floating upside down isn't a good sign

My favorite fish, the one that trampolined off leaves and had a fascinatingly manoverable *ahem* anal fin, was sick. We decided he was constipated, as he was looking fat and pale and breathing very quickly. After doing a bit of web based research, I discovered a potential cure... Peas!! Full of fibre and fish-friendly! You have to peel them, which I'm not sure is physically possible, but hey, the little guy was worth it.

So I rushed home to get the pan on, only to find him floating upside down just above the gravel. I was very sad. I netted him out and watched hopefully for a bit of 'oy get off' thrashing around, but there was none. After watching him do the toilet bowl free-style, I started cooking, and couldn't balme the frying onions for my watery eyes. It's insane: I've lost relatives and cried less. As Andy pointed out, we had cared for and tried to nurture him. And fed him a huge red flake that probably led to his untimely demise.

We had a mini-wake, well drank some beer anyway. The positive I take from this is that the two females seem healthy, and they hadn't started to eat him. I'm not sure I could have coped with fish canabalism.

On a more positive note, I swam 25m unaided, on my front, and not looking like a, well, dying fish for want of a better analogy. It might not sound like much, but I think it's the furthest I've swam on my front for about 15 years. I have wanted to get good at swimming for a long time, but it's only now that diving is making me more confident that I can try. I was swimming a half decent front crawl, but bloody hell, it's knackering isn't it? You see all those grannys floating serenly around the pool smiling, I wasn't smiling. They must be turbo-charged.

My drysuit literally just turned up- hurray, freezing mountain lakes here we come! That's if I can get into the thing. I hate gearing up as it is - carrying heavy gear, struggling into the wetsuit, struggling to get the tank onto my back. Well, now I have to do all that while wrapped in several layers of restrictive fleece and a plastic body bag. I managed to get the dry hood on with only minor loss of skin and hair, and I felt like all my face was being forced out through a straw. The underware is close fitting, restrictive and hot, and then you have to struggle into the actual drysuit. I stupidly tried to do this in a 70 degree living room, I though A would come home hours later to find me dead from heatstroke. I couldn't quite bring myself to pull the top of the suit over my head, I know for sure I'd never be able to get out without assistance. After about 5 minutes of swearing, pulling and sweating, I finally managed to get the evil thing off. All I have to do now is learn how to put it all on, get my fins on my feet and my tank on my back and figure out how to manipulate small fiddly things like my torch and reel while wearing 5mm thick neoprene gloves. I seriously think coldwater diving is for masochists only.