bsoder

Zero tolerance = zero intelligence. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I've heard of a number of these types of cases, there was one a while back where a girl swapped lunches with her mother by accident, and her mother had a paring knife in her lunch (for an apple.) The girl found the knife, took it to her teacher, and ended up suspended for if I remember right three days. Zero tolerance means a student with her mother's paring knife in her lunch is equivalent to a gangbanger with a switchblade. Like I said, stupid.

heh... when my wife and I watched that last night, I told her, "If that had happened to you, I'd expect you to grab him by the weenie and throw him off the platform."

from the FF people I've met, I'm gonna guess zip-off crotch.

More than that, REGARDLESS of whether YOU or I have guns in our homes, the parents of our kids' friends might. My guns are locked up, but my kids are also "gun-proofed" as much as I can make them, since there's no guarentees they won't be exposed to one somewhere else. People who won't teach their kids anything about firearms other than making them the forbidden fruit are more of a concern to me.

That'd make for an interesting poll... "why'd you quit?" except that I'd imagine that most people who quit wouldn't be on dz.com to vote..

Are you that bad of a shot? Schoolkids run too fast? That's offensive and not funny.

attitude and people, by far.

We've owned several digital cameras over the past four or five years, all Olympus C-series, we've been very happy with them.

Bill, any idea what the conversion would cost, at least in theory?

I think it depends on how you count it. Mabye it'd be a 13-way. :)

I'd heard that the reasoning behind using a 22 was that the bullet would break up and deform so badly that it couldn't be matched to a specific gun. Interesting, if true.

Mabye. Anecdotal, but I recall reading a while back a story written by someone who was attacked by two men. He was carrying a Keltec P-32, which holds seven rounds of .32 ACP. He pulled his gun when they started beating him and shot both of them - if I recall right one three times and the other twice. They DID stop the attack... and walked to the hospital. There's a LOT of discussion over the effectiveness of smaller rounds. a .22 wouldn't be my first choice of defensive caliber, a 12ga shotgun would be my second choice, not BEING there in the first place would be my first choice

I think he meant DZ's that would work with a bigger AFF student. I'm 99% sure Coolidge would, pretty sure Eloy would, dunno about Buckeye.

Kyocera 6035?

Hmm.. you must have more muscle mass on you than I do. I'm at 250 now, same height, and I still have a pretty good stomach to lose. :) Do you do much weight training, Dave?

Ed, congrats on the weightloss - I had a lap band done about 14 months ago, I've lost about 90 lbs, with about another 50 to go - shooting for 199.

The issue wasn't with him recommending some weight loss before Alpha jumps... it was the attitude, the smell comment, etc.

That pretty much describes my philosophy. I take care of her, she takes care of me... and we're very happy, thanks. :)

heh... I know what you mean. A "slow-suit" would help, I'm sure. I also got a bit of coaching on how to fly a bit slower, that helped me too, talk to your instructors and ask who they'd recommend you work with, odds are one of them is probably the local expert.

[replyWhy not just keep your mouth shut and direct them to someone qualified to teach them? Because I'm not a complete idiot. It kills me when people on this board assume your knowledge level based on your number of jumps. I could have a thousand jumps and still be giving out shit advice. Or I could have LISTENED to my instructors and be parroting the advice they've given me. If someone asks me something I don't know, I don't try to answer it. If they ask me how I try to go slower being a big guy, I'll tell them what I've been told to try, and has worked for ME (and I qualify that to them as well.) It's also part of the social aspect of skydiving - if every time you go talk to another skydiver they say "I don't know, why don't you go ask your instructor" what kind of impression of other people there are YOU going to get? Edited to say: I'm not teaching. I'm not telling them "now what you do is..." I'm saying "what worked for me is... and you should talk to X and/or Y (your instructors) as well."

I figure that if someone is asking me for advice, they are probably checking the answers they got from other people, or they will be checking the ones they get from me. Generally I'll tell them what I was taught, then end it with "but you should ask your instructors and others as well, get multiple opinions." That's what I do when I have questions - ask around.

I did the same thing (Bev Suit), except I got the swoops as well. Very effective at slowing me down. Learning how to "hug the beachball" helped a lot too. Not that I'd try give you any advice, being a sub-100 jump wonder and all.

I installed slink bumpers on my rig recently (and yes, they're installed correctly) but I still find the slider gets below one or another of the bumpers occasionally. Is that normal?

Personally, I feel the dropzone we go to and take our kids to is pretty safe. Not necessarily as safe as at home, but certainly to a level I'm completely comfortable with - definitely much safer to me than a typical McDonalds. I can't say whether this would apply to most dropzones, some dropzones, a few dropzones, or just one - I've only been to two dropzones total. The other dropzone I've been to, Eloy, wasn't, in my opinion, "dangerous", so much as just not kid-friendly - too big, too much going on, and no really decent place for them to play. I've never seen nor smelled any drugs at my dropzone other than alcohol. Do people have sex there? Sure, of course they do, but not in the packing area, nor anywhere public that I've ever seen. Does anything go on there that I'd prefer my kids not be exposed to? The language is probably the only thing I can think of offhand; but then, words are only words, and so far I haven't had to correct them for saying anything they shouldn't be. I give a lot of credit for this environment to the DZO. Additionally, I think the people who would be looking for the "seedier side" kinda get the drift from others that this isn't the place to find what they're looking for. Again, this applies to the dropzone we jump at, not anyone else's, I'm not qualified to make that judgement - just as noone else is qualified to make the decision for ME what an acceptable environment for my kids is. Damn society has too many busybodies who want to stick their nose into other people's business as it is anyway. I think YardHippie hit the nail on the head with this: I am going to environment-proof my kids the best I can, instead of kid-proofing my environment, within reason. Oh, and as far as kids skydiving? I wouldn't want my 8-year-old soloing. Others might feel differently about their children; that's their right as parents, and I am NOT willing to judge them. Some people don't want their 15-year-old doing a tandem; again, their opinion and their right.

I didn't realize they got that inaccurate down low, I was under the impression they got MORE accurate the closer to 0 you got. Is that the case with all alts, mechanical and digital? As a total coincidence, my altimeter (Digitude) failed somehow this past weekend. I was on my way up for a hop-n-pop, we got to ~5K and my alt was showing 1300 feet. I jumped anyway and just ignored the alt, figured not a big deal especially with an h&p. I didn't look at the alt until I was on the ground again, and my landing spot was better than 90% of my previous ones. Since then (mabye 5-6 jumps) I've deliberately ignored my alt while landing and I'm finding that my spots are better, probably because I'm paying more attention to my external cues.