jriggert

He is my friend, so I do hope for the best for him... but the REAL "rest of the story"?? I paid for the lawyer upfront to get him out of jail! I just want my money back!

So a few of us took a trip to New Orleans a couple months ago and one of our friends got into a minor scuffle. Not a big deal, except they have a zero tolerance policy on fighting and he got arrested. We were told they just like to teach people a quick lesson, and in court they usually just dismiss these cases. So he hired a lawyer to show up in court and take care of it for him... But now he has a scheduled court date for next week, and he can't get through to his lawyer. Anybody have any ideas on who he should contact to see if the court date has been changed, did they set up a new courthouse, what happens if the lawyer you hired just disapears in a hurricane?

If you want to try it, a good suggestion I found was to buy a one gallon gas can and mix your acetone into the gas there. Then you can pour it into your tank pre-diluted and it's easier to keep it off your paint. This is a really good compilation of some different info, including some information from the original post: http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:Acetone_as_a_Fuel_Additive A couple interesting parts of that site are a link to this web page that markets 100% acetone as a fuel additive. They just bottle it in small bottles for you: http://www.xtrampg.com/ And another party who tested this in his vehicles and soaked various fuel delivery components in 100% acetone to see how acetone affects those parts: http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:Acetone:Dave_Narby Sorry for all the links, but with fuel prices where they're at I think it's worth the research! Keep in mind these are all personal testimonials, but there are quite a few that say this works.

LOL... well Heidi you got me excited there for a second. The Biltmore looked awesome until I checked out the price on hotels.com... $426 a night for January and February! They better buy me a new rig for my birthday if I'm going to send them there! They actually don't need a flight - they live in Durango and will drive. The warmer the better, so southern AZ is probably where they would like to go. Pampering is good, but they also like to have a city nearby with other stuff to do.

My Christmas gift to my parents is a weekend getaway to Arizona this winter. Anyone know of some good resorts to send them to in the $100 - $200 a night range? They don't golf, and no they don't skydive either... they just like the warm weather. Thanks for the help! J

That might be a little bit of a harsh response. Those same words can mean different things to different people, and you may (or may not) have misinterpreted what was intended. Here is a different spin on each of those same statements... and I'm really not trying to argue. I just think it's interesting to look at a different perspective: Maybe if you plan like you were going to live forever you wouldn't be so scared to get hurt. Fear of being hurt (either mentally or physically) causes a lot of people to never go after some of the things they want. Note there is a difference between being scared and using caution. The little parts of life are as important to live as the big parts. Some people may persue every one of their dreams, but if they are constantly looking towart the next "big" event they truly are missing out on a big portion of their life - the little things in between. The future doesn't have to be having a million dollors to spend when you get old. For example taking a few weeks off jumping at your local DZ to fund a trip to a new location. Lets say you take 3 weeks off and died on the third week - does that mean you made a mistake by skipping out on those 3 weeks of jumping while trying to plan and HOPE you have time to take a vacation? What's the magic number on how long we should hope to live? Do we say at the start of every minute "this could be my last minute of life", "my last hour", "my last day", "week", etc. There is very good chance that you could pull off a wing suit jump from a large cliff TODAY. If this is one of your ultimate skydiving goals then why wait if you might die tomorrow in a car accident? I know you want to develop more skill before trying this, I am just pointing out the irony of the statement. You are hoping for the future too! And would you reconsider doing that wing suit jump today if you knew for a fact you were going to die tomorrow? Just a thought :)

Check out the rules: http://www.xprize.org/teams/guidelines.html The are closer than you think... The vehicle needs to be big enough for three people, and they have to strap three people in, but the actual flight only needs to take one person with appropriate ballast to simulate the other two occupants. However, I don't know if this particuliar craft was built for three or for one. I'm sure someone else can comment on that.

--edited to delete survey flaw comment-- I usually don't say much, but you got me going on this and it will probably turn into a long winded response. You had a good point when you said we could make MileHi better, but then you tore down your credibility a bit by assigning blame to the wrong people, and not offering any solutions other than "the assholes just need to realize they are wrong and change their attitude". Now we have all created some serious negative publicity for the place the poll is supposed to help?! From all the negative responses you listed in your poll, it looks like you are listing out the different problems you see there. Here is how I would address some of these: 1) ---MileHi employees are lame, but the fun jumpers are cool--- I am not sure what you mean by lame in this context, but that word does not characterize their general staff. Most or all of their tandem instructors and camera guys do a great job of making sure the tandems have fun and are safe. I think the AFF instructors do a good job with the students as well. If you interview students after their jumps I think you will find that most have a good experience. Most everyone I have met in manifest is friendly. They may have an occasional bad day, but that is expected for all they have to put up with. Packers are hired for the purpose of packing as many canopies as they can. You can't blame them for acting preoccupied. I don't know who the lame employees could be? If your beef is with some of the business decisions made by the owners, it is completely unfair to blame that on the employees. 2) ---You have to be in a "click" or be an asshole at MileHi to feel welcomed--- Sure they have clicks, and this is probably the real issue at MileHi. There may be some people that do not want to invest effort into teaching people with low jump numbers and/ or skill. They would prefer to jump with more experienced flyers. This is not unique to MileHi, that is just how some people are. So what are some ideas on how to change this? One thing you can't do is change the way people are - you have to find proactive people who are interested in the cause and go from there. 3) ---The DZO is contributing to this negativity--- I don't completely understand how the business is run, but I do know it is a rather unique situation. I don't think the true owners are a part of the day in/ day out operations. There is an acting DZO that knows how to run the place but the final decisions are left to the family who inherited the DZ. The argument that the acting DZO contributes to any negativity is absurd. If you are venting about the $1 jump ticket increase the family decided on, well that argument doesn't hold water either. It would be great if we only had to pay $17 per jump instead of $22, but this is a skydiving BUSINESS. The business owner gets to decide how much they change for their services. What have we done for the owners that they should feel obligated to keep prices low? It's not like we have to pay them - just drive to Brush and spend the extra money on gas instead. 4) ---I gave up, I refuse to jump there anymore--- Drive to Brush - they appreciate your business too. Move to Arizona in the winter, and Chicago in the summer. Buy your own airplane. Find a new hobby. Wait a few years and hope another Colorado drop zone pops up. 5) ---MileHi is a tandem factory that doesn't care about fun jumpers or the overall vibe--- MileHi was built to make money and tandems make the most, so it makes sense that they focus their energy on tandems. If they didn't care about fun jumpers why do they organize balloon jumps, night jumps, CASA boogies, water training, AFF training, etc.? I visited New Zealand a few months ago and they truly have a tandem factory in Queenstown. No gear rental, no AFF or static line for the locals, just tandems. I think they will take you up if there is room and you bring your own gear, but count on a solo unless you bring a friend. I really wish this could turn into a discussion about making a drop zone better... but it's not looking good. JJ

What is ironic is that you are complaining about negative attitudes by broadcasting your negative attitude to hundreds/ maybe thousands of people on this forum. Is that really going to help make MileHi a better place? I don't want to make it seem like I am bashing because I think we all want the same thing - a more social, fun, inviting atmosphere at Mile High. I assume you have good intentions, but I promise you that venting about it will not change a thing. Before any of us can complain I think we need to look how each of us contribute to make things better. Do you go out of your way to welcome visitors and jump with them? Do you spend time with students and new jumpers to help make them feel at home? Outside of jumping and packing your own rig, what do you do to contribute? I'll be honest and say that I don't do these things either. I think it's natural to want to show up, pay the least amount of money possible, and have the best/ safest environment given to us. But you won't hear me complain if I'm not GIVEN everything I want. We already do have a lot going for us - convenient location, good weather, safe jump plane, beautiful scenery, and many great people. You say you want to open the eyes of the "pricks" out there... well try opening your own eyes a little wider and realize it is going to take some real effort by all of us to create any change. JJ

I am currently working on a website for a small company and am looking for some good sites that I can get ideas from. FYI - it is an informational site, not commerce. I was wondering if any of you have a list of some really well designed sites that you know of. Building a web page is easy, but it is pretty difficult to try and make something flow well and look good so you remember it.

Kayaking community in Colorado - primarily front range. http://mountainbuzz.com This has been around for awhile and is a pretty good site. There is also 'powderbuzz' portion of this site but it is not as good (or at least not used as much).