Deuce

Ugh. I am so not communicating well today. I was making a generalization in order to agree with Quade in an effort just to keep the conversation going. Q's position is that skydivers are right of center. I thought about that, and while we generally sure don't LOOK right of center on the DZ, and our parties don't resemble anything you'd find at a decent country club, maybe we actually are, and maybe that's cause generally wealthy people are more conservative than people who are less wealthy. For the folks not working in skydiving, it takes a lot of money to play. As Seinfeld would say, "not that there's anything wrong with that". Gimme a hug, I'm so misunderstood.

Well, I still think most of them defy easy definition (sorry to repeat myself by being redundant ) I exchanged some PM's today with a freind who is definitely left-of-center, but is an NRA member. I think we get a lot of that out on the left coast. Folks who are are "conservative" but are "pro-choice", and folks that are liberal NRA members. I don't disagree with you Q-ster. Maybe the right of center thing comes with the money it takes to be active in skydiving.

Space age fun! I got the colors backward, but I should could my blessings I can remember that far back. http://www.un4gettabletoys.com/KrazyKar.htm

I think most of them defy easy definition. I think most of them are pretty individualistic, with varying degrees of intensity of trying to convert others to their brand of individualism.

I have the same camera, and knock on wood, haven't had any problems. I use a Cameye II also. JP

Oooh! I forget it's name, but it was yellow and round and flat and it had a seat, and it had two giant wheels that your cranked with your hands. The wheels had that "hypnosis" spiral on them. You could turn the wheels in opposite directions and just whirl in place, or you could get going straight, like 20 mph and then crank back on one wheel and it would chuck you right out into traffic. Great toy. All the really good ones could kill you. Ah, the good old days.

But it's not about me. It's about your using the oldest debating trick in the books. When you can't win on ideas, attack your opponent. That's twice you've tried to turn this thread personal on me. And you chose to use my wife as the subject, rather than me. I am trying to simply walk away from this discussion. If you must continue to use an example of low morals in your examples, use me.

Yeah, the giant hybrid funnel to the SpongeBob Squarepants theme is pretty epic. Let me look for the Master tape, and maybe I can crank a few more out. Stand by. Here's some more pictures from last year.

None of it is funny Bill. A demonstration of ethics would be knowing you could prove your point statistically and refraining from doing so. It's been about a year, I think, since I participated in one of your lopsided PC judgement fests. I've had enough. See you next year.

Didn't you get a copy of last years? Dude, it starts with me asking you what time it is, and you, very drunk responding "IT'S BEER THIRTY BITCH!" "SHINER-BOCK, YOU CAN'T GET IT HERE, ONLY GET IT IN TEXAS, BITCH!" And MonoUno, can't wait to see that belly-cam footage. Have you seen any foot-cam wingsuit stuff? I bet that would look cool too...

I call bullshit Bill. There's nothing in the article or this discussion to this point that indicates that the behaviour of my wife is statistically anomolous. It is your nasty sidelong attacks that make any political discussion with you so unpleasant. Very different than the very pleasant guy you are in person. But sometimes I get tired of listening to you condescendingly cast judgement. Making this personal is low, even for your standards of debate. So when did you stop beating your wife, huh?

D'oh! OK, Omar and Gasson have very gracefully agreed to provide me with all their video footage from the DZ.Holiday Boogie '03. Jim Gold, Gold-medal winning camera flier for year's CRW national first place team, will be flying over most of the RW jumps, BigBen will be giving up all his inside footage, Loudiamond will be sharing his FlockCam footage and I'll be doing my Monkey On Crack imitation getting footage of every DZ.commer I can find in the clean blue skies over Eloy. I will have my S3 by then, so expect to see plenty of bueno DeuceFootage of the DZ.flock. I put together a video last year as a fundraiser for Sangiro-san, but that was very much a cobbled-yogether thing, and was pretty much just mine and Ben's footage, plus some great scenes from Krishan, Mike, and Vic. Every night we'll do a firewire party, and I'll take any footage from the rest of the DZ.commers that they will give me. Jim and I plan to have the DZ.Holiday Boogie '03 DVD done and shipping within a month of the end of the Boogie. Cost will be $25 + actual shipping, and we expect the DVD to go at about an hour. It will mostly be skydives, interspersed with fabulous high-resolution still photographs If you are a DZ.commer and aren't actively hiding (or ask me not to include you) you will be on this recording! Bring it!

Ugh thanks for that Dave. Did you know that jockeys can actually puke on demand? The term used for such an act is called "flipping". Theres your trivia for the day

Thanks! Nice to see some old friends again!

And what "should" an open minded person read? Everything. I don't read the East Bay Express by picking it up and asking myself "Wonder what these deviant drug-addled socialists are up to today?". I can only hope that folks don't lon into National Review Online asking themselves "Wonder what these uptight conservative family-values religious right wingers are up to today?" A new friend recently painted all family values oriented conservatives with a broad brush. It hurt. I had a black partner who witnessed me being dissed in a similar way quite a few years ago, and his response to my discomfort was "So how to YOU like it?" That made things a lot worse. My response was "I don't like it at all, which is why I have never intentionally hurt anybody like that person just hurt me." That actually opened up a wonderful dialogue between us, and nobody I've met, or anything I've read has educated me about the black experience. Or at least Glenn's black experience. But if the topic was verboten, if my discussing it was greeted with a rolling of eyes, and a clicking of tongues, I would not have recieved that education. So, for me and open mind is having read the book on something, when presented with a person who rhetorically asks "Do you know why this is the way it is?" to answer "No, tell me" and listen to their answer. The fact that their answer is their reality makes it relevant.

Super cool. You going to post pics?

I did not intend to "attack" BillVon's post. In my little world there is nothing at all unusual about families of whatever ethnicities with well-behaved children. That's the whole point of my lifestyle. The point will come when the bubble will burst for my kids. "Yes, hon, more than half of all folks who get married end up getting divorced". So we look across the restaurant at a single mom with kids eating and maybe we discuss that statistic and what it means to them. Yeah, look at the black family. What to do, if anything. Nobody has any trouble encouraging me to look at my church and consider what to do about it, if anything. It's just the knee-jerk condesencion that gets me. Edited to add link: I looked up the article in total, it's here: http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/jgraham200310060900.asp

Bill, I wonder just how much time you have spent in the African-American inner city. Any statistical anomaly is worth remarking. I get "You've been married to your first wife for 17 years? No shit!" all the time. Why are racial anomalies off-limits? I eat crap on this forum all the time for my religious and cultural beliefs. Why people are surprised that a guy with my background embraces diversity so enthusiastically constantly, well doesn't surprise me, but does brace me. People are so willing to stereotype me and mine without getting to know us. So this person sees a nuclear black family, which is statistically an anomaly, and remarks on it. You sneeringly condemn them for expressing their opinion and shut off any possibility of dialogue. What's wrong with talking about the fact of the demise of the nuclear black family in America? What should be their punishment, thought policeman? And as an aside, my children don't know the words for the different races, they describe other children as being tan, light brown, dark brown, yellow-haired, etc. The nature of my community is such that my kids expect all black families to be like the black families in my Parish, married with children. But when they learn in sociology that only 30% of African American children are born into a home where the father is present, not necessarily married, but simply present, I do not want them exposed to the intolerance you are expressing if they want to discuss the issue. "Hey Dad, you know, looking at that family, just like ours demographically, I'll betcha, you'd never suspect the statistics of that happening were so grim" But I seriously doubt you were reading the National Review with an open mind either.

GOOD FOR NORMAN!

VERY nice!

Such a giver...

Ah. I suspected this might be the case. "Camera Awareness" is displayed most magnificently by the most proficient Freefliers. These are almost all exit geeks, but there is one RW geek by Connie while waiting for a base to build.

People! We wear all this crap on our heads for a reason! When in the presence of a camera flier and not engaged in serious-assed RW, VRW, CRW, Freestyle, or Wingsuitedness... GEEK! Attached is the official DeuceSignal for GEEK ME DAMMIT! John Matteson was almost a Q-level, the highest level of Geektitude, but Boomer had to be ordered. Particularly on climbouts while waiting for the folks inside to stack, geek your cameraman. That is all.

I'm 6' and 190# and I sent my C wing back for a D wing because I couldn't get under lighter tandem pairs. I still use every bit of those wings when I am under light ones.

OK, that's proof you haven't met her.