We've lived in Seattle for a while now, 13 years next January.  Because of this I've become unimpressed by rain.  However there's a storm that's been passing through since Sunday that has me very impressed.  According to the Seattle Times, 3 inches of rain has fell between midnight Sunday and 5 p.m. Monday.  The same article states we've received 7.38 inches so far this month, and it's only the 7th.

Ben doesn't seem to like sleeping much. When we get him dressed at night for bed (in PJs that don't fit anymore. We measured him today; he's grown an inch and a half since July 31st, when we last measured him) he says things quite casually that really drill it home to us that he doesn't actually spend that much time at night sleeping. We're going to have to install a camera in his room sometime just to watch...

5. Listen to the weather. Ben likes to press his ear against the window during rain storms

4. Listen to his heater. Ben gets out of bed at night "every time" it turns on at night and then gets back into bed when it turns off

3. Read books. Steve has caught Ben on more than one occasion sitting in his blue chair surrounded by books, just slowly flipping through them. If he keeps this up, we'll run out of batteries as he sneaks flashlights under his covers to keep reading just a few more pages

2. Look out the windows. Ben spent a long time telling us about some random lights shining. It took us a few nights to figure out he's spending time in his bathroom looking out the windows there at the lights across the street.

1. Watch the moon. He makes it a point to tell us about the moon and how it looked last night while he was, uh, "sleeping"

Came downstairs yesterday. Steve was sitting on the couch watching Ben running around in circles in the family room. Ben shouted, "I'm exercising! I'm healthy!"

Wha?

"I don't need a flu shot! I'm healthy already!"

When I started taking pictures underwater I began to learn a lot more about photography.  It didn't take long to start feeling constrained by the point and shoot cameras that Valerie and I had been using for the previous 8 years.  We had a film SLR camera for years but we never really used it aside from our trip to Alaska. 

Valerie and I have been talking about getting a Digtal SLR for a while now.  Well, mostly me.  Valerie has a little Casio EX-750 which fits nicely into her purse and takes really good pictures.  As with most consumer electronic purchases, I spent months and months researching, learning, reading reviews, and refusing to make up my mind which camera to go with.  Fortunately Nikon and Canon released their new line this fall and the decision became easier.  The Nikon D80 has been coming out with stellar reviews, addresses most of the problems that people had with the D70 and D70s, and comes at a reasonable price.  The one thing everyone tells you when choosing between the Canon and Nikon is to go to the store and hold them.  The Canon Digital Rebel XTi is a great camera, but it's small.  When you put a 35mm or a 28-55mm lens on it you don't notice, but when you put a larger lens, like a 75-300mm lens, it really feels awkward. 

So the D80 it is.  I picked it up on Tuesday and am dying to go out and take some pictures.  I've been playing around with it just in the house and am blown away by the crisp pictures and the ease of use. 

Last weekend I went on a dive trip with Silent World up to Nanaimo.  For those who don't know, diving in British Columbia is a lot like diving around Seattle (cold), but the water is usually more clear and the types of sea creatures  are a bit more varied.  The other nice thing about Nanaimo is that it's relatively close -- just a quick drive to the border and then a 2 1/2 hour ferry ride.  The plan for the trip was to drive up on Friday, do 2-3 dives Saturday, 2 dives Sunday, and drive home Sunday afternoon.  I've been to Nanaimo once before a few years ago.

One of the biggest draws of diving in Nanaimo is the shipwrecks.  Nanaimo has a very active artifical reef society which has been able to sink three major ships, the HMCS Saskatchewan, HMCS Cape Breton, and the RivTow Lion.  The HMCS Cape Breton is the second largest artifical reef in the world, measuring 411' bow to stern.

There were a lot of people on the trip, something like 22 in all.  Normally this is a recipe for disaster, but Craig did a good job getting three boats running all weekend.  One boat had four divers all diving traditional tech diver gear (twin 108's with trimix, stage bottles, etc.), one boat with six rebreather divers, and one boat with the newer divers and other open circuit scuba divers.  It's pretty rare to be on a boat with just rebreather divers, so I was pretty excited.  With just rebreathers, the dive profiles can be longer, deeper, and more advanced.

Friday

Craig (the owner of Silent World) and I left Seattle around 11:15 on Friday and arrived at the hotel and checked in, had a beer or two, then went to dinner with the group.  I was pretty tired, but dinner was a good time and the food was really pretty good. 

Saturday

Saturday's first dive was on the HMCS Saskatchewan.  The boat captain Ed did a quick briefing about the site and mentioned that we were moored amidships on an anchor block.  Craig and I back flip off the boat, meet at the mooring line, and descend into the dark.  Once at the bottom we look around for a minute, I snap a quick picture to see if my camera is working correctly, check the dive computer and swim off.  We swim along for about five minutes, looking at the anenomies and a cute little stubby squid when Craig looks at me and asks "Where's the wreck?"  I'm confused, I thought we were on the wreck.  I point at the bottom and say "Uh, here?"  Then it dawns on me that the wreck can't be this big.  Crap.  We're lost.

This actually happens to me quite a bit.  Above water my sense of direction is above average.  Below water I can get lost in just a few minutes.  People who follow me on dives are seriously taking their lives into their own hands.

So here we are, in 130+ feet of mostly dark water, not far from a shipping lane.  Neither one of us is really concerned -- air isn't a problem (on our Evolution rebreathers we can stay at 130' for a couple of hours), but we both feel pretty stupid.  The Saskatchewan is not a small wreck by any stretch of the imagination, how the hell did we miss it.  Craig starts swimming a search pattern and about 10 minutes later we finally find evidence that we're getting closer (more life on the bottom, a few ropes laying around). 

The rest of the dive, although a bit shorter than planned, was quite nice.  The wreck is beautiful and the gun turrets are quite impressive. 

The second dive of the day is on Snake Island Wall.  Snake is by far my favorite dive in Nanaimo.  The life on the wall is amazing, with a really large variety of anenomies, rock fish, sponges, tube worms, etc.  Diving the wrecks are cool, but I'm much more into the natural dives.  I'm also excited about this dive because we planned to go deep.  Apparently there are some sponges which grow down below 130' in this area which are really quite beautiful.  Craig and I decided it would be cool to go take a peek. 

So we roll off the boat, drop down and do a quick equipment check, then start decending over the wall.  It takes a few minutes to get to the sponges, and as I look down there's no evidence of the bottom.  In fact, it's pitch black aside from the light of our flashlights.  We level off and start looking around and sure enough, sponges.  I take a look at my gauges and see we're at 165'.  Definitely my deepest dive yet.  The dive was fantastic, ending with a swim with some seals on the edge of Snake Island.

Sunday

Sunday starts a lot like Saturday -- throw our stuff in Craig's car, grab some food, head over to the marina.  Our first dive is on the HMCS Cape Breton.  This weekend is the 5th anniversary of the sinking of the Breton and we feel it's our duty to see how she's doing.  Sunday morning is foggy though, really foggy.  Looking out from our small boat you can't really see much.  When we get to the site, Captain Ed strongly suggests when we're done with our dive that we come up the mooring line so he can find us.  We roll off the boat, down the line, and end up on the deck of the Breton in short order.  Craig sets a strobe on the line so we can find it on the way back and we start swimming aft.  About half way from the mast to the stern is the skylights of the engine room.  When the Breton was sunk all of the engine machinery was removed and a really large room, probably 30' by 30' and 5 stories tall was left.  We slipped through the windows and decend into the room.  I'm speechless -- it's just plain cool to drift by these catwalks and stairs.  A few minutes later we're outside again and heading aft. 

As we swim along the back of the ship Craig looks inside to see a shelf covered with old dive equipment, plastic jewelery, and other things.  Apparently divers over the years have turned this room into a bit of a shrine.  The rest of the dive goes without incident -- we end up swimming the full length of the ship, back to the mast, and up the mooring line.  A few minutes of deco and we're out of the water.

As we sit on the boat between dives we try to figure out where to go next.  Eventually Ed mentions there's a wall a hundred feet off the bow of the Breton.  It's not an "offical" dive site, but he came across it while he was working on setting the anchor blocks for the Breton's sinking.  Sounds interesting, so we head over.  Before we get in the water we ask Ed what direction the wall is from the anchor.  He points off the stern of our boat, then says 130°, nope 270°, then finally 30°.  We're screwed. 

When Craig and I hit the bottom we look around, Craig checks his compass and we're off.  Five minutes later it dawns on me we're lost again.  Crap.  Fortunately Craig was paying attention when we swam off and we're quickly back at the anchor, and this time I notice there's a definte slope to the bottom where the anchor is.  Apparently we decided to swim uphill.  This time we try downhill and maybe 30 feet from the anchor is the wall.  The wall is beautiful, with some really dramatic overhangs.  We only go down 100' or so (our shallowest dive of the weekend), see some sponges (one with a grunt sculpin inside), anenomies, starfish, and more. 

After the dive we head back to the dock.  It's about 12:00 at this point and our goal is to make the 3:15 ferry, so we have plenty of time to eat, clean our gear, pack the car, and hang out.  Then it's off to the ferry and on home.