froggie

michele, please dont think that! its soooooooooo not true. what i was trying to do was exactly what im sure i did... bring a smile to the faces of some folks here. I dont have anywhere near as much time to visit this site as i use to. with that in mind, i log on and feel lost. I dont have the PC abilities, or the time, to read every single thread. not when im home to sleep and shower and then im off to the dz. I havent even eaten a single meal here in 3 weeks. So when i log on, and see all these new people, new topics, stories im not familiar with.. well, that gets kinda weird. Ive followed your progression, and im damned proud of you!!! I even bragged about you the other week to one of our Instructors here at Xkeys. Sis is right, it seems like so long ago i went thru ground school and began doing solos w/ one instructor. It was in march, not even 6 months ago! but it feels like such a long time. so much has happened, so much has changed. Im up to 25 jumps now. To all my friends, sorry I havent been around much, skydiving has taken over my life, and the new found friends have been a big part of it. BUT I havent forgotten about you guys! kel PS- to all of our newer friends, dont stop sharing stuff about who you are... cant make good friends that way. WELCOME TO OUR LITTLE DEMENTED HOME!

this is an attempt to revive good threads.. trying to bring the mood back up around here... i dont have the normal "flying" dreams but about 2 months ago i had a dream that i had all the gear i ever needed.. woke up and was soooooooooooo sad cause it wasnt true. but now, with the settlement from the accident just around the corner i had the same dream. this time i woke up and was estatic. pretty soon i will have everything i could ever dream of and money to waste!!! breaking my nose, having knee surgury and not walking for months suddenly seems all worth it! and they say money cant make you happy... guess they werent skydivers then! Giddy Giddy me! kelly

sangiro, ah. i just posted a thread. its called "for the old timers" . it was posted in a good spirit. sort of to keep the old timers around. It was not ment to be offensive or insulting. please dont take it that way. we love all these new options, and the fact that over 4,000 people, skydivers and whuffos alike have found your site in recent months, well, that totally kicks ass. The point of my thread was just to remind the old timers what we built, and that its still around. we just have to put a little effort into bringing it back.. kel

Nate, let me be the first one on here to say CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!! its an awesome life huh? one day, when youve been in the sport a few months, youre going to sit down with a good friend and have a conversation about how you got into the sport... its at that moment that youll realize what a completely different lifestyle you live now, and how its the most amazing thing that has ever happened to you... the wait is worth it, the conversation is worth it. (sorry, had a real sentimental moment with a good friend tonight, we did a lot of 'serious' talking and im still reeling in it..) kel

i just came across a thread from Monk that mentioned his disapointment in the change of things around here and how he missed the 'good ole times'. well, heres a thread to remember those times... Remember when... FFF was the original FFF and his sex life dominated the threads? Remember when... we didnt have all these fancy options for the threads? Remember when... The pub was just a far fetched idea for the 'new, feels like its never gonna get here' dz.com? Remember when... The nakie pics of the dz.com chicks were posted? Remember when... Wingi made daily appearances on these threads? (me too ) Remember when... It was the same 10 or 15 people posting? Remember when... Pammi was graduating to more and more freefall time? Remember when... Private issues could be discussed and you didnt get flamed for it? we all shared a lot more personal info way back when. Remember when... Sangiro did his motorcycle trip and posted all those cool pics? Remember when... The battle of the sexs ran strong and ended with the girls winning? Remember when... The polar bear wasnt finished yet and we all waited intently for the finished pics of it? Remember when... Wingi posted a pic of himself nakie? what do you want to remember ol'e timers? Sis, youll always be sis, and somewhere deep down ill always be froggie.. just doesnt feel like it anymore... kel

as i said after my first tandem jump (which was in the winter) "OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD! I CANT FEEL MY FINGERS, MY EARS ARE KILLING ME!!!! BUT I DONT CARE! I DONT CARE! THAT WAS AWESOME!!!!" ...... get my point? its well worth it..... Just make sure their some kick ass skydives so its all worth while. kelly, the NorthEast queen

sangiro, welcome home! i forgot you were moving to London. I should be out that way sometime this winter... going to do a little traveling starting in November, planning on doing the whole "lets see America thing for about 2 months. coming home for christmas, then hitting the UK for about 3 weeks. ill be sure to let you know more when i know more. kel

skyhawk, honestly, that thought didnt even occur to me. my chin strap can be a bit of a pain in the ass to tighten anyway. i can never seem to get it just right. I tighten it too tight, then i loosen it too much. I never dreamed that it would do what it did when i deployed, but then again i never planned on having line twists like i did either. It taught me how some minor things can really screw up a normally stable body position. Ill tell you what though, i wont be jumping that helmet any longer than needed. Ill be placing an order online soon to a my friends friend, he makes these really lighttweight helmets, set for an audible and a protrack. spaces built right into the helmet for them. It barely weights anything at all. Hes based out of Austrailia. So it will take a bit of time to get here. Josh, in answer to your question "where have you been?".... working at the dropzone, jumping, hanging out. been going out to dinner with folks from the dz most every night. This past friday night i was the lucky camera girl who got pics of her good friend screwing up a pond swoop at the local golf course and crashing in. He was totally fine, just a bruised ego. We were able to save his Cypres. thank god. It was actually quite hilarious. he gives me a wind sock, his camera, his book bag and a pullup cord and sends me off to the golf course to get set up cause we were demoing in.. I got some sweet pics of two friends swooping, and then it was his turn. I get him in the view finder and am following him down from his hook turn. hes about 1 foot of the water. no pics yet.... SMACK!!!! I was so shocked. I looked up and screamed to him. but something inside my head said "he'll want pictures!" so i just started snapping away while still yelling at him to tell us if he was okay. he bounced twice, then went under (its a deep pond). I think i might have gotten some good pics of it. swam to shore and we pulled him out. popped his reserve. saved the cypres. went back to the dz and brought us some beer and some dinner. poor guy. but hes perfectly fine .we were able to dry out his canopy as soon as we got back to the dz.. was jumping his system again in 2 days. another jumper got it all on video. the funniest part is that hes doing the breast stroke towards shore and another jumper comes along side of him and does a perfect swoop while hes struggling to make it to the shore. it was hilarious. hes planning on getting the video up on a web site in the near future. ill be sure to post the link when he does. I did a hop and pop from 13'5 with my friend Damo (from SONIC BOOM) today. now that was amazing.... i highly recomend it to EVERYONE!!!!!!!! so much fun. Josh, when are you going to jump again? hows jumping going for everyone else? any new stories? kel

fallinmarc, ROF. no, that does NOT count as a malfunction. it counts as 'pilot brain fart'. ive got this closterfobia thing and i cant stand having the chin strap even touching my neck. it makes me start to gag, so its almost always a bit loose. Plus, its a protec, and a bit too big for me. it was a gift from stacy. i helped her find a really sweet oxygen (?) helmet and so she gave me her old one as a thankyou. Pre-second piece of skydiving gear. So its got more sentimental value than practical value. i will be buying a new helmet on tuesday. (Damo) one of the guys from sonic boom gave me some info about his helmet. Ill be ordering my own soon. also buying another one too. but back to the 'beer' wanna be mal. its soooooooooo not! :) its pretty funny. in 24 jumps ive had some crazy hilarious stuff happen. I cant imagine what stories ill have when ive got 500 jumps. So how is everybody? kel

started this week off by making a kick ass tracking dive on monday. Just me and my friend Mikey. The dive went so much better than the one last week, and the one last week was good. I dont jump again until thursday. Start thursday off with a nice hop-n-pop from 5 grand. Decided to H&P cause i wanted clear airspace to really learn my canopy. I had a radio with me and two people on the ground videoing my landing. So thier telling me all these extra things to do up there. Prolly did at least 5 practice flares. Gotta get that right, these landings hurt like hell! Even though im on radio im still doing my own thing. Not that that was the right decision, but i had to do what i was comfortable with, even if it wasnt the best desicion. Georgie wanted me to land in a certain (read: smaller) area of the field. I chose to land in the longest section. my call. it was what i was comfortable with. No danger in that desicion. So the video shows that i flared a little high and that im not finishing my flare. Im doing the second stage after i hit the ground. well duh, no wonder the landings hurt. So i watched that video about 30 times before i manifested for the next jump, which is the wackiest jump ive had so far...... heres the story of my "if everything could ever go wrong it did.." jump so im the second person out. i give a count but still not enough time before i exited. So im in freefall and at the same time that i realize that i didnt wait long enough i also realize that my helmet chin strap wasnt tighened enough. So im watching the guy below me. our seperation is okay so now i can play around up there. So i do like 4 backloops in a row and the damned helmet is catching massive amounts of air (cause its so loose) and is just throwing me off balance. I go neutral. decide to do some barrel rolls. that doesnt go to stable either. dont like that feeling .roll back to my belly, but my legs are funky so i go into this head over heals forward dive. get stable again. did some right 720's. go stable again. locate the guy. The guy that jumped before me starts deploying. Im watching and analizing, deciding if there is enough horizonal seperation between us two. Im not comfortable with it so i deploy. Get thrown around in the harness, rotating all over the place. rough opening. I didnt pack for myself.. I go to look up (canopy check) and my helmet gets caught/hit on the risers (line twists down to the risers) and the helmet that was too loose from the get go goes "boinnnggg!" and pops off my head. I say a nice F word and catch it as it pops forward. grab the helmet as its above and in front of my head. grab the goggles (which broke) shove goggles in helmet. bite down on chin strap of helmet. Grab the risers and just start pulling apart and kicking. little me, all 115lbs trying to kick out line twists on a massive spectre 190 canopy. The line twists started above the slider, contained the slider, and went below to my risers. Took about 40 seconds or so but i managed to kick them all out. Controlability check. Everythings A okay. So now i notice that im a bit downwind/crosswind. Winds were coming out of the south, and i was East, between daliah ave and the airport, above tuckahoe road.(for those of you familiar with Xkeys) So ive burned off a bit of alti dealing with all these problems. Time to decide if i should land off. Check my position. check for outs. Decide that with a little help i can definitally make it back and still have time to set up a decent pattern.... I headed for the runway and rode the thermals to my holding area. Without the thermals off the runway i wouldnt have tried to make it to the landing area, i would have settled for out front of the airport to land. But i know about the thermals off the runway, and how if youre above it you could just be gaining alitude and not loosing much.. just holding there. So I use the thermals to keep from loosing the alti that i need to make it home safely. Set up a decent pattern, only had to do one S turn to burn alti and headed in for my final. PLFed the landing and my friend sarah around and goes "so how was that landing...?" my answer: "After that fucking skydive i dont care about the landing! im just glad its all over and im safely on the ground... so, wanna go skydive? i sure in hell do! I LOVE THIS FRIGGIN SPORT!!! ........ expect the unexpected...... kel

it seems that our little frucinator was running around yesterday getting girls to put fruce.com stickers on their boobies. Guess those pics will start showing up on the web site soon huh frucey? she wont mind. after the stories she shared at the Library IV last night im betting shes not too shy.. kel

favorite part of the skydive : standing in the door getting ready to do a 2 way, whether its a belly jump or a tracking dive. Just being in the door, yelling an exit count with a good friend smiling right back in my face. when im jumping by myself my favorite part is waving and smiling at my friends who are still in the door. I also like packing. YES FOLKS, I SAID THAT I LIKE PACKING!!! WTF?!?! NO, SHES NOT CRAZY. It's something that i find rewarding , and Ive been taught some good techniques that make it a hella lot easier. my least favorite part is manifesting. or at least that time right before manifesting. check ground winds.. are they good for me to jump? watch landings. study winds. study landing patterns. go manifest. get jumping clothes on, get geared up. go to boarding area. i tend to be lazy, so i need a bit of motivation to get manifested. but once i do im good to go. i just dont like the whole "whats jumping conditions like today?" part of it. besides that, i bust my ass working on the dz the majority of the time i'm there.. its nice to lay around and not be bound to any classroom. kel

anne, i know the feeling... on monday i did my beer tracking dive with Mikey McGrath (camera flyer on the ipoc skysurf team) and he shot vid of it. I only have 21 jumps but looking at the video from that jump and thinking back to not that long ago when i was doing AFF its amazing. I remember the fear "gotta get stable out the door" now my favorite thing to do is geek the my friends who are hanging out the door with their video helmets. the jump with mikey was amazing. I did a diving exit and he grabbed my hands almost immediately out the door. he releases and on the video im on the hill waving to him, giving thumbs up, smiling like crazy, laughing, waving. Then he purposely caused seperation so that i could practice matching my tracking with his.. its not up close, not until the bottom of the skydive when I track next to him, and at that moment (great editing mikey!), the singer starts singing. The timing is perfect. To see ME adapting my body to freefall with another person. Im tracking but arching a bit to get down to him. we get side by side and the transition to a really desent flat track is schweet. I go neutral at 5,200 feet when i just knew i was near 5 grand. another amazing thing. He told me he didnt want me to check my alti at all, just enjoy the tracking dive, expect the dytter to beep. I didnt, but i still knew i was near 5 grand. To know what alitude im at, thats sweet. So i go neutral, check alti, go back into my track for a couple of seconds. go neutral box again, wave off at 4 grand. nice smooth wave off and then to see myself on video deploying. then mikey deploys and the canopy is opening as the words "Connnnquerinnnng the wormmmmm" are playing. totally sweet skydive, damned good edit too. At times i cant believe i skydive. I cant believe that in the years to come this is the 'home movies' ill be showing my kids. I love my life. and it just got better :) kel

aw, the frankenotter is Robs Baby. Did you see him during the 108 way attempts, the caravan and franki were both gone to other dz's. The replacement Super Otter came with its own pilot. Rob didnt know what to do with himself. He looked totally lost. have you jumped with John behind the controls yet? Yet another darn good pilot at xkeys....