wolfriverjoe

Wait. Wait until next season if you have to. Back injuries are nothing to play around with. What happens if you aggravate it next jump and do enough damage that you can't jump again ever? Personally, I'd wait until you can arch on the ground without discomfort. Don't be so quick to assume that student canopies can't open hard because they are "huge and well packed". They can still open fast enough to hurt on occasion. And you still have to land the thing. Other people may or may not jump with worse injuries, but most of them have the skill and experience to properly assess the situation and be reasonably certain they can work around the limitations of the injury. Either that or they are stupid. If you want it bad enough, it will still be there when you are healed. "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 has got to be one of the dumbest things I have seen. Sparky How about THIS? "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 much weight can a sparrow carry? "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 Depends" I don't have a serious issue with younger kids having an account as long as they are closely supervised while on line. It's how a lot (and I mean a whole lot) of people communicate. Making sure privacy is maintained, checking out all the friends, watching the posts very closely, all that is very important. I know parents that have any posts made by (or to) their kid come across their (the parents) phone as an e-mail. Stalking your kid isn't a bad idea. I do have a serious issue with him creating an account when he was told not to. I have a worse issue with the lying about it. You aren't being overprotective at all. "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

Yes. Thanks Greg. The visuals (especially the confetti) are absolutely amazing. But when I see you and Joe on the camera credits, for some silly reason, I fully expect to be wowwed. And have yet to be disappointed.

Yeah, well... If I was a left-handed ginger I'd be in denial too. WHAT"S WRONG WITH BEING A SINISTER GINGER?!?!?! I'm not in denial about it, I embrace it. (like I have a choice) I don't dress that well or go to the gym. but if you keep this up, I'm going to consider it a PA.

Two. I explained that a while back. Not trying to sneak around. I thought I recognized your debate style. I thought that was against the rules. http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?username=jaybird18c; http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?username=pajarito; "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 can't honestly say what I would do in that situation, because I haven't been in that situation. But I hope I would do the right, legal thing. The right thing being to not shoot a defenseless person, no matter what they had done a minute ago, no matter what they may or may not do in the future. Because it stops being self-defense when the immediate threat is stopped. And I would guess that most people in defensive shootings have done so. Because if they hadn't, then this wouldn't be as big of news as it is. And if there were a huge number of these types of situations, the anti-gunners would be all over it. It's what they claim will happen if civilans have guns. But they have yet to be able to back up any of the "Blood in the streets, Back to the Wild West, shooting each other over traffic accidents" hysteria they promote. "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

Oh, but aren't they just like in the Disney movies??? Darwin Awards personal account. Not a real award winner, but still a good 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

There's lots of "Girls with G-things" (trying to keep it out of SC) pictures, calendars and videos. Wearing little or less. But you posted pics of the "Dillon Girls" (with an "o" not an "a"), including one of the most popular, Cathy Rankin. Dillon has always been a class act. Both in their publications and their business practices. On her site, is one of the most popular cover shots (it was made into a poster and sold very well). Ok, the thing won't let me pick out the individual picture. It's #13, second row down, secong from right. The one with the Ford GT with the back deck up. "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

Sorry, but no. Dillon Precision calendars and catalog covers have always been fully dressed. The Dillon Aero calendars went just a bit further, but no more than bikini tops. And FWIW, Dillon put a dude on the cover of the catalog back in the mid-nineties. Buffed out dude, no shirt, big squad automatic "G-thing", standing in a pond.... with a few rubber duckies floating off to the side. "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

First you donate a shitload of money to both parties and all the candidates that have a chance of winning. Then you spend another shitload of money on lobbyists to tell the congresscritters that you own what to pass as laws. "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

Pretty Cool!!

And off to SC we go. It's was discussed there pretty thoroughly. And yes, going back, getting another gun and shooting a defenseless person (regardless of what he did 5 minutes ago) is murder. "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

Something like that. But remember, long, thin glider wings are very efficient, but not terribly high performance. Even for planes, higher performance means smaller wings. Compare a fighter jet with a transport. The faster one has much smaller wings (for a similar weight). Even the "swing wing" high perfromance planes (F-14 and F-111 are the two that come to mind) changed the configuration to match the performance needs (although the overall area didn't change, the different sweep angles changed the lift and drag significantly) And I am approaching the limits of my aerodynamic engineering here. Professor Kallend is a much better source for this kind of stuff. "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 unless the technology and materials chage dramatically. For any given canopy, smaller is going to be faster and more resposive. It's a function of overall drag and line length. There are exceptions, of course. A full elliptical or X-braced is going to be higher performance than a "true" square. I don't know how much bigger the X-brace would be to get performance similar to a square of a given size (one size? two? more??) "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

By spring loaded pilot chute, I am guessing you are referring to the reserve pilot chute (and the bridle too) Container also includes main D-bag, bridle and pilot chute. Reserve and main canopies also include the slider (I could be really picky and say "lines" too, but that's going too far ) "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

There was a short piece in Parachutist about parcticing stalls. It talked about using the pilot chute as a "stall warning" indicator. And about watching the canopy during the stall to see what happens. Link:http://parachutistonline.com/columns/foundations-flight/toggle-stalls "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

And...that's a great plan. Keep focusing on the fundamentals, but you'll also find a tremendous value in being there when jumping isn't happening. Folks are usually very happy to share info and answer questions. And show off their toys. Don't forget that part. Really. The protrack beeps when you turn it on. I occasionally get asked "what is that?" and often pull it out and show the person asking what it is and what it does. There is a test mode that makes it do all three alarms. That is fun to demonstrate. "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've jumped a Cessna a couple times too! Caravans are made by Cessna, ya know? No step/wheel to hit and you gotta be doing a hell of a job to get on the strut! Yes, I know, I may be blonde, but I do know Cessna makes the Caravan. Lol. Never actually seen or jumped anything but a 182 in terms of Cessnas though-- but if the Caravan lacks any unnecessary appendages to attack me whilst exiting (I'll take your word for it), count me as a fan! Nope. You aren't ever going to be forgotten. And you weren't attacked. That wheel was sitting perfectly still, minding its own damned business, just hanging there waiting to be needed on landing, when you decided to attack it. Probably not the best technique for hand to hand (face to wheel??) combat, but that's a whole different issue. And diving exits out of a 182 are great. You put your foot on the step (ya know, the step is designed to be used by feet) and go. "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 local fuel supplier. Not the guys who fill up the local gas stations. But a company that provides home heating oil, off road diesel (for construction sites) and various other POL products. We have a 250 gal tank, and they come out and fill it up when we call. The fliers club on the airport has the same setup, and uses the same supplier IIRC. Not everyone carries 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

just to play devil's advocate - the rating someone chooses to go get doesn't guarantee more skill or better judgment (consider a 'coach' that has thousands of jumps and just didn't choose to pursue AFF rating vs a relatively new skydiver that passed the AFF course barely) just authorization from USPA that he 'should' be we can't assume a skill level just by virtue of the ratings held - we can only discuss what's appropriate for the authorization and SOPs allowed, and then whether the individual doing the teaching will choose to disregard those standards for either very good or bad reasons I understand why Andy or Jen would choose to go above and beyond on a coach jump - and I'm ok with that provided the (released to self supervision) student is trained to those expectations and not what is 'typical' for coaches - I'd do it myself for special students, but it'll be clear before the jump, not changed during such that the student is possibly confused or distracted little surprises during an excellent dives are great (adding turns to a really good Cat B, etc) - any surprises when things are already going bad just make it potentially worse. - IMO, IMHO, YMMV for me, it's all about following the plan to eliminate surprises in the end, we're best served by not passing on students that are not ready for self supervision - but that's not always easy to spot in just a couple CatD and Cat E jumps Ok, I'll bite. (

Don't let skyflower_bloom jump it! Oooh.... That's mean.... Funniest thing I've seen today, but mean. "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 been made clear that the major players in this conversation cannot or refuse to participate without being personally insulting. This behavior is, for the most part, supported and allowed to occur by the liberal leaning "so called" moderators. Therefore, it becomes very difficult to discuss the topic at hand in an honest and civil manner with some level of maturity. Well, you duck, dodge and ignore questions on your positions; yet continue to restate them over and over again, expecting others to accept what you say as "truth" and using horribly innaccurate websites to support your positions. Some people consider that as insulting. You should also do a bit of research on the rules. There's a fine line between attacks on your postion and attacks on your person. One is permitted, the other isn't. There are people on here that are very good at approaching the line without crossing it, and baiting their opponents into crossing it. Lastly, ignore the trolls. Don't bother responding. They don't go away, but you don't have to let them get to you. You may or may not have noticed that you are the only one on the "religious" side of this debate (including the locked and deleted threads) that I respond to. There's a reason for that. There are trolls, idiots and jerks on both sides here. "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

This is (and always has been) a very popular saying in society. Yet I almost never hear any citizen of a democratic republic argue that we should give up the practice of choosing governmental officials by means of citizens exercising their right to participate and vote in a popular election. Which begs the question: if the task of lawmaking and policy governance should not be performed by officials chosen by popular elections in a political process, then WHO, INSTEAD, SHOULD GOVERN - AND HOW SHOULD THOSE GOVERNING ATTAIN THEIR OFFICE? Legislators should be selected by lottery amongst the electorate. Anyone who has passed the bar should be barred from office outside the Judicial Branch (whoever practices the law shall not write one - conflict of interest). Legislators should be obligated to serve one and only one term, and to return to ordinary citizen status thereafter. No special medical or retirement benefits. I do not claim that this is a "solution," but that it could hardly be worse than what we now have. BSBD, Winsor Arthur C. Clarke came to the same conclusion. In at least one of his books, the argument was made that anyone who is willing to put up with the crap needed to get elected should automatically be disqualified. And as long as you weed out the criminals and the stupids, a lottery was the most efficient way. "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