Once again, The SCUBA Show has arrived at the Long Beach Convention Center – and this time, I’m actually planning on taking a dive vacation sometime within the next year.

I mean a REAL dive vacation, not just a day trip to Catalina, so I paid close attention to the travel packages.

I was disappointed that Cuba was not represented at the show – my friend Bruce went diving in Cuba a few years ago and said it was one of the best trips he has ever taken.

Professional Debriefer Paul came along to inquire about SCUBA Certification and sample the beer that we stashed in his backpack.

We annoyed this really hot chick from Guam.

At it’s narrowest, Guam is only four miles across, but apparently there is an abundance of spectacular dives there.

“Fantasy Island” in Honduras seemed interesting, and the chick at the booth said that there are no ugly women in the entire country.

The only thing that sounded weird about their resort is that it’s on a small island, which gives me a feeling that it might be a tourist prison, but I was assured that it isn’t.

When I go to Mexico, I drink with Mexicans, not American tourists, so one thing that I always scrutinize on a potential vacation is the interaction with the locals.

I will have to go over all the travel brochures that I collected and figure out where I want to go, and how broke I want to be when I return.

One of the attractions that I’ve overlooked in previous years has been the Wyland Art exhibit.

Robert Wyland is a world famous marine life artist whose work can be seen all over Southern California – he painted the whales on the whale tank at the old Marineland of the Pacific and painted the whales on the Redondo Beach Power Plant, just to name a couple.

A work in progress – A Wyland Turtle.

Wyland’s smiling shark painting.

Robert Wyland was there, working on his next masterpiece.

Me with the famous Robert Wyland.

We stopped by Pacific Wilderness and spotted my next major purchase – an auxiliary air supply for $380 – the price is good through June, so I have plenty of time to sell blood to finance the purchase.

We also annoyed the ECO Dive Center booth and inquired about Open Water Lessons for PDP.

There’s a rumor going around that ECO has the hottest female dive instructors on the West Coast, and so far, I can’t dispute that claim.

As soon as PDP mentioned “Divevets,” “Dan” and “discount,” the Open Water class price doubled.

When PDP actually gets certified remains the question, but hopefully it will be this year – with diving, he may one day be as macho as me.

We arrived later in the day, but still managed to meet a few of our friends from around the diving scene.

Profession Debriefer Paul captured the event:

To watch this video on YouTube.com, click here.

With Psycho Bitch gone it is time to start anew, socialize and find my next ex.

I bought a ticket to the Catalina Hyperbaric Chamber Dinner at the Divevets table – the cost was $90, and included dinner, raffle tickets and a free tour of the Aquarium of the Pacific.

All proceeds, over the cost of the meal went to the general operating fund for the Chamber; even though they charged $6.50 for a can of Heineken, the Chamber didn’t get any of that.

I’ve heard this has been a fun night in previous years – lots of women and lots of beer.

This year, the Divevets couldn’t fill their table, so half the people there were strangers.

Mike C. was working on Donna The Hot Biker Chick, even though she seemed thoroughly annoyed at first.

The entire main floor of the Aquarium Of The Pacific was made into a gigantic dinning area.

This is what I was served – I asked, “Is this an appetizer?”

The waiter said, “No this is the main course.”

This really hot chick from Arizona, Jill, sat at our table…

So now, cock blocker Mike has two chicks now swarming all over him.

And… I’m stuck sitting next to Dan who’s getting more drunk and telling me that he’s so horny that he would even do me.

So far for me, the night was sucking hard – if it wasn’t a charity event, I probably would have just left.

Sans me, here is our table.

One couple, Mike and Yoko, who we don’t know, seemed to be increasingly annoyed at our growing beeramid of Heineken cans – the Aquarium went cheap and decided not to serve Budweiser!

They showed an old episode of Emergency! that featured a diving accident and the use of the hyperbaric chamber.

It was quickly pointed out that they flew to the chamber on Catalina for the outside shots, but the interior scenes were done on a sound stage in Hollywood.

The announcer explained that the Catalina Chamber only receives 50% of it’s funding from LA County and the rest comes from charity events such as this dinner – OK, so I felt a little warm and fuzzy – probably from the beer – even though Mike was getting all the chicks and Dan was hitting on me.

The Aquarium was open for tour – it was really nice not to have thousands of screaming kids around, as is usually the case.

The world famous Bill H. won a raffle prize – I believe it was a BC system worth $900.

Our beeramid is complete – only because the bar ran out of cans.

I got burned not only with the women, but with the raffle prizes as well.

Oh well, at least the Chamber is there if I ever need it – I think next year I’ll just send them $90 and skip the dinner.