Christmas Eve Swim Fun

Not a creature was stiring... well, except for the sea lions everywhere, quite a few swimmers (non of our peeps) and loads of fish and birds! We did see Richard, Anna Marie and a few others, though I think most were either busy getting ready for holiday stuff or headed to Coronado?

The MCs braved the 56 degree, FRIGID waters and LFTC was right -- well worth the dip!  The waters were smooth, a few swells in the cove and gorgeous sunshine on deck.  That was a treat -- and my hot water bottle, plus some of my warm, spicy chai helped to thaw Bill and I, post swim. Still, we felt good even making to the 1/2 and back. The water was not too clear, but not bad -- a beautious day with the sunshine beat down... the tide wasn't too low at 10:30 when we went out. By around noon when we walked past the cove all we could see were rocks every -- take-off rock looked like an island. Real knee-scraping swim time, so we were glad we'd gone out earlier.

Daisys still blooming on December 24, can you believe it? What a day!

Missed everyone this weekend and hope you all have a happy Christmas. Mine certainly is with our children all nestled all snug in their beds (what?) and home for the holidaze.  Happy times.  We look forward to our polar bear dip and NEW YEAR at the shores together--PARTAY!  Hope to see you in 2012!

December 24, 2011...sublime 

~mercari

diana's fight club (thank you walter!)

swim report on diana's weekend fight club swim: fri, noon, diana, janie, kathy, lftc stared down at a rocky low tide wondering how we were gonna get in. my suggestion (and always will be regarding everything in life) was to just lay down. lay down and go with the flow which works beautifully if you don't take into consideration the BRUTAL cold, the cold that causes your teeth to ache, eyes to ice over and numb your senses. see? put aside that and it's cake. dammit.  we all flop in and set out, trailing along to the kelpy a, stopping to discuss ice cubes (according the mightiest c) and over to the half which is nearly at the marine room lately, then across to the pins or 1/4, we mostly bounced around the swim channel and oh, how to get out? how to exit in the even lower tide without looking akward? once again, lftc has the solution: lay down and slide in, then crawl gracefully out on our stomachs before kneeling, then squatting up like powerlifters. how can that not be grace and beauty? if you factor in the bleeding knees from the rocks, the wads of sea grass hanging off our caps, the white/blue extremeties and speedo wedgies, it's just plain hotness.  this is how the fight club operates, people: with grace and beauty.
to go on, walter refers to our weekend group as diana's fight club. i love this and have asked her to blog it but she has no computer, our poor little dianadarling. she says walter is hogging his mac so she's offline. i guess i'm blogging on her behalf. so there you go, a little tutorial on how to exit the water and a new nickname.
swim saturday at 10:30, december 24th, christmas eve. i'll bring pot brownies. again.

Rock Star Swimmers... and you know who you are!

Didn't swim Saturday and heard we definitely missed out on all kinds of wonders -- turtle sightings, dolphins leaping, seal lions chasing about, near-best-swim-evah, so beautious AND Leonard reported the FREEZING temps in the H2O... 56 ouch! degrees!

Well, it warmed up for us on Sunday (LOL) and the sun even came out to warm the chill just a tad... I just don't know how LFTC, Diana darling and Marta manage to swim in that frigid water sans pants, but they rock!  Rock Star Swimmers they are... Leonard, Bill and I swam about in our seal-like wet suits trying desparately to stay warm any way we could. Bill swims at least twice as fast in the winter and whoa, he's tough to catch when he gets going. We raced out to the 1/4, then raced to the 1/2, then absolutely chilled to the bone, raced back in, as the rest of the gang chatted and bobbed about catching up on the lastest what, ice cube news? I don't know, I wanted to talk too, but the cold water forces me on or I'd probably just freeze in place!  Still, what a gorgeous Sunday it was, the seal lion group raft ducked down under me just as we were heading out of the cove and they were such a fun team to watch circling around. Sure wish I could swim like that.  Of course I saw dolphins today too, long after our swim and we were headed to the car... still, saw them frolicking at the A having a great swim too.  

Happy Holidays from the Cary (and Bill), the MC's ... this was the cove today, another day paradise!

So, to all our dear mer-friends, we wish you and yours a very happy holiday season.  Our daughter, Emily arrives home this Wednesday for a month long break from Kyrgyzstan and fun family times are ahead!  

Have a great holiday and we hope to see you all at our New Year's Day Polar Bear swim celebration.
~mercari

cold and dry sissy or cold and wet manly man?

swim report, friday december 16th, noon: claudia, ralphio, lftc and not another soul in sight, even the guards were locked in their hut. why? winds, that's why, high winds, heavy winds, blow hard winds and cold! my bottle of sunblock sitting on the deck table couldn't stay still, ladies in fur coats and tall suede boots, guys in coats and gloves and us, standing around wearing speedo's and goosebumps! why am i doing this? why? big wind chop, 2-3 feet at least, we could see nothing but water and had to kick on our backs several times to navigate and recover from gulping salt water.  my watch read 59 right outside the cove, 57 solid for the duration. we swam to almost the marine room, the air was colder than the sea. man alive, it was hard to get in today. i felt like i was between a rock and a hard place: go and suffer or don't go and suffer, stand in the water to acclimate and suffer in the wind or jump in immediately and suffer from shock. claudia was not going to relent but i tried, we could have easily went for hot chocolate but these people, YOU people are tough! the overall swim? awesome, kick ass, fun and challenging. when we ran up the stairs, (okay, slogged) we ran into another tough group; hove, vic and chris gearing up to go out and be manly men.
that's the thing for me, i sometimes find it easy to NOT want to go, weather, rough conditions, no partner, my phone rings, whatever, but when i just act as if i'm going and get there, i have never one time been disappointed. the opposite in fact, every single time.  so thanks to claudia and ralph for being manly men today and throwing me out there, you all should go out too. join us in the awesome misery!  besides, i miss you!
lftc-out

Partay like a rock star!

For those who couldn't attend the annual LJSC Christmas party, here is my report as perceived by the voices in my head:  A good time can only last so long.
Many of our regular crew were on scene: Toni, Steve, Marta, Phoenix, Diana, Claudia, Ralph, Janie, Dana, Leonard to name a few, lot's of serious Cove swimmers, many we see all the time, many who spend hour upon hour in the sea so are rarely seen on dry land. 
My feeling is that this type of party is much better appreciated under the influence but I had to behave as Ali was in tow and I wore a dress. The dress was such an odd garment to me, it was very distracting. The first hour was mostly spent wondering who all these fully clothed people were, who is that man in a shirt and why is that woman wearing a dress? Where am I? Why am I here?
The second hour was spent eating unidentifiable meats, pork or beef, I couldn't tell because the first taste had some kind of fat/gristle and that was it for me, the 'white' meat was either fish or chicken, again I couldn't tell as I was reeling from the fat/gristle trauma. The dinner was followed by yummy cake which I did eat, at last! a food I recognize!
The third hour was spent watching and doing a little Hula-my friend and bestest swim partner (she knows who she is) had signed all of us up and didn't show, Phoenix too was all hot to Hula, did show up but hid under the table when the Hula call rang out.  Thanks to brave Janie, Toni and LEONARD for being gamers, all the little girls too: my Ali, Jaycee and a few other cutie pie's. 
The fourth and fifth hours were spent watching a slide show, I saw a bunch of pics of us, most notably, New year's day 2011, we were the last group standing on the grass, all the other partyiers long gone. Says something about our group's bad assery, doesn't it?
The sixth and seventh hours were given to awards and notable swims, lot's of us were mentioned but I was tired of sitting in a chair in my dress, David kept sneaking outside to drink wine by the big gulp size, I wasn't winning any raffle prizes, I wanted more cake or cocktails and Ali was losing her mind with excitement, I had spent so much time reeling her in. We had to go! Please Carol, be done, but no..
All kidding aside, Doug did a very good job as usual, he's good with detail, Marta was delightfully buzzed with her wine and cute dolphin purse, it was good to see swimmers on dry land, some of us look really good dry and clothed. Even barely dry and clothed, the tiniest bit of lipgloss is a wow factor for the swim crowd. This is a bonus, not having to glam it up too hard, that would suck for this girl.
I could be much more bitter, way more cynical and judgemental, but this party was for swimmers, done by swimmers and I love the swimmers so I'll save my commentary for something else. I know you can barely wait!

Weekend warriors, go, fight, SWIM!

Weekend of the 11 pack swim, November 27...
such a smooth, awesome swim!

We MC's made it last Sunday for that really big 11-pack day (I can't even remember who all was there but it was at least a GIANORMUS BUNCH!) and it was a truly a glorius day--cool, smooth and clearish waters... all the hard core no pants swimmers and us wimps (that cringe at the mere thought of no wetsuit as the temps plunge below 60, heck, even 65) were there!  Hey, gimme Hawaii or the Caribbean -- even the Mediterranean and I'm such a NO PANTS SWIMMER!  This water, not so much...  Honestly, I have the utmost respect and admiration for youz hardcore merfolk.  You rock and SWIM!!!

The day of our 11-pack swim in the late afternoon.

The water this weekend was great too, though the water temps seem to be creeping down. Had a great swim with LFTC, CFTC, Claudi, Diana, Ralph and the MC's... out to the half then those that could take the cold went on to the A. Sunday it was just me, Bill and Leonard -- Diana and Phoenix went early, probably so they wouldn't miss a minute of the grovadellic La Jolla Christmas Parade...maybe not. Bill and I checked in on it after we ate something hot but had to head home for Sunday chores... the weekends just go by WAY TOO FAST !Here are a few  pics from this weekend.
~mercari

Saturday, December 3 we swam with
LTFC, CFTC,  Claudia,  Diana, and Ralph

Sunday, December 4th was a bit bumpier and cooler...
still a gorgeous day!

Sunday, December 4th, bumpier and cooler...  

brr.. sure is gettin chilly

LFTC, the Mighty C's, Diana Darlin, Claudia-badass-Rose, Paula, Ralph, Cftc and three lovely swim gals... am I forgetting someone? Im still a little chilly. Glorious conditions beyond the .25, crossed over a few mountains getting there.. not sure where these giants came from but we made it and had a great swim to the .50 through clear water, some views of the bottom and lots of waving kelp and the water has taken on a turquoise hue, only a few fish and us. At one point on the way in as I was doing a body scan to make sure that the most important body parts were still working (heart lungs... possibly brain) Claudia said, 'oh, its warm here.. feels warm and cozy'.... ? really? I've been chuckling ever since.. guess compared to frign Alaska its warm, kinda. Anyway, we rallied at the .50, Ralph, Bill, Paula took the "A" route, the rest of us headed back the way we came and all landed on shore in one cold piece. Nice loud meeting in the jacuzzi afterwards. 59 is taking me right to my edge, its beautiful to say the least!! Super grateful for my swim friends and cold water endorphins and apparently brown fat too, whatever that is!!