The perfect pout comes at the expense of my ocean swimming career

Call up the alternate, I quit the old person ocean swimming team. I love to swim. I am not naturally gifted at much, and I pretty much stink at most sports, I am terrified of getting hit by a ball which makes me a poor choice for your softball, volleyball, kickball etc league. I am good at swimming. It comes very natural to me. I taught my brother to swim, I am working on the boys and they seem to really respond to me in the water. I swam while I was pregmant past the point where I could even walk. It is my thing. I am not fast or in an adult league, I just really enjoy it. To take advantage of where we live I started ocean swimming. Many people do it, it seems really safe, we are a harbor beach, so there are no waves, no scary currents or undertows, it is so safe it is not even a patrolled beach! 

Then this week I saw this in our local paper:

Balmoral Baths unwelcome visitor

Posted Thursday 23 December 2010

Yesterday an early morning swimmer in Balmoral Baths was surprised to see a large wobbegong within the bathing structure.

Council’s Manager Assets and Services Craig Covich and his team were quickly on the scene and called the Council’s diving contractor to assist with its removal.

Wobbegongs are a bottom dwelling species of Carpet Shark and are typically not dangerous unless provoked.

The baths are a netted area and this guy should not have been there.

Then I saw this on the council website:

Tiger shark sighting

Posted Tuesday 4 January 2011

nsw Police and the Fisheries Information Line have received a report about a tiger shark in the Mosman area (Balmoral Beach / Chinaman’s Beach, Middle Harbour).

nsw Fisheries are encouraging swimmers to use enclosures where available to reduce the risk of shark attack.

The nsw Department of Primary Industries has released a brochure and has set up a website which contains more information about how to reduce the risk of a shark attack.

So, I was beginning to become apprehensive about my ocean swimming career. I thought I will got down there and if there are others swimming I will swim with them. If not I will swim in the netted area. There were people so I swam in the open ocean but very very close to shore.

Then I got stung by this, 

on the lips and on my tongue. There was a split second when I thought what the H*&^ is happening to me, then I knew, a jelly fish is trying to commit suicide by having you eat him. I had to then pull him off of me as he was stuck to my face with his poison tentacles. I ran out of the water and looked around to see if I could see other little bastards so I would know what got me. Sure enough, they were everywhere, I was too busy looking for shark attacks to notice before. I ran up the hill as fast as I could go up the 300ft elevation change at 14.5% grade. The only thing I can think to tell you it feels like is if you heated up your cheese grater to poker red hot and then rubbed your mouth along the fine grate side. Mike and I pulled out the tentacles(they were blue), the pain settled in about an hour. But I could not get one, it is in my lip and that one still is sore. It said systemic complications were rare, I did not get any except the feeling I had been beat up and left for dead on a road side. Is that systemic?

Needless to say, tis was the last straw on an already shifty camels back. I will not be setting any ocean swim records, I do not think you can really improve your stroke by wading in the pee pool with the boys.

Also, that day I was almost arrested(seriously,they threatened me and held me there for about 5 minutes telling me it was a class 4 offense) for signing for my groceries using Mike's card and my signature. I will tell you, I was not leaving that store without my Pampers and my eggwhites two items as rare and precious to me as the White Tiger to the WWF(world wildlife fund not wrastlin').