To Do BA Dry

Under "things I want to do" I thought, especially to appease my friend Ed McNamee, it would be nice if there were a way to meld my triumvirate blogs (blog.tyrannosaurusmouse.com blog.pandoramachine.com and blog.pleasurefortheempire.com) with the addition of puppiesandtoast.blogspot.com into one feed. I don't think there's an automatic way to do it. So it looks like it won't get done.

So. With SCUBA. I'm allergic to neoprene. There are three options in the world of wetsuits that I know of.

• There is stuff called Sharkskin which as far as I know is simply not available in the US.
• Then there's a UK company called Fourth Element which makes a wetsuit from Thermocline. (I feel fairly confident that I am not allergic to the Thermocline material as I have a pair of AquaLung gloves made of Thermocline and haven't had trouble with them.
• Lastwise there is stuff called LavaCore made by Oceanic. This is the cheapest option at about $220. (I have SCUBA "socks" made by LavaCore and again I feel relatively confident that I'm not allergic to it.)

Incidentally, tests have shown that what doesn't help is to wear (say) LavaCore underneath Neoprene. Nope. Still have allergic reaction. Apparently everyone on the Internet who has a Neoprene allergy says the same thing. It just don't work.

But then here's another thing.

Although all of those above suits are neutrally buoyant, which is very groovy, they're all fairly light-weight. Scuba diving in New Jersey is almost never warm. Because when you're not diving in the North Atlantic, you're diving in quarries which are under fifty-degrees at a depth of 50' year-round.

• So that means that realistically a dry suit is usable all the time when diving here. 
• And many dry suits are available without neoprene.
• Dry suits are, unfortunately, expensive (like $2000).
• Dry suits have almost no resale value, so you can pick them up cheap off of the Craigslist.

And that's about it for what I have to think today. I'm done thingking. Tinking. Finking.