Easy-Setup-Pool Tip of the Day IV

Decide that you need "a few more inches" of water and top off the pool to just over the edge of the inflatable ring. Bad idea.

Wait for the rain to come.

Later, observe what sounds like the coming of a tsunami, or torrential downpour. Look outside to realize that's your pool, not SLOWLY draining, but VERY RAPIDLY draining!

Gallons of water pour through your yard and into your neighbor's.

Go outside in your undees and lift the purging side of the pool an inch or so and draining stops immediately.

Vow to never fill pool above inflatable ring, and vow to always have someone check on your house if you're out of town.

Easy-Setup-Pool Tip of the Day III

Setup the filter, and realize you need to add those chemicals you forgot to buy. Run to Lowe's and pickup granular "pool shocking" chemicals. Mix with water in a bucket and "broadcast" into pool.

Drive past a pool store, stop in and ask if that was the right chemical. It wasn't. Dang.

Pickup granular chlorine, and shock it again. Worry that mixing these two chemicals may cause an explosion, or corrode the pool or your skin.

Pickup testing strips and observe the chlorine level is at the highest readable--10, when it's supposed to be 3. "Guess I'll wait a bit..."

Wait until levels are at 3, then place dog in water to see if he disintegrates. Dog is happy, so jump in pool and splash around. Yay! Easy-setup pool setup!

Easy-Setup-Pool Tip of the Day II

There's still hope. You realize that the only truly level 12' square part of your property is your patio. And lo and behold, it's exactly 12'! To leave some room for doggers to go in/out the backdoor, you decide to setup the pool mostly on the patio, with two or three feet hanging off the edge. Cool! You'll have a pool in no time!

Repeat the steps above, this time filling the pool most of the way. Success!

That is, until the next morning.

Observe the contents of your pool slowly spilling out, and the pool deflated to about half its once-bolstered turgor. Effingham.

Realize that even those 2 feet overhanging the porch were the cause of it. "When they say level, they mean completely level." But, this is fixable.

Run to Lowe's and pick up a bunch of 50 lb. bags of sand to bolster the edge of the pool that's leaking. This will gain you an inch or two of levelness. Perfection. Refill to 2 inches below the inflated ring.

Easy-Setup-Pool Tip of the Day I

If you're like me, you love being in the water! So when you find out that owning a pool is both inexpensive and "easy," of course you should get one, right?

First, pick up your pool at Walmart; yes, Walmart. Then discover that an 18' pool won't fit in your back yard. Return pool.

Exchange the pool for the 12' model, which will fit nicely in the backyard.

Look around for 30 minutes to try to figure out what type of chlorine to put in your pool, and how much. Leave without chlorine. "I'll come back later."

Get back home, unpack the box and observe "must setup pool on completely level surface." Ignore warning, but try to "grade off" your heinously sloped backyard a wee bit with a garden shovel.

Unpack the pool liner, and spread it out on the "level" ground. Stop reading the instructions and try to figure things out on your own.

Realize you need to inflate the upper ring, but don't have a pump.

Run to Walmart, park in the garden section (bonus tip) and pick up pump for $9.96 (made by pool company). Inflate upper ring.

Try to finagle pool into right place without any luck. Break out those instructions, and realize you were supposed to put the ring OUTSIDE the pool, not inside.

Deflate upper ring, put ring OUTSIDE the pool.

Reinflate upper ring; cursing is permitted.

Smooth out wrinkles in pool floor. This is not optional, even if you thought it was.

Begin putting water in your pool! The fun part!

Go outside after half and hour and realize when they said "must be on completely level surface," they meant it. Observe water spilling out one side of the pool, and not even a drop of water in the other side. F.

Deflate upper ring along with your ego.

Evil Scuba-ers Tip of the Day

Do you know someone who suddenly took up an interest in scuba with little or no warning? Be careful! They could be terrorists!

Here are some signs the FBI says to look out for:
- Desire to learn how to swim in murky water
- How to swim up pipes
- How to be towed while in the water
- Pays for lessons in cash
- Declines to give personal information
- Writes amusing quotes in a little notebook

Scuba Tip of the Day VIII

While scuba diving, you are using muscles in ways they are not accustomed. This can lead to the dreaded leg cramp. To avoid this, eat a banana and make sure you have a proper electrolyte balance. Also, try stretching before your deep sea adventure. If you still get a cramp, try straightening out the muscle by grabbing your fin and pulling towards you. You may need to get your buddy to assist you.

Scuba Tip of the Day VI

You learn lots of things from crazy scuba diving folks. (Must be the nitrogen narcosis.) One thing you may learn is: if you go to a Hooter's in New Orleans, the girls will probably give you their number. (Do with this what you will.) And also, even though scuba divers often see each other in skimpy swim wear, many would "have to be paid a lot of money to sit there nekkked" when asked if they'd ever be a nude model for artists.

Captain Skyteam Tip of the Day

So you're headed to sunny Florida for a trip, and conveniently, your first flight is late, causing you to miss you connection, and be stranded in not-at-all-sunny Cincinnati, OH in the middle of winter. To add insult to injury, the airline (not to mention any names, but they rhyme with "Bomb Bear") tells you that you'll have to stay in a hotel overnight and that you can't get your checked bags. "Graciously" they provide you with an overnight bag (which is basically a "Delta SkyTeam" t-shirt, and some overly-scented lotion). So, this becomes a two-part tip. First, if you cannot resist the urge to swim in the hotel's pool and hot tub, but don't have a bathing suit, you can easily claim that "you're European" and swim in your dark-colored boxer-briefs. Doesn't work as well with lighter-colored skivvies. But what you'll find out is that if you DO swim in your BVDs, you'll 1. have nothing to wear to bed (which is awkward when sharing a hotel room) and 2. you'll have no underoos to wear on your flight the next morning at 6:00 am. So, what we've found and tested is that you can "stick it to the man," and "stick it to your boys" by wearing your SkyTeam shirt as boxers! Put your legs through the arm holes and tie around your waist! And, you even have easy access for late night bathroom trips! What's most fun is you can prance around and in your best superhero voice declare, "I'm Captain SkyTeam!"

Scuba Tip of the Day V

A cowboy proverb says: "As a horse knows not the height of a rider on his back, so a scuba diver knows not how big he is in scuba gear." The proverb is true, y'all. If you are already a big guy (who likes to insult girls who eat muffins), adding a large tank, fins, snorkels and other apparatus, you become REALLY big underwater. So when practicing in a confined pool area, don't be "all up in peoples' grills" like you own the place. It's just rude. And annoying.

Scuba List of the Day III

It's important in scuba to know a little sign language, obviously, because you can't talk. And they do make underwater tablets that work in water, but if you're with Amanda, she's probably filling it up with quotes for her quote board! So, you should probably learn the following things to sign prior to scuba diving:

• I'm out of air
• I really, really have to pee.
• Can I pee in my wet suit?
• Is there a bathroom underwater?
• Some jacker just took off my face mask; I can't see; and I just realized I'll have no way of watching you respond
• A shark just ate my fin
• The fact that the shark just ate my fin is actually the least of my/our worries.
• Do I look fat in my non-black wetsuit?

Also important to note: in scuba diving, the "thumbs up" signal does NOT mean "cool!" "awesome!" or even "all's well!" It actually means "ABORT THE DIVE AND SWIM AS FAST AS YOU CAN TO THE SURFACE!" So, be careful not to get too excited underwater.

Scuba Tip of the Day II

When you're clearing your mask for the first time underwater, it's a good idea to be in the shallow end. Then, when you freak out because you breathed in about a half gallon of water through your nose, you can just stand up.

Scuba Tip of the Day I

When scuba diving, you'll encounter many an odd-fellow who will awkwardly chide on about how he took an overweight girl on a first date, told her she wasn't allowed to order herself a muffin and only share his because it was $4, then proceed to tell her she needs to go on SlimFast. In such an event, you should keenly follow rule #2 in scuba diving: always dive with a buddy. Why dive with a buddy? According to the PADI diving manual, it promotes safety and fun, but according to me and A-Ger, it also promotes a great way to ward off joke-cracking jackers who will try to steal your mask and fins and invade your personal space. If you're diving using the buddy system (which you may have thought expired after Kindergarten) you'll know to punch people like this in the face at the sign of impending attack.