Newbie

a friend and i used to enjoy weekly handgun target shooting here in the UK before large bore handguns were banned, following the Dunblane shooting, when it was legal to apply for a firearms certificate to hold handguns, as it is in the US. I still enjoy shooting when i get the chance abroad, but it's not something i actively seek out - i'd rather be jumping, but if it's a bad weather day, then sure, why not. As for owning one - would depend on a number of factors. If i was living by myself, quite possibly - if not, i would have to take into account whether my partner was happy to have one (she has already said she would not want to have a gun in the house - she is from NYC), whether there were children about etc. I'm not anti gun per se. Shooting can be fun, and it can certainly provide a source of security, but too many guns is just not a good thing, especially when mixed with the volatility of human nature. "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

man i'm an idiot! After having given up a few months ago, i forgot that i had 1 or 2 roll ups that day. No wonder! Anyway thanks for clearing up the mystery for me, i was wondering why i was feeling it on particular that day and not previously....

what altitude do you need to be at and for how long, before you start to get mild hypoxia? Maybe i was paranoid, but i could swear i was feeling quite relaxed when we were up around 14k for a while last weekend; it was a sort of general lightheadedness, nothing to worry me about, but i definitely noticed something. I'm not suffering from anything that i know of right now (cold etc) that might be affecting it. Is this normal? "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

I'm not lazy; sometimes it's either eat at fast food or don't eat...and I suspect it's that way for lots of folks.... I don't yell at them. I've not raised my voice at someone who did the job I did back in high school. I won't raise my voice at them, either... It's unionized here, so I suspect they make a nice hourly wage.... I don't have someone hand wash my car, and I use self serve gas.... The landscape guy my family uses (on three properties...) has been working with us for years, and does the twice yearly cleaning of gutters for us. We pay him well. As for someone to clean my drains, the last time I used a plumber, he was $75 for a house call, and then $50 per hour after the second hour. He worked very hard, but also was paid very well. Both of those are city employees, and make a more substantial wage than I do, along with retirement/medical benefits.... I have no idea about those guys' wages, so I can't comment.... I look after myself, and I afford the cost of living I am "so accustomed" to....me. No one else. I clean my own house (like the majority of us do); I cook most of my own food (like most do). I look after myself, thank you very much.... Your entire diatribe has nothing to do with the ability to speak the native language of the country you're working and living in... Ciels- Michele none of my post was directed to you, it was at funks, and of course i'm generalising somewhat to illustrate my point, and these points won't be applicable to everyone. But if you honestly think that massive immigrant exploitation in the US is not directly attributable to the wealth and power the country and some areas of societiy have and do enjoy, then i think that's pretty naive. It happens here too, but to deny it is living with your head in the sand in my opinion. Unfortunately people are too quick to find the negative in the situation (complaining they have to put up with Spanish on a 411 call) then realise how much those people who that message has been directed to help their day to day lives out. "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

That and the above was a load of rubbish. why? "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

Fine, dont force people to learn the language, if that is going to be the case then lock them in their home and do not allow them to socialize or interact with the english speaking public. This will prevent them from getting jobs at fast food windows, screwing up my order and then acting as though I AM the idiot for not understanding what THEY are saying...its hard enough to understand somebody speaking english through those damn speakers, last thing i need when i am hankering for a wendys double is some non-english speaking idiot asking me to repeat my order 5 times.... if it wasn't for those "non-english speaking idiots" at the window at the drive thru, being paid $4/hour (if lucky) to have some "lazy non cooking person" shouting and screaming at them to get the order right and learn to speak the language now they are in 'your' country, you would be hard pushed to get your burger, and get it at the measly price you pay for it (someone has to work for pittance to keep prices low, and it's certainly not Wendy's board of directors). Likewise, if you like the fact you get cheap and plentiful groceries, get someone to hand wash your car and pump your gas for next to nothing, someone to clean your drains and guttering, clean your streets in the rain while you sleep warm in your bed at night, collect your trash early in the morning before you get up, clean the bathrooms in the offices you work and generally look after you and afford you the cost of living you are so accustomed to, i wouldn't worry about the fact you have to hear 5 seconds of recording on a 411 call telling your to push 1 for Spanish (remember, your brain doesn't always have to do what your ears hear - choose to ignore that bit). The saying "don't bite the hand that feeds you" comes to mind.... Edited for tipoz "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

Are they useful for providing a spiritual and moral backbone in a society where morals and values seem to be ever decreasing, or are they discriminatory and divisionary to all those groups of differing faith (or non faith for that matter)? There has been some discussion in the UK on this recently - i'm wondering what people think. See here for more info: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/3791463.stm "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

Not wanting to digress, but you sort of struck a nerve with that one My day job is teaching 5th and 10th graders about business and also the impact local business/organisations have on them and the community as a whole. Regardless of what may be going on in other schools up and down the country, not a single child is excluded from my programme. I work with the top high flyers right through to the lowest academic achievers (sometimes the one's with the most nuance and real world understanding), and the "problem" children (see:those that want to 'kill' the other kids, and generally be disruptive/destructive/disrespctful), the ones with all sorts of learning difficulties, new immigrant children that can barely speak the language etc you get the idea. Not a single one is "left behind". Sometimes political slogans are just that, other times there is an element of truth behind them. Going back to "Just Say No", i honestly don't know who came up with the slogan/programme, but it was obviously someone who had no exposure to the drugs problem, or a realistic sense of how to deal with it. Sorry for the long winded reply

Are you asserting that the drug problem is far greater now than in the 80s, or the 70s? Ineffective was Just Say No, but so has everything else. People want drugs, be they legal or not. without turning this into a "drug policy" post now, i'll just say that things did seem to get worse (see the crack epidemic). Sure people will always want drugs, but there are effective ways to combat the trade, supply and demand, other than coming up with a slogan where you "Just Say No" that addresses approximately none of the issues as to why people will be taking drugs (for fun and/or reasons of escape) "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

there is nothing pathetic about not wanting to jump out of a plane, free ride or not. It's not because they are "wimps with no balls" - you are not asking them to come to a water slide park with you; you are asking them to place blind and unknowing faith in someone that will save them as they do something completely unnatural and fall earth bound at 120mph out of a plane. I don't know why it's hard to understand that, in theory, a lot of people like the sound of that idea, but when given the opportunity to do it for free, they refuse. Just get some good CD's/tapes for the car, and day dream of all the fun you will be having at the dz - that's what i do and it sure makes the 5 hour round trip to the dz seem more bearable "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

i'm not trying to be condescending, it's just he was Pres while i was too young to really know what politics was all about so i'm a little naive about his policies. So many people on TV are calling him "the greatest Preseident the US ever had" and i'm just genuinely curious to know why this is. As far as i can tell, he resurrected a flailing US economy through massive tax cuts but this came at a cost of record annual deficits and a ballooning national debt, and minority groups didn't seem to benefit at all. I know he breathed life back into a then demoralised and flailing US military machine, but this came at a cost of $2 trillion to the tax payer. His policy of "Just Say No" to drugs didn't work, and the drug problem in the US just escalated to where it is today. Where he seems to have been great was in his ability to begin nuclear arms reduction with Gorbachev, but he likewise also had to bear the cross of the Iran-Contra affair. He seems to have been an excellent communicator with the people and made them warm to him, perhaps unlike other presidents had - maybe it's that charisma thing again? Anyway, can someone let me know why people consider he was the best, and if possible relate it to your own personal experiences under Reagan? Thanks "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

it doesn't matter what we might be working on now, satefy/training issues should come out of any post regardless of it's inital content, if it's warranted (like it makes another jumper wonder about whether or not someone is doing something - like pulling in a track - that could injure them, or worse, if that sort of thing comes out of the initial post). I guess I didn't see anything in his post that made me think he was trying to pull in a track. His post said he tracked for a while, then went to pull, and had trouble finding his handle. I agree that it didn't say he tracked for a while, then stopped tracking for a few, then went to pull, and reminding someone they might want to do this is not a bad thing, in itself. But the post was a request about info on where the handle went / why it wasn't there, and your reply had three words to do with that then went into something related, but far less worrisome in my opinion. (I'd rather pull in a track than not find my main handle any day. Missing handles probably account for more fatalities than pulling in tracks, too.) But, my rebuttal has nothing to do with the original post, either, so I've sunk to a level. thats why in my original post i said "not sure if you flattened out...." because, hey maybe he did - in which case he can chose to not read my post. The point is, from his original post, i didn't know. What i do know is that pulling in a track, especially one that's gone on for 7 seconds, if it's efficient, can injure you, damage equipment, and has been the possible cause of at least one fatality from what i know. I don't care what the ratio of injuries/fatalities are of not being able to find the handle:pulling in a track, because both are bad. If i think someone might be doing something that i know to be a bad thing, i'll let it be known, not because i want to hijack a thread, because it's out of concern for that person. Whether that concern is justified or not, i don't know, but i'll leave the decision making up to the person who i was responding to. 3 words on the original topic were because i have no idea what happened to his handle, and i have not (thankfully) experienced that situation before, so do not have any advice from experience to add to what can be done to rectify that situation. At the end of the day i would rather say something to someone that they might already know and feel a little silly, then not say something to them and think they might be none the wiser is all

thanks for that link too, i was just reading some of his entries, it's really interesting to get a first hand view, rather than the biased skew the media puts on things. "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

it doesn't matter what we might be working on now, satefy/training issues should come out of any post regardless of it's inital content, if it's warranted (like it makes another jumper wonder about whether or not someone is doing something - like pulling in a track - that could injure them, or worse, if that sort of thing comes out of the initial post). "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

i'm a 100 jump wonder and don't know jack but i would say to those who say it's not free fall that until you're going up instead of down, it's logable time. "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

weird! No idea. Just one point though - not sure if you flattened out from your track (i.e. arched and or dearched to slow down), but allow a second or 2 (i usually take about 3 or 4 secs after tracking) to do this after tracking out rather than going straight from a track and pulling as this can injure you/your equipment, and has been the (possible) cause for atleast one fatality (although this could have been due to pre-exising medical conditions on that jumper). Maybe at this stage your tracking is fairly slow, but just bear it in mind for when you get to the point when you can burn a hole across the sky as your tracking becomes more efficient. PS make sure you allow extra time for this so you don't go low on the pull.

was thinking about taking the week off and heading up - will there be jumping all day everyday (weather permitting obviously)? How much are jump tickets? What can i expect? I've jumped at Langar a few times before, just not during a boogie, and not for about a year. PS what's the bunkhouses like? Thanks "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

Judging by some of the Ugly Americans I encounter around the world, it is hardly surprising. Add to that the sheer inelegance with which we traditionally wield both power and "aid" and you have a pretty repellent mix. When people ask me if we have lost our fucking minds by virtue of one particularly enlightened policy or another, I can only answer "I suspect so." We are a nation with a short attention span, and we do not tend to do our homework. Our leaders are but a reflection of who and what we really are. When we are finally and fully hoist with our own petard I will refrain from a good "I told you so," since I will be as badly screwed as my fellow countrymen. Thus you should all enjoy yourseves, since it is much, much later than you think. Blue skies (with dark clouds on the horizon), Winsor great post "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

got a news item/url for more details? I'm not saying Stern isn't a reliable newshoud, i would just like more details as i don't get to hear his show anymore (we don't get it here). Thanks "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

The Extreme Body Flight tunnel http://www.extremebodyflight.co.uk/ says it's opening to the public in August, while Skyventure still need to secure another £500k or so it seems. Will we really have a tunnel in August in the UK? "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

N/A

i agree with you up, but some parents NEED to be told. Unfortunately i get to see on a daily basis (i work with 10/11 year olds and 13/14 year olds in school) the results of neglectful, irresponsible parenting - kids that are destructive, disrespectful to teachers and classmates, disengaged, violent and aggressive and generally disinterested - and yes, some of those are the 10 year olds. You can see them acting out scenes from movies that they shouldn't be allowed to watch until they are 18 (at least that's the law here, 18 rated films is our NC-17 i guess). You are right - we shouldn't need things like this - but it's not about giving BACK to the parents the decision making process - they have that already, and for some, that is the reason some legislation is needed, to ensure they are making positive decisions based on their childrens welfare, not just having so little interest in their childs development that they can put them infront of a television set for 6 hours a day, allowing them to do and watch whatever the child wants, and not caring if they go to school or not. You brought a child into the world, care for it, BUT when you don't (and a lot don't) i would far rather see government step in than have that child run rampant, have the parents held accountable, and get the child the care it needs. Edited for tipoz "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

Whalerider

That would be because we've been living with a terrorist threat for the past 75 years. If you put bins out in public places some fuck will put a bomb in it and kill people. Thus there are no bins anywhere where the IRA might like to plant a bomb - like prety much anywhere in London. It's something you might find youself having to get used to in the near future. without any sarcasm, i think some bombs in a few rubbish bins is the least of the US's terrorist worries. But you're spot on about the lack of bins in London - ialthough i have to say for the most part i think London is quite clean these days "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts

Only the one time, then when the effects of that assault on my taste buds and stomache wore off, I went right back to mixed drinks where I belong. LOL now he gets it "Skydiving is a door" Happythoughts