A Pirate, I Am Not.
Over the years, I've told you folks some pretty awful, Horrific Adult Stories. These are embarrassing, humiliating, tales that hopefully make you all feel better about yourselves.
Buckle up. Here's the King High Poobah of all the Horrific Adult Stories. If you're squeamish, or if you enjoy me as a person who you've never thought of as possibly the most disgusting thing on the planet, turn back now. You've been warned.
Here's a pretty picture while you're deciding.
Still here? Okay, here goes. It all started last week, when we were on our yearly family vacation to sunny Panama Beach, Florida, and Nolan and I decided to go SCUBA diving.
Yeah, I know. Like that ever goes well for me, right?
Whatever. We decided to go. Now, I had not been SCUBA diving in fourteen years, since the dolphin humping incident of 1998. As one can well imagine, I was what one might describe as anxious. (If by anxious, you mean sick to your stomach with worry over drowning in the Gulf of Mexico.) I finally fell asleep the night before at midnight and was awakened a few short hours later by what can only be described as a Thunderstorm of Biblical Proportions. It was as if God had decided to go Old Testament on Panama Beach. Thunder, lightning, hail, North wind, South wind, smog, etc. You name it, it was happening.
And yet, when dawn came, we still went.
No one ever accused us of being clever.
Two intrepid divers went out onto the sea that day. Hopeful, eager, and in my case, fully breakfasted on a banana and a granola bar. The storm raged on. The captain said it would be fine; we were going the opposite direction than the storm. We'd miss it completely.
Evidently, no one told the ocean that. The waves of the briny deep sloshed us around like whites in a washing machine, reminding me of another Three Hour Tour that ended badly, and I had NOT brought my floor length sequined gowns and my pageant banners. (Implying of course, that I would be Ginger in this Gilligan's Island Scenario.) It was at that point that the divemaster said, "The waves won't be as bad coming back."
I cocked my head to the side, marveling that in all of the getting thrown about on the ocean, that I didn't feel seasick. I thought that, and then, like an idiot, the same sentiment left my lips.
Shortly thereafter, the banana and the granola bar made a reappearance into the story. One might even say violently so.
Let me just say that you haven't been demoralized and humiliated until you've vomited in front of complete strangers. Over and over, peeing a little each time, while hanging your head over the side of the boat, being rained on WHILE WEARING A WETSUIT. It was, quite possibly, the least attractive that I've ever been in my life.
However, at the time, I didn't care. I was too busy ridding of my body of things that I can only imagine I'd eaten years before. The cheerful divemaster (who at this point I wanted to punch in the forehead a little) said, "You'll feel a million times better once you get in the water."
Famous. Last. Words.
Luckily, regulators are made to be thrown up in, and man, was I giving mine a run for its money. Yet, stubbornly, I followed Nolan down to the shipwreck dive site. By this point I was throwing up so hard that I couldn't open my eyes. This is a problem when diving, as I do not read braille, and even if I did, the fish don't have those little bumps on them, even if I could catch one of them to feel it.
At this point, I cracked an eye to see that Nolan was giving me the thumbs up sign, which in diving, ironically enough, means 'go to the surface.' We were only fifteen feet down at this point, as I thought, THANK ALMIGHTY GOD," I headed to the surface. It turns out while I was busy dry heaving into Davy Jones Locker, Nolan (who hadn't worn a wetsuit) was getting the holy hell stung out of him by a gang of Jellyfish. What are a group of Jellyfish called? A covey? A herd? a wad? Whatever. Nolan had a dozen or so stings, so he couldn't get past them. I didn't get stung. Lucky me. *cough*
Back on the boat, I was coming down from my seasickness, but still being rained on. The other divers came back up, giving me a wide berth, and off we went to the next dive site. I pleaded with Nolan to go without me, so that could sit on the boat like a wet cat, pissed off and tired and trying to recover some of my dignity. He went, and then fifteen minutes later, he was back on the boat. Nearly twenty years of SCUBA experience, and he couldn't get his ears to equalize. Which meant he couldn't go past fifteen feet.
Which means that four hours, two hundred and fifty bucks, thirteen jellyfish stings and four million dry heaves later, neither one of us got to go SCUBA diving.
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play?
Our vacation was a blast, that one morning notwithstanding. I think it was God's way of telling me that maybe underwater adventures aren't for me... Nolan thinks I need to give it another shot. I say it's gonna be another fourteen years before I forget the last adventure and want to get back in the water. :)
Buckle up. Here's the King High Poobah of all the Horrific Adult Stories. If you're squeamish, or if you enjoy me as a person who you've never thought of as possibly the most disgusting thing on the planet, turn back now. You've been warned.
Here's a pretty picture while you're deciding.
Still here? Okay, here goes. It all started last week, when we were on our yearly family vacation to sunny Panama Beach, Florida, and Nolan and I decided to go SCUBA diving.
Yeah, I know. Like that ever goes well for me, right?
Whatever. We decided to go. Now, I had not been SCUBA diving in fourteen years, since the dolphin humping incident of 1998. As one can well imagine, I was what one might describe as anxious. (If by anxious, you mean sick to your stomach with worry over drowning in the Gulf of Mexico.) I finally fell asleep the night before at midnight and was awakened a few short hours later by what can only be described as a Thunderstorm of Biblical Proportions. It was as if God had decided to go Old Testament on Panama Beach. Thunder, lightning, hail, North wind, South wind, smog, etc. You name it, it was happening.
And yet, when dawn came, we still went.
No one ever accused us of being clever.
Two intrepid divers went out onto the sea that day. Hopeful, eager, and in my case, fully breakfasted on a banana and a granola bar. The storm raged on. The captain said it would be fine; we were going the opposite direction than the storm. We'd miss it completely.
Evidently, no one told the ocean that. The waves of the briny deep sloshed us around like whites in a washing machine, reminding me of another Three Hour Tour that ended badly, and I had NOT brought my floor length sequined gowns and my pageant banners. (Implying of course, that I would be Ginger in this Gilligan's Island Scenario.) It was at that point that the divemaster said, "The waves won't be as bad coming back."
I cocked my head to the side, marveling that in all of the getting thrown about on the ocean, that I didn't feel seasick. I thought that, and then, like an idiot, the same sentiment left my lips.
Shortly thereafter, the banana and the granola bar made a reappearance into the story. One might even say violently so.
Let me just say that you haven't been demoralized and humiliated until you've vomited in front of complete strangers. Over and over, peeing a little each time, while hanging your head over the side of the boat, being rained on WHILE WEARING A WETSUIT. It was, quite possibly, the least attractive that I've ever been in my life.
However, at the time, I didn't care. I was too busy ridding of my body of things that I can only imagine I'd eaten years before. The cheerful divemaster (who at this point I wanted to punch in the forehead a little) said, "You'll feel a million times better once you get in the water."
Famous. Last. Words.
Luckily, regulators are made to be thrown up in, and man, was I giving mine a run for its money. Yet, stubbornly, I followed Nolan down to the shipwreck dive site. By this point I was throwing up so hard that I couldn't open my eyes. This is a problem when diving, as I do not read braille, and even if I did, the fish don't have those little bumps on them, even if I could catch one of them to feel it.
At this point, I cracked an eye to see that Nolan was giving me the thumbs up sign, which in diving, ironically enough, means 'go to the surface.' We were only fifteen feet down at this point, as I thought, THANK ALMIGHTY GOD," I headed to the surface. It turns out while I was busy dry heaving into Davy Jones Locker, Nolan (who hadn't worn a wetsuit) was getting the holy hell stung out of him by a gang of Jellyfish. What are a group of Jellyfish called? A covey? A herd? a wad? Whatever. Nolan had a dozen or so stings, so he couldn't get past them. I didn't get stung. Lucky me. *cough*
Back on the boat, I was coming down from my seasickness, but still being rained on. The other divers came back up, giving me a wide berth, and off we went to the next dive site. I pleaded with Nolan to go without me, so that could sit on the boat like a wet cat, pissed off and tired and trying to recover some of my dignity. He went, and then fifteen minutes later, he was back on the boat. Nearly twenty years of SCUBA experience, and he couldn't get his ears to equalize. Which meant he couldn't go past fifteen feet.
Which means that four hours, two hundred and fifty bucks, thirteen jellyfish stings and four million dry heaves later, neither one of us got to go SCUBA diving.
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play?
Our vacation was a blast, that one morning notwithstanding. I think it was God's way of telling me that maybe underwater adventures aren't for me... Nolan thinks I need to give it another shot. I say it's gonna be another fourteen years before I forget the last adventure and want to get back in the water. :)