Categories
New Zealand

New Zealand Itenerary

Just so you know, I’m leaving for New Zealand on Monday. Thanks to Ben and Alison & Mick for putting me up [read: ‘putting up with’] before we get out of the country…and when we get back. Instead of e-mailing people who want to know how the trip is going while I’m gone, I’ll be posting updates to this page whenever possible. It’ll be quicker and easier that way. Thanks for your prayers and support and all that good stuff… It’s going to be great!

Here’s the itenerary:

  • America West Airlines 30 May Memphis Intl -> Phoenix [Sky Harbor Int] 2:20 P 3:43 PM (Local time). HP 6443 Economy. 3:23 Duration. Canadair regional jet 900.
  • America West Airlines 30 May Phoenix AZ -> Los Angeles CA 4:19 P 5:42 P HP32 1:23 Duration. Airbus Industrie A319
  • Air New Zealand 30 May Los Angeles -> Auckland, NZ 9:30 P 5:15A 01 June. NZ 1. 12:45 duration. Boeing 747-400
  • Air New Zealand 01 June Auckland -> Wellington 7:00 AM 8:00 AM NZ405 1:00 duration. Boeing 737-30
  • Return– Air New Zealand 22 June Wellington -> Auckland 5:30P 6:30PM 1:00 Duratoin. NZ464 Boeing 737-300
  • Air New Zealand 22 June Auckland-> LA NZ6 7:45PM 12:40PM 11:55 duration. Boeing 747-400
  • America West 22 June LA->Phoenix 3:50PM 5:10PM HP30 1:20 Duration. Airbus Industrie A319
  • America West 22 June Phoenix->Memphis 6:00PM-10:57PM HP6398 2:57 Duration Canadair Regional Jet 900
Categories
News

Cruel? Unusual.

According to this news story, evidently mannequin theft has been an issue in Japan. The dolls resemble children about the age of six and are named “Peko-chan.”

Reuters reports this about the sitings:

After a wave of “Peko-chan” disappearances last year, the company suggested chaining the dolls down, but customers complained that this would be cruel.

Cruel!? It would be cruel to tie down an inanimate object? Am I missing something? Are we that materialistic? Must we personify hunks of plastic that are trying to sell us more junk? Good grief…

Categories
Hate When That Happens

Wal-Mart: Axis of Evil

Alolng with the disappearing lake story, this Wal-Mart News is hereby deemed worthy of the new category, “I Hate When That Happens.”

Categories
Religious

Victory

All in all, several hours have been lost to this battle. In the end, victory was rediculously easy. But nobody has to know that. I finally figured out how to add a new speaker to the GWFS page on CrieveHall.org! So be on the lookout, there should be new content in the near future. I know you probably didn’t really care about that, but it was fun to type anyway… So deal with it!

And I go to New Zealand in a little over a week. Yeee-haw!

Categories
Hate When That Happens

Missing a Lake?

Anybody missing a lake?

Man, I hate when that happens…

Categories
News

Rethinking

I may be leaning more towards the drugs, now.

By the way….why is there nothing on TV….ever?!?

Categories
Me

Summer Livin’

Summer is here. Wow. I miss Freed… and its people…. some more than others. But I won’t bore you with that. Home is very good. I started work at church on Monday and loved every second.

I guess the closest I can come to topping skydiving is to tell you I had my wisdom teeth cut out today. I must say that this experiment to test whether I prefer drugs or Jesus is leaning heavily towards the Jesus side… I suppose it isn’t really crazier than jumping out of an airplnae.

Which, by the way, was not caused, forced, ordered, etc etc etc by Leslie. So quit asking! It was lots of fun, and you need to do it. The skydiving, not the wisdom teeth, that is.

So you, dear reader, have a wonderful day.

Categories
Me

Proof, Part 1

14,500 feet. 120 mph. Wow.

Categories
Me

The Story

Alright. So here’s what went down. Pun intended.

We (Leslie, Jerry, Amanda W, Amy F and I) get to West Tennessee skydiving at about 1:40 sunday afternoon. Ten minutes late, thanks to my inability to notice when your higway veers around small towns like Bolivar and men named Leon’s inability to figure out what girls named Leslie are talking about…

The facility is down a winding 1.5 lane country road in farm country, flat as can be. The fields are tilled and brown with the rest just covered in grass and whatever else grows by itself. We present and watch a 20 minute video explaining to us what fun we’re about to have, as well as informing us that we can’t sue the airplane manufacturer, pilot, gas manufacturer, parachute manufacturer, harness manufacturer, goggle manufacturer, guy who inflated tires in the plane, fellow who washed the airplane window, guy who poured sugar in the gas tank, the company doing the jumps or the man who throws you out the door. I don’t remember everything it said, as the video was narrated by ZZ Top meets amish man meets David Koresh.

So the crazy owner (Mike, I think) walks in with waivers. We literally have to intial close to twenty times and sign away all rights to anything and everything. They also explained to us that if we wanted a lawyer to interpret the agreement, to make sure he was from Tennessee, so we don’t get messed up. So we signed and sealed the seven seals.

We hoped to all jump together, as the plane seats 14 jumpers. Unfortuately, they didn’t have that much room or that many cameramen. So, we planned for Jerry and Amy to go first. Leslie, then me, then Amanda would go on the second plane. A few minutes after we made that plan, Mr. Owner-Man calls me up to the desk and informs me that because of weight and cameramen, I need to take the first flight with Jerry.

Now, the irony. Leslie and Amanda were the people most excited and least scared. Jerry and I were terrified. And we had to go first.

We got suited up in “form fitting” jumpsuits. My instructor’s name was Bill. He was funny and knew that it didn’t really matter what I did. So he just told me how to get to the door and how to steer the parachute, basically. Jerry’s guy made him practice jumping out of the mock-up airplane in the center. We got harnessed up, put up with the weird video guy, took some pictures…and nearly 45 minutes later, boarded the plane.

The plane was “interesting.” You sit in the floor, facing the back, in two rows. You have to spread your legs and go as far back into the lap of the person behind you as possible. The jumpmaster attaches himself to you at around 10,000 feet. As this was a pretty small plane that had been souped up pretty well, the takeoff was very quick. We got to altitude (14,500 feet) in pretty close to 7 minutes from wheels-up. The jumpmasters had a great time at our expense in the plane. At about 3,000 feet, Bill pulled a knife out of his suit and told me that if something went wrong, he was cutting me loose. In his words, “No sense in getting both of us killed!” He said later, “If this parachute messes up again, I’m just gonna quit using it!” I’m still not sure whether he was lying that time or not…but he later told me that the last time he used it, it didn’t open correctly at first and he had to adjust it, but for me, he had packed it a different way so it shouldn’t have a problem.

The plane takes off pretty quickly, and the whole time, all the jumpers are eyeing altimiters. It was pretty neat to go through the clouds and realize just how high you were. Once you get to altitude, the plane slows to around 100 miles per hour and pulls a nice little parabola, just like NASA’s famed “Vomit Comit.” It gives you a second of near-weightlessness so that you and the jumpmaster can sort of stand up.

Once the plane levels off and everyone is standing in a crouched position, they roll open the lexan door and people start waddling towards it. The plane is completely full, so someone is in it immediatley when the door is open. People walk towards it and then just dissapear. Now that’s weird!

I waddled towards the door, very much not wanting to jump out of it. I know I could have turned back, but I was not about to come back to the earth on the plane. I’d never hear the end of that.

So, it was my turn. Before I got to the door, my cameraman climbed out the door and moved to his left, clinging to the outside of the plane, so he could capture my exit. I moved to the doorway, with my feet on the very edge, my toes hanging over 14,500 feet of nothing. My arms were folded so I wouldn’t be tempted able to try to hold on to the door or grab for anything (like the wing) on the way out. We rocked in and out of the plane to a count of “Ready” – “set” – “jump!”

Jumping out of the plane was perhaps the most counter-intuitive thing I’ve ever done. Given the choice between solid plane ground and nothingness, I’ll take the solid ground any time.

I rememer jumping and falling and thinking about what in the world I had gotten myself into. It took me a few seconds of falling to remember the position I was supposed to be in. It didn’t feel like falling at all. It was like floating, not touching anything, with a really really really strong wind. A few seconds later, it occured to me that I was enjoying this. At first, it was difficult to breathe, kind of like if you stick your head out the car window on the interstate. (We tested that theory on the way to skydiving…) After a few seconds, it just occured to me that it wasn’t the wind keeping me from breathing, it was me. A few deep breaths solved the problem. My instructor started waving his arm in front of my face, and I looked away from the ground for a second and was surprised to see the camera man right in front of my face. I smiled and waved a few times and was loving it.

It seemed like just a couple of seconds later that Bill stuck his arm in my face again and pointed to the altimiter to show me that we are just at 5,000 feet. I had already fallen close to two miles, and it felt like it just took an instant. I was disappointed that the fall was going to end, as hard as that is for you to believe!

He pulled the ripcord. The parachute opening was definitely a noticable occurrence. It didn’t hurt, it wasn’t sudden or shocking. It was like being stretched and being pulled from facing the earth into a standing position. It only took a couple of seconds, and it was almost completely silent. The earth still seemed incredibly far away.

My ears cleared pretty quickly, and the descent was gorgeous. Bill let me steer and we did some spirals going down and practiced landings. The canopy ride lasted around five mintues. It doesn’t occur to you just how high up you are until the last few seconds, when the ground actually starts to get close and you can see the tops of trees. We landed squarely in the middle of a pea gravel target, softly and gently. We landed standing up with just a step or two, and it was very easy.

So that’s what skydiving was like. It was incredible. And you, dear reader, need to do it as well. And I get a discount if I ever go again if I refer you….so remember who told you! :-) What a rush!

Categories
Me

Yes, I really did.

Yes, I jumped out of an airplane today. On purpose. More later.