Counting Hours

In addition to keeping a tally of how many dives a diver has made, one is supposed to keep a tally of all the hours spent under the water.

I have been very good about logging my dives and keeping a record of how many dives I have made.  I record the time, date, how much weight I have put on my weight belt, who I am diving with and where.  I then use up the rest of the page describing the dive and what fish I've seen. A record of the total hours under water, not so much.

As I work toward my master diver award, I have to count up all the hours I've spent under the waves.  I did have a record of the hours a few years ago when I was becoming a branch instructor.  I had vowed then that I would be much more conscientious at keeping a tally of the total hours under water.  Like many resolutions before it, I it slide.  

Dragging out all the diving log books I have ever used this morning, I paused.  

I love taking a good long look at the pile of dive logs and their wrinkled from damp pages with the very important things to be kept safe, stuck between the pages. . . . brochures from dive companies we have used, spare i.d. photos and even a plastic Red Sea fish identification guide that was purchased on our first trip to Egypt.

What a lot of lovely memories are logged in these books. I treasure them.  They are a record of my consuming hobby.  My first enthusiastic but short dives off the coast of Skiathos when I didn't know the names of any of the fish and went through my air so quickly.  There is a record of my decision to start diving at home in the United Kingdom.  I realised that I didn't know nearly as much about diving as I thought I did and then there was the getting to grips with diving in a dry suit.  

The dives this March near the border with Sudan were much longer as I'm so much better at air consumption.  I saw dolphins and sharks on the same dive and I knew the names of most of the fish I saw.  

I recorded when I was shown my first nudibranch in Menorca, when I managed to get over an hour on a twelve litre tank of air and when I got to watch a spotted dogfish digging in the silt in Loch Fyne.  I recorded my first frightening night dive and compared it to the last enthusiastic night dive I had.  

My diving has brought me so much joy and I'm glad I've got a record of the journey.

Hard Year

I haven't been posting on my blog this year for a number of reasons. . .. Mostly, it's been a hard year for me.   It hasn't always been horrible.. . .

On the 31st of May, Rory Atlas Denson was born.  Another grandson!  He is a delightful infant, full of smiles.  He sleeps well, eats well and thinks the ceiling fan is the greatest thing ever.

I have had a whole bunch of work related drama . . . which I will not go into.  I do however, have plenty of time to write on the blog now.

The birds have had a hard year as well.  I have noticed that the sparrow bounty we enjoyed last year has not been repeated.  There are far fewer sparrows.  No visits from jays, redpolls OR red squirrels.

We haven't seen a red squirrel since January.  Please compare and contrast these two photos.  One is from this blog in 2006 and the other was taken this morning.

There are far fewer swallows this year.  We have picked up three dead fledglings in the shed over the summer.  The summer has been rough for a lot of birds.  Too wet and cold.

When walking I looked over the blackberry patch.  The berries are still hard and green.  Some parts of the patch still have blossom instead of berries.  It looks as though nothing will ripen before the frost comes.