How Do You Kill a Saturday Morning?

I had never spent too much time in San Diego other than to go to the zoo. So the opportunity arose where I could attend (and speak) at a conference for Financial Professionals in San Diego and I took it. Being purely mercenary, of course, I thought, I can go a day early and get in a morning of diving. I booked three dives aboard The Marissa for Sunday morning, March 22 and bought some extra gear for cold water. I needed a 7mm suit and I got some new fins that are slightly negatively buoyant because in all the neoprene you’re going to bob like a cork unless you’re really leaded down.

So after carefully planning my trip and my diving etc, buying a thick wetsuit and the fins (close to $500.) I get a call Friday afternoon saying the dive trip was canceled due to weather. I was disappointed to say the least. On the bright side, they called before I schlepped all that gear only to find out that we weren’t going. So now I had to figure out how to entertain myself in lieu of scuba diving. A friend mentioned that he heard there was a pretty respectable aquarium in the area so I thought I would check that out as a consolation prize.

The flight is pretty short to San Diego and we were on US Airways. I have never experienced an airline that can nickel and dime you to death than US Airways. I went ahead and paid for a first class upgrade on the way out and therefore was spared the cost of checking a bag. Yes, the COST of checking a bag. Pure rip-off plain and simple. I am going to whine for a little bit here. For years and years it was no extra cost to check a bag. Now all of a sudden they charge you for it no matter what it is, even a small gym bag. So as a result people are bringing the kitchen sink on board the aircraft, yet they discourage carry ons. So what are we supposed to do? Go naked and bring nothing with us and just buy everything we need, including clothing when we arrive at our destination? With all the terrorist hoaxes and scares they have restricted what you can bring to the point where I can’t bring Listerine. So I have to go shopping the minute I get anywhere to buy simple things I could have brought from home but can’t because if I check it it will cost and extra fee and I can’t take it on board. WTF?? So anyway, air travel just isn’t any fun any more. I think I am going to learn to fly a Gyro copter and fly myself around. How hard can that be?

We got there at 9am and had until 2pm to goof off until we could get into the conference center and set up our booth. My co-workers, Frank and Charlene, wanted to go see Shamu. I thought that would be fun as I hadn’t been to Sea World in a very long time. We checked in to our respective rooms and decided to meet down in the lobby. By the time we got there we decided it was probably too late to go see Shamu, so we went for a stroll through a shopping/dining area and then down to the USS Midway. We stopped in every candy and ice cream shop along the way.

The USS Midway(CVB/CVA/CV-41) was an aircraft carrier of the United States Navy, the lead ship of her class, and the first to be commissioned after the end of World War II. Active in the Vietnam War and in Desert Storm, as of 2008 she is a museum ship in San Diego, California. She is the only remaining US aircraft carrier of the World War II era that is not an Essex-class ship.

Midway was laid down 27 October 1943 by Newport News Shipbuilding Co., Newport News, Virginia. Her revolutionary hull design was based on what would have been the Montana class battleships and gave her superior maneuverability over all previous carriers. She was launched 20 March 1945; sponsored by Mrs. Bradford William Ripley, Jr.; and commissioned 10 September 1945, Captain Joseph F. Bolger in command (Wikipedia, 2009).

We paid our $17 and hopped aboard.

Charlene got a military discount because of her stint in the Walking Army, as we Navy folk call them. There are many stairs on a carrier and it is not friendly to the physically challenged, so we had to listen to Frank kvetch every time we went up and down stairs. The start of the tour, which is self guided, is on the hangar deck. There were a couple of planes in there and I wondered how they got them up to the top deck where they could take off. There was a small yellow plane as you came in where they would take your photo then sell it to you later. Of course we bought our photos, we were such a striking looking trio.

I visited The Midway in the 1970s when I was a kid and it was docked at Mayport, FL. I remember running through the corridors like you do when you’re a kid loose on an aircraft carrier, and tripping on the bottoms of the the water tight doors. Each doorway is closed with a water tight hatch and therefore you have to step up to go through the doorways. We walked through the “racks” where sailors sleep it off after shore leave and I think those were the original mattresses from 1945. We went down to the bowels of the ship to have a look at the engine room where my dad spent most of his time as he was a Chief Warrant Officer positioned in the engine room of the ships he was on in the Navy. The only aircraft carrier my father was on was the USS Lexington, which was sunk during the Battle of the Coral Sea in 1942. Fortunately for him (and me and my brother) he was reassigned to the USS Lamberton before the sinking.

There was a simulator area and two choices for pretending to fly an actual aircraft. One was a “ride” and the other was an actual intro class where you were briefed for about 30 minutes before flying your F-16. I really wanted to do it, especially if Captain Handsome who was running the show would have joined me. I am sure he was retired Navy as active Navy fliers are too busy with all the war going on. But macho, handsome, and hunky nonetheless, very Top Gun. I like ’em arrogant and cocky. Especially in a flight suit.

After the Midway we decided it was nap time. Then it was booth set up time, then it was dinner time. What a life.

The next day the conference officially started, but not until noon. So I spent the morning at the aquarium in La Jolla. I took the rental car and drove up the I-5 to La Jolla, which also boasts of good diving areas. I was pleased to see the Pacific storm rolling in as promised so I wouldn’t feel too sore at not being able to dive that day.

Birch Aquarium at Scripps (sometimes referred to as Scripps Aquarium or Birch Aquarium) is the public exploration center for the world-renowned Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego. Accredited by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, Birch Aquarium at Scripps has an annual attendance of about 400,000, including more than 77,000 school children, most of them there that day it seemed, and features more than 5,000 animals representing 380 species. The hilltop site provides spectacular views of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography campus and the Pacific Ocean, where I could see the fog, wind, and rolling waves.

Birch Aquarium can’t compare to the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, but it had to suffice in lieu of me actually diving in with the kelp.

Afterward, I headed back to the Hyatt and into my conference wear. A staggeringly ugly green golf shirt and some black pants. I got to hang out and talk about CRM software to passers by for the rest of the afternoon. After the aquarium, this trip got dull fast as all we did was hang out at the conference and eat. I did a talk for a workshop on Monday and I won’t bore you with the gory details from that.

Maybe next time, I’ll have an actual adventure to write about.

The ScubaJedi