Pooped

 EXHAUSTED. Another whirlwind weekend draws to a close. Another exciting day at the aquarium. I had thought today's assignment was to clean fur seal. Fur seal was said to be 52 F. I was game, if not thrilled, but I am dedicated. Fur seal is one of the exhibits where they gate the animals so you're just swimming in an empty tank. So I was surprised when I suited up and the keepers gated the sea lions and not the fur seals and said the water was a toasty 64 F! Okay, nice. But imagine my further shock and delight when I enter the exhibit and there's 2 sizeable harbor seals peeking out of the water at me! "There's aminals in here!" I declared, and the other divers said, yup, they only gate the sea lions. I had thought we didn't swim with any mammals! I walked up to the edge of the rocks and promptly slipped and fell on my ass, wearing my tank and everything. It was jarring but I was fine. I was still in a "I can't wait to tell all my friends" haze. They told me I would be scooping poop. Sure, whatever, bring it on, I'm diving with friggin seals, yeah!

Scooping poop underwater is not easy. Not hard in the way it would be on land, because underwater there's no smell at least. But those things fall apart if you try to pick them up and even if you just try to wave them into the net they go every which way but in. There weren't a lot of intact poops, it was kind of a hunting game for those. Mind you while I am swimming around, through the little arches and tunnels in the exhibit, every now and then a seal would swim over or under me. It was a little bit scary at first, but I knew they wouldn't touch me. They did regard me curiously though, and one held eye contact with me once for several seconds, which was awesome. When I had exhausted the poop search I got a brush to scrub the rocks, but most of them really didn't need it. In the places where the sun hit there was some green algae growing.  I was having trouble getting down to the bottom when it occurred to me that I forgot to put extra weights in my BC. I usually add 10 lb to my BC at the aquarium. Luckily the surface support guy had extra and I was able to get down again. I went back to scrub some rocks and noticed these tiny worms would attach themselves to my gloves when I would brush in some places. I had to brush them off me. Later another diver told me they come from the seal poop. Ew ew ew! One got on my hand later while I was rinsing my gear. I really hope seal parasites are not contagious to humans!

It wasn't cold at all and I was starting to feel like most of the work was done, so I spent some time mugging at kids through the glass, which is always fun. From inside the exhibit I could see the walrus was in the window of its tank. A visitor on the other side motioned for me to go into that tank. Um, no lady, is it not enough for you that I'm in here with the seals?! I guess she thought all the tanks were connected. Getting out of the exhibit was a bit embarrassing. There was no ladder and by the end of a dive I am so pooped that I couldn't haul myself out on my own. I had to take off most of my gear in the water ungracefully while visitors watched. Every time I dive I learn something though, and I hope that with time I'll have aquarium diving down to an art. Things like equipment setup, air management, weighting. I did try my secondary reg necklace today and it worked great. Most of you probably don't know what I'm talking about, that's okay. I'm tired.

After the aquarium I went to the Central Park Zoo to get in the rest of the animal handling practice sessions I need to be able to do the shows this year. And 'cause I'm nuts. I don't even want to talk about how many hours I was on the train today. I had some trouble with Harley the mini lop. It's tempting to lift a rabbit out of a carrier the way you'd lift a cat, but you can't just grab its middle and lift because you can break its back. You have to scoop underneath, supporting its feet. This is hard because this rabbit is not small. And it doesn't particularly enjoy being scooped out of its carrier. I will still need to work on that but they passed me anyway. Amazingly the skittish chinchilla posed no problem. Imagine a really big soft cute rat. They feel a lot smaller in your hands than they look because their fur is so poofy.

I didn't go take pictures of the baby goats. They're so cute though. I saw them yesterday. But I was so friggin tired today. I then went to a dinner party after all this. I'm home now and just punchy with exhaustion.

Did I mention I finished the sweater I was working on? I love it. It's awesome. I have to go weave its ends in now. And then sleep. Right. Good night!