement in freefall (one thing to remember is that freefall is only one part of a jump). If the tunnel instructor is also an AFF instructor, and you make sure he knows you are looking for skills for jumping, you can learn a fair amount. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

It's not that I don't think predators will take any advantage that they can get - they will. But I don't see exactly how they could "abuse' this. And I admit, I'm not sure where you stand - The idea that "we need this law because 'pervy straight guys' want to attack our women and children in the bathroom" is the fake excuse that the idiots used to pass this law (that's how I read your post - If I misread it, my apologies). So in addition to the "how will they abuse the law?" question, exactly which law do you see being more prone to abuse - the old situation where people used the bathroom that they wished, based primarily on appearance? Or the new law that requires TGs to use the bathroom based on how they were born? "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

How? How would they "take advantage" of this? Do you seriously think that some "funloving/curious" hetero guy is going to dress up in drag to see what the inside of a women's bathroom looks like? (I find it odd that you lump "rowdy, funloving, and curious" in the same group with "weird, creepy and predatory") Or if they are, would this law being in place (or not being in place) make any difference? This law is clearly in place to discriminate. The "protect the women and kids" is a smokescreen to hide behind. Kinda funny that they have to hide behind women and children because they are afraid to admit their real motives. The idea that some kid will go "heh, heh, heh (insert "Beavis Laugh" here), I'm going to tell everyone that I "identify as a woman" to see naked chicks" is stupid. If it's done as a joke, the girls inside the locker room will beat the crap out of him. And he'd face the same sanctions as any guy who did that. If it's done with a bit more thought (or lack of) and effort, and the dude really presents himself as a TG, then he will suffer a lot more. Most kids know this. High school is hell for those that are different. I'm neither TG nor gay, but I was "different." And while I don't pretend to know how much they suffer, I fully understand that they do suffer. This is why very few come out until they are in the adult world. And why lots of teens commit suicide. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

A lot of people have raised that issue. Or, more accurately, they have hidden their hatred and prejudices behind the "protect the women and children" mantra. How would "predatory hetero men" abuse this policy? Seriously, what would they do differently? The TG folk that would use a public bathroom aligned with their "new" gender are usually pretty non-descript (they look the part pretty well). Even the better transvestites are pretty hard to pick out. The idea that a "sexual predator" would take the time and effort to dress as a woman convincingly enough to sneak into a bathroom in order to commit an assault is rather ludicrous. But it makes for a great internet meme. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

Keep in mind that the Military Freefall guys use pretty big canopies. Like 360sf IIRC. They do that because they are loaded down very heavily for combat jumps, and also because they want slow and (relatively) gentle landings since they are often landing in unfamiliar, unforgiving terrain and often at night. A solo jumper under a very large canopy should fly fine. It would just be a loooooong canopy ride. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

Wow. Your hatred and prejudices are kinda scary there, Ron. I see those who wish to force their beliefs on others as the ones who threaten "personal freedom and liberty." Those beliefs tend to be twisted and highly selective versions of Christianity. And I see the ones "actively seeking internal chaos" as the ones who promote prejudice and hatred. By basing their actions on the person that they see, rather than the person who is really there. You know, like saying someone is "Muslim" and "wants to destroy the country", yet provides zero actual evidence of it. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

I know you are kidding. But here is a serious answer from someone who makes a living out on the road. How about not presenting a very real danger to the rest of the motoring public? How about not risking a breakdown that will cause huge traffic tieups? How about loaded within the limits of the vehicle? How about not so overloaded that you risk a tire blowout (can cause loss of control)? How about not so overloaded that you risk breaking a spindle (again, loss of control)? How about not so overloaded that you risk breaking an axle (which will put you in the middle of the damned road for as long as it takes to get a tow truck to you - with the attendant traffic jam)? I see this sort of thing every once in a while. Mostly it's pickup trucks that are way, way overloaded. Like a half ton truck with enough weight in it that the back bumper is nearly dragging. Idiots. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

Bolding mine. That's exactly how it works. Small minded people refuse to accept things that are "different". They ridicule, discriminate and hate. They pass laws to enforce that discrimination. They make up "facts" to support their hatred. They associate the behavior that they hate with truly awful behavior to support their hatred (TG people are rarely sexual predators, yet "they" are worried about "protecting the women and children") They cry like babies when they are told they can't do that. And then make up more garbage to attempt to support their unsupportable position (like "this is all BHO's fault"). "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

One thing to remember is that Japan's strategy was not to defeat the US (as in invade and take over). It was to push the US out of the western Pacific. If they could have taken Midway, they would have had a pretty good chance of doing that. Then they would have sought peace (on their terms) in a manner that would have let them be dominant (as in "empire") in eastern Asia. They would have had China, SE Asia, and all the Pacific Islands. All they wanted was the same sort of empire that the European powers had had in Africa and the western hemisphere (and Asia for the British Empire). They were just a couple hundred years too late. And the oddest part about it is that attacking Pearl Harbor was a stupid mistake. Yamamoto accurately described the reaction of "awakening a sleeping giant and filling him with a terrible resolve." Prior to 7 Dec, the US was very isolationist. Had the Japanese "played by the rules" and simply declared war, they probably would have won. They had gotten pretty good at carrier ops and tactics. The US had pretty much ignored the carriers and was trusting in the battleships. If the US Navy had tried to send the battleships to fight the Japanese (which was the basic plan prior to PH), the losses would have been horrific. Instead of a couple thousand dead (2500 or so), it would have likely been 10,000 or more. The carrier based planes would have sunk most of the battleships out in the open ocean, in unfriendly territory. Losing that badly in a "fair fight" would have likely made the US seek terms favorable to the Japanese. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

Why is it that your preferred way is the only correct way? I drive for a living. I'm maneuvering 75 feet of semi that weighs upwards of 40 tons. If I get lost, I can get a big fine for being on a road that I'm not supposed to be on, I can need to go 20 miles or more to find a place that is safe and legal to turn around. My preference is detailed "pathing" as Quade described it. Street names, distances and compass directions. Take Hwy 123 east 5 miles to Maple St, turn left, which is north. Go 2 miles to Main St, turn right, which is north (a lot of roads wind around). And so on. Trees get cut down or blown down in a storm. Stores and gas stations close or change names. Local names (Bailey's Hill for example) are rarely signed. "You can't miss it" is usually a red flag. GPS and Google maps/street view has made my job a lot easier. With street view, I can "drive" down the roads I plan on taking, looking for low bridges, weight restrictions and tight turns (seeing other trucks in the pictures is a plus). But they are only tools. There are a lot of stories about people ending up in fairly ridiculous places because they "followed the GPS." I still end up taking wrong turns and going out of my way to reach a destination on a fairly regular basis. Usually because the directions are poor. It's kind of funny, some directions make total sense after I know how to get there. But are very cryptic if I haven't been down that road before. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

Not a silly question at all. There used to be a glossary of terms in the Safety articles section, but I can't find it now. If someone knows where it is, a link or where to find it would be nice. Depending on how detailed you want to get, the SIM has some stuff on gear. If you are a "detail weenie" (not an insult), you might look up the "FAA Rigger's Handbook." It's a fairly detailed book that covers the stuff a Rigger is supposed to learn when working towards their rating. Fairly detailed and a bit technical, but filled with all sorts of stuff. It's available as a free download. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

Well, those pesky facts tend to show how false the claims were. Personally, I love G (3), Awarding Attorney fees for Groundless or Frivolous Claims of Mental and Physical Injury. They claimed they suffered injury, yet refused any examination. They even admitted they suffered no injury, yet continued to pursue those claims (paraphrased). Again, those pesky facts. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

I have my students steer the canopy down to 1000'. I teach them how to check canopy, find the windsock, and navigate. They love it. So far, no problems.

Well, you never really know what a student is going to do. A friend had one who thought the tap on the shoulders to uncross the arms was the pull signal. The student pulled at about 10k. Oops. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

I know! Let's play Global Thermonuclear War. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

If you were one of Hitler's stooges, would you really want to tell him it's not going to work? No, the fault was in the detonating circuit for the Allied drone (B-24 packed with explosives and flown by TV camera). It was recognized by a technician and when passed up the chain of command, ignored (see jakee's post regarding the Space Shuttle). The drone blew up shortly after takeoff, killing Joe Kennedy Jr (JFK's older brother). As it turns out (I looked around a bit), the drones were unmitigated failures. Only one did any real damage, and that was because the controllers lost control of the plane at the last minute and it crashed into the target purely by coincidence. Ryoder asked about separation (that's what I was looking for). I found that the drone would be at or below 2000ft and the control plane would be up at 20,000. I don't know if that was protocol for the entire flight, so I don't know where the control plane would have been when JKjr's plane blew. But if I was flying a full scale radio control B-24 full of high explosives, I'd be a good safe distance away the entire time. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

When someone else paints the cops with a brush that broad and negative, you claim they have no clue what they are talking about. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

You do know that from a historical perspective, the human race, and Americans in particular are better fed that they ever have been, right? If a lack of proper nutrition was a factor in being gay, the middle ages would have been gayer than the Castro on a Saturday night. The Mayans wouldn't have died out, they would have just been "Mahhhhvellous". And I'm not even going to start on the Irish Potato Famine. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

Saw that last week. Fascinating. The principles behind the supergun (boosted combustion through multiple charges along the barrel) were very interesting. The issues and concerns with the drone were new to me. I knew much of it (TV operated, pilots controlled takeoff & bailed out, that sort of stuff), but the reasons behind the explosion were always "a mystery." Turns out there was a known fault, identified and made known to the chain of command, but ignored. Go figure. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

That site tells outright lies and at the very least half-truths on a regular basis. One of it's more vocal contributors just went to jail, why? Because he thought it was a good idea to interfere with officers with his camera and by yelling at the cops, while they were trying to talk a suicidal teen off a bridge. Didn't work out too good for him, and they defended his actions. You obviously haven't read my posts in reference to body cams, or certain departments that have a culture problem(s). Some of these agencies are in locations where all levels local government are rife with corruption, starting with civilian leadership. Chicago and New Orleans come to mind. I can show you a direct correlation between proactive slow downs and a rise in crime. Arrests are down in those areas, crime is up. In the south side of Chicago murders are up 54%, that's not an anomaly. Just because you don't like it, doesn't mean it's not true. Crime spiked post-Rodney King, people became sick of it, and told the cops to crack down, we did, and crime dropped for over a decade. In most areas crime is still down, but in some inner-cities it's spiked dramatically since 2014. One more time - The story was available on multiple sites. CopBlock was the first one I found that allowed me to link it without any difficulties reading it. Yes, I've read your posts and understand your position on these things. And I like it. But in this particular case, you seem to be defending the "Bad Cops" that are pulling this shit. As in, when they are shown behaving badly, they throw a temper tantrum and refuse to do their jobs properly. And seeing as the FBI director couldn't show any statistics, where do yours come from? The head of the Fraternal Order of the Police also disagreed with his claim. To me, it's a pretty obvious attempt to say "Leave the cops alone or you are on your own." Which is just one more time that the good cops are enabling and covering up the bad cops' behavior. Just like they always seem to do. (you don't, but you are in a minority there). "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

The same story is on a variety of sites. ChiSunTimes was one. But to read the story, you have to either pay or jump through a bunch of pop ups. Same story, almost word for word. CopBlock was just the first site I found where it could be read directly. Just because you don't like it or agree with it doesn't make it false (although I agree that there is a fair amount of crap on that site). Crime is up. There are a variety of reasons for it, just like there were a variety of reasons it went down back in the late 90s. To blame it on increased scrutiny of the police is a bit of a reach. Should we not hold cops accountable for their wrongdoings? I'm not talking about honest mistakes, I'm talking about blatant abuse of their authority. Which seems to be a lot more common lately. Or is it just that now that people can obtain proof, it stops being the word of the cop against the word of the suspect (and we both know who gets the benefit of the doubt on that one). "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

Well, I really love this part: So because people have been accusing the police of misconduct for years, and now have proof of it due to the proliferation of video capability, cops are scared to do their jobs? Yet there have been a couple examples of body cams on cops resulting in lower rates of complaints against the cops, less "use of force" incidents and lower numbers of injured suspects/citizens. But of course, some cops absolutely refuse to wear body cams or audio, going so far as to throw them on the roof of the station. Probably not a site you will have much use for, but all of the "legit" news sites I could find this on had too much crap to get through to read the story. "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

Yeah, lots of people were raised to believe lots of stupid things. Things like homosexuality is unnatural, addiction is because of a lack of willpower or a moral failing, women aren't capable of doing things a man can do, that sort of garbage. Fortunately, science has shown that most of this is wrong, and there are decent and compassionate ways to address these situations. Of course, there are still people that refuse to accept reality and say something like "I don't agree. My 5000 year old collection of myths, legends and folk tales says different." So they pass laws that discriminate against people that they don't like. You rail against the "liberals" for making this an issue. It was the liberals in Charlotte who said (more or less): "Let's make it a rule that you can't be mean to these people." Who was it that passed a law repealing this? A law that basically said: "We don't like your kind. You aren't welcome here." A law specifically denying them "restroom privileges" "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

I think you understand it perfectly well. It has nothing to do with bathrooms. It has everything to do with fear and hatred. Not terribly surprising that those who have most often and most clearly shown their hatred and fear of anyone who is "different" are the ones coming out strongest in favor of this ("those" meaning both on here and out in the real world). "There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy "~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo