I had a lot of fun actually, it's nice to get a suprise day off work
we kicked off with a bunch of theory. Whilst not going into great detail, I explained how simple everything in DIR is, from the configuration, to gas and dive planning, t communication. Simplicity is really the key as it all needs to be second nature.
We then jumped in and did some frog kicks, helicopter turns, back finning, and buoynacy drills (6 metres to the surface stopping every metre for 1 minute). I also demoed shooting a bag with a spool and doing a valve drill in 2 metres. Scubee was cool with most of this as her own buoyancy and trim were pretty squared away.
Back at the surface I removed scubees dog knob fins and replaced them with a space set of jet fins. I then taught her to back fin, which she managed to do immediately, which was great. We practiced that for a while and got out.
We then had a chat about OOG. How we handle an OOG, what the role of eacxh of the three person in a team is during an OOG and how the kit configuration supports these roles. We did a little fettling at this point, as she liked the idea of not bungiiing the long hose (so she could restow it easily like we do). We then jumped in. We had agreed she would go OOG at some point, and on a platform I told her to call it when she was ready. I donated the gas and she knocked her own mask off taking it
. Down off the platform we descended she she got herself back into fighting order, and then we put everything back where it was supposed to be.
We did some precision drills where you swim over the silt low enough so that your wing inflator touches it but nothing else. If you are not in trim this just goes to ratshit in a hurry:
, and we finned backwards along the silt to show there is no reason to disturb it, no matter which direction you are in or how low you are to the bottom. .
Out of the water again, and we had a long chat about DIR and the internet. I was happy to admit there were some DIR divers that really needed to alter the configuration so that they had their dumb-ass gobs duct-taped shut, and she was able to see, I hope, that we are just keen divers like anyone else. We also moved the bands on her tins, and then jumped back in the water for 20 misn to try it all out. Now the jet fins and lower tanks made a difference. She flattened out in the water nicely. So we worked on her frog kick a little to make it more efficient. A kick and glide rather than kick kick kick. I thoguht she did great considering the kit had been adjusted and she was in new fins.
One interesting point, was that someone shouted across the car park something along the lines of "hey DIR, what do you make of my pink tank boots then eh". Whilst this was good natured, I questioned scubee on the last time someone tried to bait her into proving an internet stereotype, becuase it happens to us all the time. Then I called him a f**king stroke.
Anyway, it was a good day for DIR / Stroke relations, and scubee gave me some good tips for my IDC / IE, which was great. I did try out her force fins for a laugh - what a spectacle I made of myself. I was all over the place, at one point looking up at my feet (which were on the surface) to see if I actually had anything on my feet - I hated the bloody things, still if it works for some people, who am I to say they are wrong