Experiences that make you go "So... what have YOU done today?"

I'm talking about very unusual, extreme, and even adrenalin-pumping stuff, good or bad.

If you do it on a daily basis, it does not count (unless something different happened). I really mean something that makes you want to tell any passer-by and ask them "so, what have YOU done today?" or perhaps "do you even have the slightest idea what happened to me today?"

It doesn't have to be something that just happened or you just did, just tell us your stories no matter how old they are.

Let me start in post #2 to not overcrowd the first post...

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Here's the story of the first time I was thinking the words for a whole afternoon:

Last summer I went kayaking on a lake with a rental. The rental guy said he did go aroung the whole lake in 6 hours on his sea kayak, but they only rented cheapos and I only paid for 2 hours.

After about an hour I was about a third to half way around (I paddle like a madman) I felt like shoving it in his face, so I kept going even if I would end up paying an extra hour.

While taking a straight shortcut though a bay (meaning the shore was kinda far), the wind started blowing a bit. The kayak wasn't moving anymore, despite my best efforts (think Popeye on a row boat after eating spinach.) Then the waves hit.

The waves were rocking the boat so bad I knew I was about to keel over so I threw myself in. Fortunately, I had a vest on because I still had to swim like mad to keep my head over the waves to zip up the vest all the way. I was completely out of breath, so I had to let myself float for a couple of minutes, watching boat and paddle slowly drift away in different directions. Catching up with both was yet another challenge I had to repeat twice. At one point I thought I might have to just hold onto both and hope to end close enough to a boat to ask for assistance. YES, I had flashlights with me despite it being early afternoon.

I then tried to slowly tow the kayak to the shore and, to my surprise, I was making progress. It took 15 to 30 minutes to get there - the time was very, very slow passing and so was my speed. Turns out the piece of **** was taking water from a missing plug and it took the best part of an hour to let it drain until it was light enough to finish the job by hand.

The return trip was made a lot closer to the shore, but at the same madman rate, hoping to make it before the cheapo would start weighing 100 pounds again. I wasn't charged for the extra hour at least. For the rest of the day, I kept thinking "So, what have YOU done today?" at every person I came across. And now, this thread is born...

What I have done today:

Drove a Lamborghini around the Gilles Villeneuve race track. I hit over 220 km/h (136MPH)... can't tell exactly at what speed I peaked, I was still accelerating for another 5 seconds with a chicane coming and that's the only time I risked taking a peek at the gauge. I also got a good 2G turn on my last lap. WOW!

I was with an instructor of course, and he'd say when to accelerate, brake, what speed to hold. Amazing! The push, the rush, the speed, the G's. I had goose bumps -the good kind- on that last lap :twothumbs

It's very expensive, doesn't last for very long but has to be lived at least once in a lifetime. They're in their first year of doing this, so there were shortcomings, but I definitely will go again once they sort the administrative kinks out.

After my laps, I stayed a while near the starting stretch to watch the others... I must not know fear 'cause I was cracking up seeing how much other people just let go of the gas after finding out about the acceleration. My co-pilot said he sometimes gets ladies that just scream in fear when they first floor it



SO... What have YOU done today?

that's so cool man

I know, I can still hear the engine


Love your signature BTW... should be the CPF version of Murphy's law

No one??? No story of getting lost in the woods, close encounters, engine dying halfway on route 66???

As a photojournalist, I get to see and do some really cool stuff.

I have, in the past few years

Photographed and chatted too Sir Jackie Stewart (race car driver, from an era where many died, and safety wasn't a huge concern)

Sat in the passenger side of an ARC spec rally car and been driven through the forest at 160+kph (100mph)

Sat in the passenger side of a 380hp drift car, while being driven full tilt round the track - its an interesting sensation watching the upcoming corners through the side windows

Watched a Bushfire tear through bush, flames easily 20-30m tall (100ft) photographing from a helicopter.


seen a whole hillside glowing after a bushfire - that was really spooky looking, and something I will never forget - this was much more Epic looking live


flown in a luxury business jet (falcon 900, all leather and polished wood)

Seen concerts from the very front, watched sporting games from the sidelines

Met and photographed Megan Gale (Aussie model) and Jesinta Campbell (miss universe Australia, a few years back) along with a lot of other models.

photographed and chatted to Olympic and commonwealth games medalists, Steve Hooker, Lauren Mitchell, Blair Evans, and others I can't remember

Spent an hour ordering military helicopters around, so I could get a great photo instead of an average one

Photographed and chatted to Timomatic, and a number of other musicians/singers

Spent an hour in an underground mine simulator, in the middle of the city, hundreds of kilometers from a mine site

chatted to and photographed heaps of people, from multimillionaire CEOs to homeless people with no money, and heard their story's.


Today though, I'm off sick (bursitis in my right elbow) so i spent time with my Wife and daughter (the coolest thing I could possibly ever do)


EDIT - and added some photos too
I knew I forgot some.
I spent a whole day with a circus, most of them were related (brothers, sisters, cousins, wives, husbands , daughters, sons, etc) went though with a journalist and a VJ, and did a "Day in the life of" type piece, I even climbed up in the rigging to do some photos of the trapeze, looking down on them.
this one is from that nights show - I can't find any from the rrehearsals



I should also add, that for everything cool I do, there is an opposite.
days sitting outside a building waiting for a certain person to walk out, being stuck in the sun all day at crime scenes, watching people react when they realize their house has burnt to the ground during a bushfire, there is a lot of jobs that just plain suck, and a lot that make you question why you do it, but then there is the days I described earlier, where it just rocks !

Cool :twothumbs: sounds like a very interesting life, with a good reward!

you remind me of a few more:

When I was a kid my father worked at the biggest variety show theater of the time in Montreal, so I was baby sitted by some of our old local comedians and singers (most are dead now, but some are still in business)

I once rode my bicycle with a friend on country roads to go meet some friends out of town (they took the hitchhiking option). the supposed 1H-1H30 ride quickly turned to hell as the heaviest rain ever in the region started falling on us and we were dressed in 100% cotton sweat clothes with no lights on our bicycles. Winds blew up to 72km/h (~45mph) straight in our face. It was so bad the pedals locked in place during strong gushes, but the wind kept us straight on our bicycles. It took us 6 hours to get there, going through hell itself, cars zooming blindly inches from us. We didn't have anything to eat before leaving and only had bread to eat once there.

I once sat in a CF-18 fighter jet. It was being serviced and did not have the ejection seat on (just a dummy seat), but I didn't care as I got to play with the controls. All I thought for the next week was "So, what did YOU do this week ... and you? ... and you?"

I usually get my hair cut at the same place most local sports players and TV personalities go to. I see some of them once in a while, but I mostly go for the excellent haircut and the small talk, which is always interesting. I do get to hear one of them chat with the owner every so often.

Echo63 said:

As a photojournalist, I get to see and do some really cool stuff.

I have,

Met and photographed Megan Gale (Aussie model) and Jesinta Campbell (miss universe Australia, a few years back) along with a lot of other models.

Click to expand...

Pictures, or it didn't happen! :naughty:

~ Chance

Perv... :shakehead

So?

~ C.G.

My time in the Marine Corps might have been my best job, if only because I got to go for a handful of flights in the backseat of our TA-4 Skyhawk jets...



On the first flight in our jets, we went out to an area near Blythe California with another aircraft to chase each other around the sky for a while. On the way there, the sun was setting over the nearby mountains, and it was just beautiful!



Subsequent jobs have been more intellectually challenging and have paid better, but none have had better perks!

Steve,

That's awesome! :bow:

What was the job, why only a handful of flights?

~ Chance

I was an avionics tech, fixing essentially anything on the aircraft that had wires going to it. After a few years, I was good enough to inspect the work of other guys.. a "collateral duty inspector" or "CDI". I still did worked on the aircraft too, but also checked that other folks did a good job, put everything back together correctly, didn't leave tools in the plane, etc.

The squadron provided training for pilots when they completed some initial jet training, and prior to them going to an operational squadron. As such, we had 6 to 8 two seat trainer aircraft. If there was an open back seat, the squadron would let one of the CDIs go on the flight. I was able to go on a variety of flights... some where we dropped practice bombs, some where we marked targets with rockets out in the desert, some were test flights to check all of the systems after some major maintenance, and some were just joyrides in the desert.. those were fun!

Of course, some flights caused my stomach some troubles, and I returned with a plastic bag full of dinner, so it wasn't all fun and games. There's something about pulling 5 G's on and off for an hour that tends to cause a bit of motion sickness.

^^

Very cool Steve!!!

btw,, Oshkosh is less than an hour from me, the fly-in is always a big deal for aero buffs

I'm in central Illinois, and have a sister that lives an hour from Oshkosh, so I usually manage to get up there for a day or two. Lotsa fun! Neat aircraft, and sometimes you can attend a lecture from some of aviation's legends... I know I've listened to Chuck Yeager talk at least twice. This year I got to go up into the control tower, courtesy of a friend of a friend. Nice view from up there!

Steve; I gotta admit I'm a bit jealous. I tried to get our defense guys out west to call on my services so I could ask for a ride at the same time (the only place I know of in Canada it is possible to do so -training required, but I'm game for it). I guess the information I transmitted through the inspectors at the closest air base was just too good ...next time I'll tell my boss we need to offer some discount that will guarantee extra work in the long run :devil:

I was in the right place at the right time, to a large degree. After my time in the Marines, I went to college to get my EE degree, and then went to work for McDonnell Douglas designing avionics. To the best of my knowledge, there was essentially no way you'd ever get into a back seat there, even though they were designing and building the two seat F-15E at the time. I do feel better knowing that I designed a small bit of electronics for the F-15E, so it gets to go fly, even if I don't.

The training to fly in the back seat is fun... do it if you get a chance. I had a one day seat school at NAS Mirimar (back when it was still a Navy base, and still the home to Top Gun). You get to go in the hyperbaric chamber and learn how easy it is to not notice when you lose oxygen, you get to do a practice ejection, you learn how easy it is to fool your inner ear and that you should always trust your instruments, and you learn why you should wear all of your fire-protective clothing (ew... who knew that so many nasty things could happen).

In my current job doing electronics for big yellow machines, it's a lot easier to get onto the machines and operate them. Operating a 200,000 pound bulldozer is pretty cool too, but not quite the same as scooting along in a tactical jet.

I was at the right place at the right time when I got to sit in that CF-18 too... just not quite as cool as riding in a flying jet-fighter! I almost got to try out a military jet simulator once, but my friend could not quite get the clearance as we (me and his son) were civilians with no clearance. Rules have changed since and even employees are not allowed in the simulators anymore - which is understandable as some even spent half their shift flying, meaning they could have been even more qualified than actual pilots!

I used to drive a lift in a small warehouse, so I know how cool it is to drive the yellow machines... (but yea, nothing like a hundred-million dollar jet). If only the landscaper I worked for had listened to my friend and let me drive the skid-steer caterpillar and wow him... all those "missed" opportunities make me realize how much jumping on the train (sometimes meaning insisting) is a big part of the cool side of life. Then again, being at the right place at the right time is pretty much the essence of this thread after reviewing the stories in here... I really like hearing these stories! I think looking back at what we have had the opportunity to do and live through is a great therapy in itself *Cataract is patting his own back* Keep 'em coming!!!

I just got back from a 5 week National Park RV-camping trip/tour (cut a little short due the Govt shutdown) but here's two things from that trip that I'll never forget...

This little hike at Zion:





And where this little road went (UT Rt 261, aka Moki Dugway):




Now I'll admit to being a being a bit of thrill seeker (among other things, I'm life-long motorcyclist that occasionally rides twisty bits with ex road-racers) but having generally lived my life on the sea level shoreline of the Eastcoast....... I was SCARED $HITLESS!!