a dry spell

It was the cringe in the doctor's face that gave it all away before he even said a word. Either that or the familiar pain in both ears and the feeling of fullness in my eustacian tubes. I knew both ears were infected. Again. This time it's a bit worse and I've been told no diving for at least a week and a half. Well, I am signed up to take my PADI instructor exam next weekend - think I make two dives one in a pool?

I'm sad about not being able to dive this week but of course I will take the opportunity to rest and continue working on my own things. Unfortunately this means our 4 person topside team is now 3 leaving only one buddy "trio" available to work underwater. We've just finished day 7 of the mission - one and a half more days until the aquanauts are shut inside the chamber to start their 18-decompression. This does mean that while the science itself will slow down starting tomorrow, the instruments need to start coming up. Some are quite heavy so they require lift bags and some are quite big so require at least two people on them. Imagine trying to bring up a large piece of equipment that is weighted while trying to maintain your own buoyancy enough to go up slowly and still make a proper safety stop. It's a challenge for sure.

Talking about that - during my last dive today (and, as it turns out, my last dive here at NURC), a very buoyant sample bottle slipped out of my mesh goody bag as we were picking samples up from the aquarius. I caught one bottle but the other one just went for the surface. I took one look at the bottle and one look at my buddy - and she just shook her head in agreement - the bottle was long gone and there was no way we were going to rush up to the surface to get it. Fairly aggravating but it happens.

So back to the ears (sorry, aunt bub) - it just leaves me wondering what is in store for the next months. What will happen in Australia? What if I get another infection? Here at NURC the doctor lives right next door (I had to interrupt his dinner preparation for him to look at my ears). So with the free medical advice and supplies, this isn't a bad place to get sick. So, I guess it's time to be ultra nice to my ears and body, give it a bit of a rest, and try not to dive my heart out in Australia too much.