10/4/08 scuba

today we went out to alki in west seattle for a dive. simon had a group of people, brian was there with a group of people, and leif was there for vlad, matt and me. the goal was to figure out the bouyancy issues and then swim around a little bit and have fun.

knowing what i had last time was way too much, we started me out with 30# of weights (+3# of ankle weights). we paddled out to the bouy on our backs, and managed with help to get all the air out of my drysuit - which everyone agrees is really a little large for me, but the next size down has boots that are too small! i was able to descend with very little problems after that. so the main consensus is that with a larger suit i have extra fabric = no good, and i have more pockets for air to get trapped and keep me floating = no good. we get down fine, no issues with ears, and swim around for a little bit. about 25 minutes or so into the dive we're starting to work our way up the ocean floor (yeah, we're in a sound, but technically it's the pacific ocean) and i started to float. i stopped and exhaled big, but was still drifting up a little. so i try to reach over to dump air (i had put some into my suit to keep me warm) but was unable to reach easily, and the more i tried to reach and dump and squish the air out of the suit, the faster i started to ascend. after going about 1/2 way to the surface i just stopped, shrugged my shoulders and said 'ok, i'm going up so let's go up. don't fight it.' so up i go. leif, matt and vlad follow soon after. we discuss what might have happened, what i might have been able to do with it etc, then decide to go back down, swim underwater back to the bouy, and then climb the bouy line and paddle back to shore. well, i get about 10 feet down, my right ear wn't clear, and i get his real vertigo feeling. so back up i go, but it doesn't go away, so i chose to surface. after giving it a few mintues and the dizzyness passed i tried again. same thing! dam! so not wanting to fight that, and knowing that if i continue to have those problems and force myself to depth it could be bad, i decided to just give it up and paddle back to shore.

we took a little over an hours break and had a mocha, sat in the rain, discussed stuff, and planned for hte next dive.

this time we paddled out to some pilings leftover from something before sinking. no problem with my ears or vertigo that time. i get to the floor just fine. and this time, man i had a hard time getting up off the floor to swim around! i'd go a couple kicks, then sink back down to catch my breath. leif kept asking if i was ok. i did have a weird little thing. i was a little colder the 2nd dive. you know how when you have ice cream sometimes 1 tooth just shoots out in pain from the cold? i had that happen! so weird! no idea how or why, but oh well. it dissipated on its own, but it was weird. after about 20 minutes i knew i wouldn't have much longer before becoming really cold, so i let him know i needed to start back to the surface soon. this dive, while exhausting, was really cool.

we saw a lot of crabs, a sea slug, some nudibranches, more fish, lots of starfish, and sea anemones were all over the pilings.

after we had everything packed up simon, leif, the 3 of us and some of hte other students went down to teh tavern for berr and burgers. it hit teh spot but i could've eaten more!

we figured part of my lack of getting off the floor was becuase i was already pretty tired out from the 1st dive. so the more we practice the better i'll get in strength and stamina.

simon wants us to go out tomorrow to edmonds' underwater park with them and do basically the same thing as we did today. not sure if we'll make it. 1 - there's a chance we'll have a power outage due to teh windstorm we have happening right now, and the alram won't wake us up. and 2 - matt pulled somethign in his back today adn dependign on how it feels he won't want to carry his rig.

so we'll see what happens.

on a totally unrelated subject: 4 more days until my birthday. i'll be 42.