July 4, 2019

I took four days off from my regular job to do a fireworks show and get some diving in.

This is my 12th year that I helped to set up a fireworks show at Big Canyon Country Club in Newport Beach.

I decided many years ago to turn my teenage lust for M80’s and pipe bombs into something more productive, and legal.

This is show business, and anything really could go wrong; in previous shows, we’ve had many ground explosions, the show wasn’t wired correctly and the grand finale went off in the middle of the show, and a couple of years ago, we had started a small brush fire that the fire department quickly put out.

Now, the Fire Department has a map of all the addresses that surround the canyon, there are high pressure fire hoses marked with glow sticks surrounding the golf course and now they made us move further down range because of an unforgivable incident that happened last year.

Last year, unbeknownst to us at the time, a cataclysmic incident happened.

Apparently, a piece of mortar fell onto a homeowner’s imported Italian Marble patio and made a mark.

We had to move the mortars further down the fairway, more towards the middle of the golf course, where there is more distance between the mortars and the houses.

We also had to condense the show into three smaller rows and the grand finale; the cake displays were placed closer to the audience, which meant we needed two firing boards.

We were checking the wiring right up until 20 minutes before the show; the board has a “test” mode that verifies the connection, but doesn’t put enough juice through to set off the charge.

I was expecting the worse, considering the new set up, but the show fired almost perfectly.

Out of 600 plus rounds, we had three mortars that didn’t go off – that is a lot better than we ever expected.

The new Fire Marshall was happy, too; we may get some complaints of debris due to some shifts in wind, but no fires.

Here is the Fireworks Show from my GoPro on the firing board.

July 7, 2019

Now it was time to get back into the water.

I woke up early and headed down to Terranea Resort, arriving about 7 am.

Terranea Resort is 10 years old now; it hasn’t been easy, but they have embraced the divers over the years, with only a few misunderstandings.

I called the dive, the water pretty much looked like shit.

Maybe the recent earthquakes stirred up the ocean floor?

Thanks to President Trump, America just keeps winning.

More next week, I hope.

After spending over a year liquidating my father’s estate and dealing with some bad business decisions, I said, “Fuck it.”

I’m going back to my old life of diving, that I have missed, but never intended to leave.

Sometimes you just have to call your losses and go on with your life.

But, if I ever find that Prince from Nigeria in person, he’s a dead man.

I miss not only the diving, but the people and the scene; I never realized how much the people you hang around with influence how you feel and your mental state of mind.

That is probably why I don’t have many friends.

Well, regardless, I’ll get to more later about the missing section of my life later.

As far as this blog, I will warn you in advance, that I had a spam attack that was not caught through my spam filter, which worked quite well until they wanted money.

I have 10,000 spam comments to manually delete; that will take me some time.

The server itself was also attacked by some Turkish hackers who managed to take over another website.

I had to update WordPress to the latest and greatest, so there may be technical difficulties with the comments and counters or anything else.

To put it in technical jargon, shit on this site might be jacked.

By the way, I HATE the new WordPress interface – it’s geared for retards that don’t know any HTML.

I finally decided to get back in the water, but I have not dove in over a year, so you are suppose to give yourself a “refresher course” to make sure that you can still dive.

I remember when I first started diving and how heavy all the equipment was and how difficult the walk to the water was during beach dives.

I showed up at Veteran’s Park in Redondo Beach around 7 am to give myself a refresher course.

I bought a new underwater camera, since I can’t find my old one.

I made the mistake of not bringing any new batteries, so I was not able to take pictures under water.

The photos here are taken by my cell phone.

I always thought it was dumb to have a camera in a phone, but not anymore.

At least I was not distracted by having a camera underwater.

I ran in to Airborne, who was helping to teach a rescue course.

He said, “If you need help, just act like you have a cramp in your prostate, and one of the students will rescue you.”

I geared up and made an easy entry off the beach.

Logged SCUBA Dive #509

Solo Diving

Veterans Park, Redondo Beach, CA

In With: 3000 psi
Out With: 1200 psi
Max depth: 80 feet
Waves: Surgy at the shoreline, but managable
Visibility: 15-20 feet depending on where you were.
Water Temperature: 62 degrees at depth
Air Temperature: 74 degrees
Total Bottom Time: 28 minutes

I descended to the ocean floor at 20 feet and headed West.

Being underwater was a feeling I have missed for over a year, but I had to make sure I was still able to dive.

I slowly made my way to the shelf and went down at an easy pace.

My regulator had been serviced, I still fit into my wetsuit, I was not scared or anxious… it was just like I never left.

I went down to 80 feet, observing the crabs, sparse plant life and garbage.

After heading back up the shelf to 40 feet, I decided to take my weight belt off and replace it, take my mask off, put it back on and clear and ditch and recover my regulator.

I took my weight belt off and held it in my hand – my ass started to float up and I thought, “Maybe this was not a good idea?”

Using my cage fighting skills, I balled up and threw my weight belt over my back, and tightened it, upside down.

I took my mask off… air bubbled up my nose, couldn’t see… I sort of know what water boarding must be like, maybe.

I put my mask back on, and cleared it.

The regulator ditch and recovery went without issues.

I slowly made my way back to shore and an easy exit.

Donna the Hot Biker Chick showed up to help teach her new boyfriend, Steve, how to dive.

I had no idea she had been single again, but I never even got a call for an interview.

Until next weekend, I must sign off.

I’m planning to dive either Laguna Beach or Terranea next weekend.