This had to be the best New Years' Day I've had in a long, long time. Our neighbor girl came over to babysit, and B and I took off to go snorkeling ALL BY OURSELVES!!! No girls. I repeat, no girls!!! It was, uh, very nice.
We went to Gab Gab Beach, down on the Navy base. There was a slight hitch. Since I really don't know how to swim, we were supposed to borrow a life jacket for me to use. We forgot... But, as you can see in this picture, that is me up there, floating in some serious ocean. It turns out I am very comfortable and calm floating happily face down, watching the amazing fish and coral gardens. The problem comes when my mask fogs up, or a leaf touches me and I think it's a mutant cone snail, or other similar things. Then I totally freak out, start flailing around, and sink. B, who is an amazing swimmer and has been since he was four, doesn't really get this. After we were all done he said "J, you really,
really don't know how to swim, do you?" Um, yeah. I've told you this ever since we met, and you just now believe me? But the fins helped tremendously. It was my first time wearing them, and after some very patient coaching by B, I started to figure out how to use them. I even felt sort of sleek and fast towards the end. And he showed me how to tread water wearing them. I practiced until I could tread with both hands up out of the water- the goal being to allow me to put my mask back on without standing on something solid... (This is one of my major snorkeling hold-ups. Most of the ocean is deeper than me, or, the parts that aren't are covered with extremely delicate coral that I don't really want to be tromping on with my huge feet and even huger flippers...) But, sadly, it just didn't work. Still can't do it. I did make lots of progress. I even got so I could let a little water into my mask to swish around so it wouldn't fog up, without hyperventilating.
Pixar really wasn't exaggerating when they made Finding Nemo. Here is The Drop Off. And the fish were traveling in formations that made them appear as if they were in heavy fish traffic. The camera doesn't do the colors justice, either. The coral is purple and yellow. The fish iridescent blue, bright yellow, orange, or weird spotted patterns. Totally crazy. We saw packs of butterfly fish.
Moorish idols as big as a volleyball.
Little needle fish that are transparent, and swim right below the surface.
Towards the end we saw this completely bizarre thing. I can't even find out what it is, because I don't know enough about it to search for it... It was about four feet long, brown, with white ring ridges, and shaped like the hose on my vacuum. It's head, or whatever, was open like the opening on a tube, but it had leafy appendages coming out of it. It moved by accordion-ing its ridges forward, and when B dove down to check it out, it shrank up until it was about twice as big around, and half as long. So strange.
It was wonderful. We have to make time to do this more often...
After snorkeling we went to a friends' house, where I crashed on the sofa and took a deep nap. Went home, dropped off B with Miss R, and Misses A and M and I went down to Tarague Beach for a concert.
The band was the Kelly Bell Band. I hadn't ever heard of them, but they were really great. Our neighbors were there, and although sweet Miss K had babysat my girls all day, she was still happy to dance and play with them.
The band had all the kids come up to sing a pretty awesome rendition of the Sponge Bob song.
They took a break, and a magician came out. He totally flummoxed me, I had no idea how he was doing his tricks. He did a trick with little foam balls, which B, who is a pretty good magician himself, does sometimes with the girls. Miss A piped up and said "My Daddy has those!" The magician said "Your Daddy does magic?" "Yes!" "Is he here?" "No." "Oh good." It was funny. Then the band came on for a few more numbers. It was so great, right there by the beach. A fresh breeze, a bit of rain, but not too bad. But, there were only a handful of people there. It made me sad. The singer kept saying "Are you all still with us?" I worry that the entertainers won't want to keep coming if no one comes to see them...
