I went skydiving.
I'm not an adrenaline junkie and had no real interest. But my friend and I have almost the same birthday so we do stuff together often for birthdays. This time he suggested skydiving. Well fucccccccc
So we sign to go and he calls me and says his dad is going. oh shit. yes.
Then I get this text "Dad's out for tomorrow"
I called my friend and tell him, "tell your dad I said stop being a pussy". he laughs and tells dad.
2 minutes later "dad's back in"
Next day we show up to skydive houston.
We are greeted by a safety video with this guy:
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we can't stop laughing. Look at that dude. Well apparently he's a big deal. Invented tandem jumping and the three ring rapid release system that everyone uses.
So after beardy mcbeardington tells us we might die, we go over to the area with the rest. The crowd looks like the rock climbing crowd. Its hippie dork chicks doing slack lines trying to impress some awkward boys.
Then our tandem instructors show up. Two brazilians. They spend half their year in Houston and half in South America just skydiving. Good looking dudes with long flowing hair.
These guys HAVE to be getting all the women. Brazilian? The accent? Strap a woman to the front of you while she sits in your lap and those weird lizard brain hormones kick in during a near death experience? And they just happen to have their trailer house on site.
Anyways, so I suit up and get to the plane. Rico Suave is with me but we aren't hooked up yet.
5000 feet or so and the door opens. a dozen people jump out. oh shit this is real.
Door closes and we slowly make our way to 15,000 feet. It takes a while and we have plenty of time to think about how real this just got.
Door opens and within a minute friends dad is already out the door gone. Old man didn't even look at us. Just peaced out and jumped immediately no fear.
I strap on to Rico Suave, hit the door and.....wwwwwoooosshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
It's all air and that sinking feeling of a roller coaster, which I hate, but that ends quickly. I made myself open my eyes to not waste the free fall.
AWESOME. Calm. You can see the curvature of the earth, the ground rushing towards you. It's like being in an airplane for view but you're just a human comet flying at earth. NUTS. 100 years ago no human ever had that experience in the history of all of humans. And then there you are for 100 bucks experiencing it.
Pull the cord, quick tug of the shoot opening, and then its calm. That's actually a little weirder than the free fall. You're hanging instead of falling weightless all of a sudden. You drive through some clouds and taste the moisture.
Then you land and they sell you signing up for your next time and everyone does it because they are so hyped but most don't return.