While it comes down to the wire, play hardball with her. Make her have to give something up even though you’re going to (begrudgingly) do it anyways.
At least have FUN with your last supper!
You had a handkerchief? Why, when I jumped, all I had was my own interlaced fingers! And I was THANKFUL!
bubastis–take heart!
Hardly anybody dies in a skydiving jump.
(psst–Can I have your CD collection? And what does Mrs bubastis look like? In case, you know, the widow needs comforting?)
Similar thing happened to me, except it was a bunch of my friends who pitched in and got me the jump for my birthday. Luckily, they didn’t book the date, so i gathered up my courage for a couple of months before going through with it.
It wasn’t clear from your OP, bubastis, whether you’re doing a tandem jump (i.e., attached to an instructor, who opens and flies the parachute), or a single-person jump with instructors (where one or two instructors jump with you, but you open and fly your own parachute). Given that you haven’t mentioned a training day, i’m assuming the former.
The jump my friends bought me was the latter, and for this you can’t just turn up on the day of the jump. The day before, i had to go to an 8-hour training session, where we were taught the procedures for exiting the plane, free-fall, checking altimeter, deploying the chute, trouble-shooting, flying the chute, and landing. It was pretty intensive stuff, and they made clear that, if you didn’t pass the instructional phase, you would not be allowed to jump.
Anyway, i got through the training and turned up early the next morning for the jump. I’d done a fair bit of repelling and climbing in my youth, and heights have never worried me, but there’s something qualitatively different between walking backwards off a 300-foot cliff while attached to a rope, and jumping straight out the back of an airplane at 13,000 feet. The one criticism my instructors wrote on my post-jump evaluation was “Moved too slowly to the door.” Well, no shit! I was crapping myself.
One thing the instructors told us, and which i discovered to be true, was that you won’t even remember the first three or four seconds after your jump out of the plane. The adrenaline and fear and noise lead to massive sensory overload, and it takes a few seconds to get your bearings. Apparently, this passes with experience.
I had two instructors jump with me, and during the free-fall one was on each side, making sure i was going through the correct procedures (looking around, reading my altimeter, etc.) and also keeping me stable. It’s quite hard to maintain a stable free-fall if you’re inexperienced, so the instructors make sure you don’t go into a tumble. During the free-fall you also go through a “practice” pull, where you pretend to deploy the chute but don’t actually do it.
Then, at about 4,500 feet (i think), you give your instructors the signal (for us, it was to stick out your tongue at each of them in turn). Then you pull the cord, the chute deploys, and you’re on your own. The instructors pull away and fall another thousand feet or so before opening their chutes.
In some ways, the ride down in the chute was the scariest part for me. The view was awesome, and i had a great time, but i was also conscious that the only thing holding me in place was some seat-belt-type material and some metal fasteners. I expected, at any minute, to drop from my seat and plunge to the ground.
Didn’t happen, though, and i followed the directional arrows on the ground and the semaphore signals of the landing instructor to make a safe touchdown.
The whole thing freaked me out a bit before i did it, but once i was on the ground i wanted to go again. If i hadn’t been about to leave Australia for the US to enter grad school, i wold have thought seriously about taking it up as a regular hobby. But it’s pretty expensive, and i didn’t have the money to do it.
Anyway, i hope you have a great time. Try to keep your head clear and make the most of flying. It really is amazing fun.
DO IT !!!
It’s fun… fun, fun,fun,fun,fun,and more fun.
Really.
And the modern equipment is a whole lot more fun(and safer) than the bulky, awkward harnesses I learned on a generation ago.
There’s a bumper sticker at most jump sites that says " Remember when skydiving was dangerous and sex was safe?"
Seriously—it’s a whole buncha fun, and you’ll love it. But it’s natural to have butterflies in your tummy–so:
do take ivylass’s advice: eat a good breakfast at home, but don’t much before you jump. And pee before you get in the plane… you’ll feel better. 
err…I meant to type “dont eat much before you jump”
ooooooooohhhhhhhh do it! and then come back and tell us EVERY DETAIL because I’m jealous and the best I can do now is live vicariously.
have fun! you lucky bastard
I did one a few years ago, strapped to a competent person! I too was performing raindances the night before. In the plane the instructor guy was quite chatty and that helped me relax a bit. A final “You ready for this?”, and a strangulated “Aye” from me and we were out of the plane. It was fucking amazing! Trust me, you’ll love it.
Back in my younger, single days, I dated a guy who had more than 500 jumps to his credit. I used to go to the weekend events with him - but I just went for the party. A bunch of people tried to get me to jump. No possible way. I explained to the jumpmaster that they would have to throw me out of the plane. He told me, in all seriousness: “We don’t charge extra for that.”
::shudders::
Years later I was in Panama City with a friend who wanted to parasail. I said “fine, I’ll watch.” An eighty year old lady went up after my friend, and proceeded to dog me bad when she got back. I couldn’t back down from an 80 year old, could I?
So I parasailed. It was beautiful. I will never do it again.
Looking forward to the full report, Bubastis my boy.
I did it 3 times - two with a line-pull and once with a tandem. All were fun.
Remember: only 1 out of 166,000 people die while parachuting.
And the last 165,999 people were just fine! So what are you worried about?
Woohoo!! Go for it. You’re braver than I am!! I used to think it would be sort of fun… then I discovered a fear of heights, and decided not to pursue the interest.
And remember, the only people who forget their parachutes are the folks who’ve done it so often they go “on autopilot” Not kidding, unfortunately… in the late 80s, a very experienced parachuter/videographer forgot his parachute doing a jump which he was videotaping. The “oh shit!” moment was shown on the national news. The jumper - being quite dead at that point - was unavailable for comment
**Bubastis?
Bubastis?
Bubastis?**
Lad, come on back - all is forgiven!
You there?
Prolly on his knees recalling all the Sunday School prayers he’s ever learned.
The weather forecast for Ireland is pretty awful today, so he may well have another week or two of dread to look forward to.
I went through skydiving training much like mhendo’s, only I didn’t have instructors on each side during my jumps.
(Now, this was sport jumping, not military jumping. We just happened to do it near an Army base.)
My first jump I just missed the ammo dump.
Second jump I just missed being impaled on the large, metal wind arrow at the airfield.
Third jump, pretty good.
Fourth jump - into the trees.
Fifth jump - Partial 'chute malfunction. Opened low and didn’t have any shot of reaching the drop zone. Missed the quarry and the sewage treatment plant and actually made a decent landing on a soft piece of turf.
At that point I figured that I probably wasn’t too good at this shit and I’d better knock it off before I frapped.
::: Looks around. bubastis is gone, right? :::
Maybe you’ll be inspired by this guy: Kiwi!. Live the dream!
So. Um.
Anybody heard from Bubastis yet?
Man, its hard to type with all these broken bones.
Well, as Struan pointed out below, the weather this weekend has been pretty bad. I prayed for bad weather, and what I got was truly BIBLICAL. Its a fuckin monsoon. So of course, no jump for Bub. And you know something? I could have cried.
Saturday was a different story though; we left early to make the drive down the country to the parachuting club. We stayed overnight in a lovely b&b that Hardship (T.M.) had organised. Before leaving, I bid farewell to friends and family. I hadnt told anyone why we were going away, and with good reason; my mother would have had a fit. Better she thinks we went on an entirely un-Catholic romping session (me and Hardship (T.M.) arent married as some have assumed above) than on a death-jump. She’d have been saying novena’s all night. When saying goodbye, I really must admit, I felt like I’d never see them again. In fact everything I did on Saturday felt like my last time; my last meal (steak, undercooked, bah), my last beer (flat) my last movie (American Pie: The Wedding, on a 14" tv with bad reception). Going to bed last night, the wind started to rise and the rain started to fall… I’ve never been so happy with my choice of religion.
This morning, it had faired a bit, and seeing as we came this far, we decided to take a spin to the airfield anyway. We were pretty sure that I wasnt going to get near the sky with the weather still so changeable, and we were right; all jumps cancelled for the day. However, I did get to do all the training for my jump (a tandem, the only one permitted to first-time jumpers in this particular club).
The training was a blast; the instructor was really cool and put to bed any fears I had. Maybe I was so calm because I knew I wasnt jumping, but I felt so relaxed that i really, really wished I was going there and then. The walls were covered in skydiving photo’s, many of them tandem shots… in every photo, the passenger looked to be having the time of their live. I had initially feared this jump, but now I was bitterly dissapointed. The club said I could return at any time and jump, without undergoing training again. Frankly I cant wait.
I’m aiming for mid-february, when you can be semi-guarunteed of good weather. It’ll be much easier, I’m thinking, to schedule the jump myself, instead of being TOLD I’m jumping with only a few days notice, as happened here. I really, really cant wait.
Hardship (T.M.)… I thought she was trying to kill me, but now I know she’s just great. This is going to be the best present ever.
Told you so.
(Seriously, glad it went well–good luck on your first jump!)