mdrejhon

One note, the Pet series is a bit different from the regular Roomba's: http://www.irobot.com/hrd_right_rail/roomba_rr/roomba_532/Roomba532_rr_faqs.html Bigger bin, extra set of rollers for easier maintenance... I don't have a pet (at this time), so I'm using the regular Roomba's. In general, as a rule of thumb, I found I need cleaning a lot more often if I'm having Rosie (er, Roomba) vaccuum the carpet rather than floors. The regular Roomba is excellent on hardwood floors in pet-free households and is much lower maintenance, does not require cleaning/untangling nearly as much -- after the initial vaccuum, probably 1 in 5 vaccuumings (or even 1 in 10), rather than every vaccuumings. You still do have to empty now and then.

They work great on bare floors and low pile carpets of small apartments, or one floor of a house -- it's helpful to become familiar with the best way to operate it by keeping the floors uncluttered. You do have to spend a moment verifying the place is Roomba friendly (i.e. don't leave laptop charger cords lying across the middle of the room). Expect to replace the $300 robot once every two years, with another $300 robot, they do wear out (!!!) -- If you don't like self servicing (beyond cleaning the rollers, etc), then ebay the worn out unit as ~$50-$100 of replacement parts for other Roomba owners who prefer to self-service their unit, but you do save enough time to make it worth your while, because you can do other cleaning duties (i.e. kitchen) while the Roomba vaccums, or you can start it right before you leave for work. Helpful tip: Use the hose of your old fashioned vaccuum cleaner to clean the Roomba once every two months or so. It will keep its innards clean, especially if you don't like self-servicing a robot.

Same. At two different DZ's, I've landed more than 30 minutes after sunset. That's literally night jump. A combination of a late sunset jump & high-altitude hop n pop. I _truly_ should have brought along my headlamp and a strobe light! However, I enjoy night jumps, and I manifest on a night jump whenever I have the infrequent opportunity to do so.

I do not wear my hearing aids in free fall. They stay in my gear bag.

Not place, but my most memorable non-RW skydive is pulling at 13,000 feet and then doing cloud surfing a tall cloud (not illegally going inside it -- just blade-running the surface of the vertical/sloped cloud cloumns). 7,000-feet tall clouds in a partly cloudy sky is simply amazing. As long as they're not thunderstorm clouds. It's also safer than wingsuit BASE skimming near a cliff. Wish I had that nerve. But cloud surfing is the next best thing, if you can do it nonstop for 10 minutes on an almost 7,000 feet tall cloud, on the sides of cloud cliffs, and cloud slopes. Solo jump, of course.

The rig is purchased and on the way. Good to know that there's an option, at least something that can be done during some future "send-back-to-factory inspection". The flap change is probably less extensive than that Javelin J1 renewal. (good one)

Hello, I have been shopping for replacement gear on an unexpected basis, and I think I have found one that fits my needs perfectly -- It's a black rig as I wanted! Except a few square inches of the container is pink instead of red, which clashes with the rest of my gear, and is a girl color rather than a guy color. I am unfamiliar with the practice, so I'm curious: Do people ever send rigs back to the factory to get a flap replaced with a different color, or re-dyed, etc? I'm wondering what the practice is? (send back the container to factory, get a single flap replaced with a different color? Is it generally expensive or cheap for them to do?) Also, I might just jump it as-is -- pink and all -- I can just say I "support the cause"; which is the gentlemanly way of doing it.

I've been satisfied with my Sabre 170 and actually jump it a lot longer than I expected to (about 600 jumps on it). But I would never trust a packer to pack it again - the only slammer that injured me was not my own packjob. Visited hospital as my neck felt immobilized. Thankfully nothing spinal. Due to stretched ligaments in my neck, I was sore for 4 months and had to change sleeping positions for that duration. I still jump it. My own packjobs only. But that is no fun when I help organize a Rainbow Boogie. Next canopy is probably a Pilot 140 or similar, as I've demoed many of those already.

There are some good replies. I think Dropzone.com needs a "Like" button next to some posts.

Hey Jan, I also want to say a happy birthday to Jan as well! Have a great one! Cheers,

Wow. I am glad that you made it back to the ground safe and alive! Tomorrow, rent a rig and make just one high-altitude hop and pop, just to "get back onto the horse"!

Dozens of canopies all opening in a small space and kicking their legs. Who's talking to who? It mainly happens with canopies closer to each other, rather than 1000 feet from each other, usually when tracking neighbours have off-heading openings that points roughly at each other, or they are trying to merge into a pattern and want to essentially notify them of an intent to merge. i.e. situations of actual threat. Or when the a small fragment of airspace is more congested than expected. Sometimes it avoids the needs for a drastic evasive response, if you know they aren't planning to turn into you. If they respond immeidately with a kick, while turning their head at you, you know they aren't planning to turn into you. It's sometimes safer to fly side by side than to turn left/right into somebody else's airspace, if that canopy has now acknowledged your prescence. Sometimes it is sort of like giving permission to fly 100-foot-separation CRW, or whatever -- if they don't see you, then you have to worry they may turn into you. There are certain situations where you are stuck with canopies in front, behind, and to left, right. You have to decide between flying nearer a canopy that sees you, or a canopy that does not see you. If someone gives you an immediate leg kick while staring at you and the acknowledgement was less than 1 second, it's pretty confirmed that the leg kick is addressed at you -- you ARE close enough to see their facial expression or hear them. The useful of legkicks are actually more apparent at bigways, because it's pretty much regular behaviour at the Perris 100-ways, large State Records, and World Records. Also, some skydivers (like me) are deaf, and any yelling is ALSO accompanied by a leg kick -- it's good supplemental visual information. BUT SHOULD NOT be depended on. It's just good courtesy. Go to several 100-ways, become assigned to a middle breakoff, rather than an outer whacker, then you'll once-in-a-while be in "boxed-in" situations that make you understand that leg kicks are useful, after all. You obviously rather follow side by side with a canopy that sees you, rather than turn closer to adjacent canopies that don't see you (because they might turn unexpectedly into you). In many jumps you want to AVOID being boxed in, and being good at it, you can avoid it more than 90% of the time, but there's often that "one jump" at a major event, where the leg kick may occasionally make or break a specific fly-direction decision. Another way to picture a scenario. 150 or 200-way jump. Your neighbour tracks a bit too far. Another neighbour opens a bit closer, and because you had to track between two neighbours that didn't fan out enough. Another one opens near too. Now you're surrounded by 3 canopies between 100-to-200 feet away, flying in various directions, within less than 100 feet of vertical altitude of you. You immediately see one of them that is doing leg kicks and staring directly at you (close enough to see eyeballs), she then immediately turns towards clear airspace. You decide to turn to approximately follow her, knowing three things (1) You immediately noticed good safe airspace in front of her, and (2) she's immediately no longer a threat because she's flying directly away from you, and (3) The simultaneous instant look/kick/"yo!" confirmed your prescence, she is far less likely than the others to move unexpectedly closer to you. .... Finally now you're safe from the other two canopies that don't see you until 3-4 seconds later (during which time they MIGHT unexpectedly turn towards you) Time elapsed for the entire paragraph above: typically 2 seconds, on average. (during which time before leg kick reply, you're actively flying to avoid everybody on average, hoping none of the 3 turns into you. But obviously in the occasional situation you are "uncomfortably boxed in", you prefer to fly near people that notice you, rather than fly near people that don't notice you. There's a lot of sorta-fuzzy scenarios, but you get the gist. The leg kick is good courtesy at big ways.

That won't work for me. I'm a deaf skydiver.

Leg kicks are pretty common at bigways, where many canopies open in tight airspace.

Mine's a 1.1, and it worked.

If this is a footage-only jump, I think it would work well. Use actual jump footage with some REALLY good jumpers (preferably people who's done it before -- Eloy, Arizonia has been historically popular for skydive stunt filming), but film some of the scenes with cheaper cameras during the daytime with dark jumpsuits. It's harder to wear cameras with big lens for high-quality night jump. This is probably easier than getting the more-expensive huge-lens fast-shutter cameras necessary for good night footage, and making custom helmets necessary. (using consumer cameras for night jumps, will be too noisy and not studio-quality). Daytime jumps should be OK from some good prosumer cameras on pre-existing camera helmets, if you're sourcing for a HDTV broadcast advertisement... CGI recommendations: - Convert the day jumps to night jumps. Equalize/adjust as necessary. The reflected sunlight on dark jumpsuits is converted to a reflected "moonlight" appearance. - Add beautiful moonlit sky in the background. (ideal if you can record accelerometer data during camera pointing, so that the background mapping can stay in sync). - Make the mirrorball reflections look like sunrays or laserbeams. Exaggerate the visibility of the light beams. Enhance the mirrorball taken in the daytime footage, when video-editing (CGI) the scenes into night jump, so the mirrorball stays dazzling. Need to tint/monochrome it, to turn daytime reflection look to nighttime reflections. Creatively use the sun as the illumiunation source to exaggerate nighttime moon or lightsource reflections. Then again, if you got the expensive cameras/helmets necessary for virtually noise-free night jump video, and can't afford the expensive video edit software for all sorts of CGI effects, your film making process might be different...

One of the neat things about discoballs is reflections off walls and floors. - In the sky, you don't have a wall and floor. So it's not as dazzling. - Plus, you would REALLY need a bright source of light in order for the disco spots to be visible on surrounding flyers - Flyers would need to be less than 10 feet from the disco ball, for reflected spots to be clearly visible. You'd invite only very capable nightjump flyers. Otherwise, reflected spots are too dim to see. - It would be very hard to aim the light source. A shaky light source will mean shaky reflections, that are not noticed, especially if dim. - It would be very hard to stabilize the disco ball from vibrating/shaking in freefall. A shaky disco ball will mean shaky reflections, that are not noticed, especially if dim. - In addition, Night vision would be screwed, especially if you could see the bright light sources (especially since you'd need a light source from both sides). One light source might shine into your eyes, making it impossible to see reflected spots on other flyers. Scientific prediction: Disco ball jump will be a boring bust (with too many risks) for these reasons. :-( Alternate recommendation: 600 glowsticks off eBay for $49.95 (CLICKY) .... I usually get a batch once a year, mainly for ground/party events. For night jump, you could wear 50 or 100 glowsticks per person, or connect (and superglue) a long string of glowsticks, and use a 10 foot length like a streamer or freefly tube. Reel it up and unreel during freefall. Or tape 100 of them on a hoop, and do a night hoop jump, with a glowing hoop. You could even attach glowing streamers to the top of the hoop too. Make sure you put plenty on everyone, including around the ankles and wrists, as well as on your helmet. Since you can get "massive" numbers of glowsticks for cheap off eBay, the "liberal usage" of glowsticks, is a safer night jump idea, IMHO.

One of the rare tips that dorkzone helped me learn is that the flare begins when the brake lines become taut enough (tail deflection begins: i.e. where the parachute starts to deform), and it is not always full arms high at the loops. Some canopies have so much loose brakeline, that you must find where the loose brake line stops by pulling down the toggle handles until the brake line becomes taut and tail deflection is about to begin. Sometimes that's 6 inches below the loops, sometimes that's 3 inches below, sometimes it's at the loops (where the toggles get stowed). Basically, pull down the toggles until you feel the resistance begin: Now the brake line's taut and that's where the tail deflection begins. That's where the flare band begins. Now on your final, that's where you pre-position your hands/toggles on your final glide, to be ready to flare with better efficiency. Once I figured that out, my landings improved dramatically. I remember that you're a short person & you may need the brake lines correspondingly shortened. New lines are usually longer than the rentals you were using before. You also need to be aware that brake lines often gradually shrink/shorten as they are used more, and need relining/readjustment to prevent flares from becoming dangerous. It's good to make sure that the beginning of the flare band (brake line taut / tail deflection) and the end of the flare band (just about to stall) is within your arm stroke's range. Get familiar with the start and the end of the bands in many practice flights. If any part of this flare band (range) is above the loop above you that the brake line goes through, or if any part of the flare band is below your full arm stroke, you won't be able to maximize the flare of your parachute. WARNING / DISCLAIMER: Of course, this may not play a factor in your case, and your parachute is already properly tuned for your arm's stroke, and you need to get more familiar with the flaring and the flare range. Do not blindly follow dorkzone advice. But you already knew that.

A lesser known, is Albert Robida's "The Twentieth Century: The Electrical Life" (1890), translated from "Le Vingtième siècle. La vie électrique". This is an 1890 book that includes televisions and video teleconferencing, and predicting some dystopian attributes of the future. Even older, this is an 1879 science-fiction artwork of a television/conference display: Telephonoscope. When the pratical telephone was developed, it was imagined that eventually light would be transmitted as sounds were.

All the older routers are unavoidably secure. Keep that in mind... If such an older router must be used, treat it as if it was a public wifi hotspot - use secure https web addresses when accessing facebook and other websites. Also, bear in mind that any drive-by wifi user can break old WiFi encryption algorithm (WEP and older varieties of WPA) and use the network for nefarious purposes.

Less than one week to Rainbow Boogie 2011! For those not sure if they want to come, here's: ...PHOTOS of last year's boogie evening dance/party ...Facebook Event: Rainbow Boogie 2011 Skydive ...Facebook Event: Rainbow Boogie 2011 Banquet/Party ...Youtube Video (this one is the one targeted towards gay market) ...RainbowSkydivers Facebook Group Photos Feel free to RSVP if you're planning to come to this all-inclusive boogie, whether you're straight, gay, bi, lesbian, etc... The party has become one of the best dropzone parties in the Northeast!

I still jump a Sabre1 and while it's served me well, I would not recommend it for people with back problems. Although it can be packed to open reasonably comfortable: When packing, flake lightly/crinkly and not too flat/neat/slippery, roll tail AND nose tightly (but this one, do neatly) when you cocoon, use Dacron lines, use a bigger slider.... Keep in mind it's not guaranteed, and also that you might occasionally use a packer that may not pack it as well as you do. I made the mistake of letting somebody else pack it, and will only pack my own packjobs from now on. For people with back problems, I really DO suggest that it is cheaper (health wise) to spend $1000 extra on a pillow-opening canopy such as Pilot, Sceptre, etc.

It's worth noting, that not all gay men likes anything related to asses, instead preferring oral. There's also the fact of the invention of the douche -- since many gay men will NOT tolerate shit (I meant that in a literal sense) or the smell thereof. To some straight men, even a *cleanly* douched woman's ass often smell better/more flowery than her bush; it's all in personal hygenie. Same applies for the other side of the fence, and is actually done much more often. The stereotype of the "fudge packer" misnomer actually miffs me a bit, unless in good humor, because the reality of most gays is actually different. It's usually a misnomer, whether it is the experienced douching, the odorless dieting, or the many gay men who DON'T even do ass. Or the longtime love-nesting home-owning tax-paying gay couple that prefers cuddling to sex.

Hello, I am not old but being mindful of the issues based on some research for someone, it appears that the sweet spot for an older skydiver is a wingload of very close to 1 on a very good brand canopy. So if you are scared of swooping and want to maximize safety.... (especially after you're finished re-doing your jumps on student-type wingloadings) 1. Eliminating the "Ankle Crush" factor: As pchapman explains, modern canopies plane out more easily, the smaller they get, because of their speed. (At least for the sizes currently in common use). But going too small means landing mistakes are even more dangerous. Canopies wingload 0.8 approximately and smaller canopies -- the canopy starts to have the ability to "plane out" -- completely zero vertical velocity. Lighter canopies than approximately 0.7, you will still have some ankle thump factor usually (unless you are really good and aggressive at flare on a new canopy) but it's a lot less than a round. The act of flaring is like trying to tilt the nose upwards on a gliding airplane: It allows you to turn forward velocity into lift (at least until you slow down and you don't have lift anymore) -- that's how airplanes can safely land even when they lost an engine (i.e. glider). Your canopy is lighter than an unpowered metal airplane, and you will much more easily "plane out" on landing. Round canopies were not really gliders back then and didn't have the luxury of the "flare" to zero vertical velocity like a landing glider. Now, once you more heavily load than around 0.7 to 0.8, you can easily completely eliminate vertical velocity, and therefore, eliminate ankle thump given a proper flare in good winds. Yes, smaller canopies makes it even easier, but a mistake flaring under a smaller canopy means big danger, especially if your bones are at risk. Note that new fabric, will plane out better than old fabric. So buying new for your main is a good idea, they land more gentle. 2. Eliminating the "Wind Hold" factor: Bigger canopies than a wingload of about 1.0, you will be stuck on the ground too often. Big parachutes go slow. You fly backwards during strong winds. You decide to stay on ground. You want to more heavily load to prevent wind holds from happening too often. 3. Eliminating the "Slammo Opening" factor: Older bodies can't handle explosive openings. Choose a soft-opening brand that's very forgiving of occasional messy pack jobs from random packers. There are many, I've seen Pilot's and Sceptre's open so pillowly-soft and gentle. Just make sure you know to pull a tad higher (i.e. don't do many low 2000ft pulls with them). If buying used, choose an appropriate slider size the factory recommends; some used canopies came with sliders too small for them before manufacturer recommendations changed. (i.e. my Sabre 1, which opens too fast sometimes; I don't recommend them unless you're prepared and don't let inexperienced packers pack them.) 4. Reducing risk of landing errors Factor 1 and 2 (ankle crush and wind hold factors) tends to recommend smaller canopies. Now you already know more heavily loaded canopies start to become unforgiving of landing mistakes, like improperly-executed low turns. Therefore, you now have to find a compromise loading that's heavily loaded enough to satisfy factors 1 and 2 (ankle crush and wind hold factors), but not too heavily loaded to significantly increase risk of landing mistakes. Therefore you will see a common and good equilibrium modern wingloading of approximately 1.0 for a first canopy -- give or take depending on specifric circumstances. .... So, if your priority is a good compromise, you will find a wingload factor of around 1.0 (give or take a little bit, depending on wear, brand, body weight, instructor approval, Brian Germain chart, Skydiver Information Manual, etc), brand new, on a pillowy-soft-opening canopy of recommended new-jumper-friendly type, to be roughly a perfect compromise for someone who is worried about being easy on old body and ankles. Of course, when you start jumping, you will be jumping something really big (i.e. 260 square feet, etc) and will be pretty lightly loaded. It will still have much less ankle thump than any round, and will be comparable to jumping off a chair. If they got good fresher student canopies, on a good day, that are easy to flare, and you are good at distance perception & flare timing, you can still pretty much plane out on jump #1 and pillow soft touch down. (it happens often nowadays at some dropzones with good student canopies now! But there will be those less-good landings that have a bit more thump.) .... But temper your expectations, for now -- be prepared to PLF to save your bones. That said, you need to make sure you have the strength and make sure you've got strong bones (i.e. don't skimp on your vitamin D and calcium, etc and/or get enough sunlight to get that, if you work a desk job) before you begin jumping. You MAY still get injured skydiving, but you can LESSEN your risks, especially of major injury, by following a few of these popular (and easy) 1-2-3-4 recommendations. Yes, you MAY find you want a faster canopy eventually, but for an older skydiver, it's really is best downsize really slowly. Watch your body's ability to tolerate skydiving, and how well you still PLF these days at your age, before making further major gear decisions. Especially if you've got years of family behind you that want to see you stay alive longer. :-) Lastly, your instructors will be the most important people in it all. Find someone who "understands"; especially at least one of the instructors who's been "there" in the old days, too. Even if he won't be your primary instructor (they're getting rarer and rarer...)

Pssst....build one in Chicago? I think that's currently dormant, and needs some team of investors to push the interest forward. Skydive Chicago looked into it, and thought it wasn't touristy enough of a market. But Chicago over the last 10 years have become a much more interesting tourist destination (study it up; you'll see) and we're wanting to visit Chicago in the next year or so, just solely for the tourist aspect (After having dismissing the city for so long as a washed-over destination). And it is not too terrible -- it's a big city with a large local skydiving population, and it's a pretty tunnel-dry location of United States, sufficient to attract market from nearby cities, and allow some skydivers (potentially me included!) to decide to lengthen their future O'Hare/Midway layovers to an overnighter to spin a visit to the tunnel. Then there's the whuffo market that is ever so-important, local advertising will be very important too. I think the market's sustainable enough -- if both Montreal and even out-of-the-way Nashua NH, can have profitable Skyventure tunnels, then Chicago surely can. There's dried-up pre-subprime-era "due diligence" somewhere there. Hunt it down and see if you can help them out. Maybe hunt for a job in Chicago, too, so you can position yourself in that territory accordingly? Anyway, wild ideas, maybe not sustainable, but worth a peek-see if you can track down the old due-diligence and see if the business conditions changed...