I'm getting more and more spooked by algae, seaweed, etc...

The Ohio River is within the northern range of a lot of snakes you'd rather not know about. :afraid: And I'd be skeered of sunken stuff there. Too much history...bootlegging...Avast ye! Stuff overboard... Downed trees, assuredly. Home of copperhead, cottonmouth, and black water snakes. Gah! :) Otherwise, how was the swim? :D I'm quite familiar with the cottonmouth and the copperhead from my younger days in the deep South. It is why I would rather risk the sharks in the gulf than do any fresh water swimming down there (not to mention the alligators).:agree: The swim was great as long as one didn't mind the taste of garbage dump near the shores.:dinner:

I took a stick right in the mouth at a race recently. All natural; no nails. A woman right ahead of me stopped swimming and just as I thought "why is she pulling up?" BAM. It hit me crossways, like I was going to take it back to shore and trade it for a Milk-Bone and a pat on the head. Seriously, how do they coordinate the ads with the posts and threads? Did some computer program see the word "Milk-Bone" and thus up pop the ads "Pet Calm," Risperdol Legal Advisors," "Dog Scared of Thunder?" and "Love Swimming?" I'm finding the scared dog ads very amusing. Ourswimmer, I hope you take heart that there is medication or treatment for you, should you bring a piece of driftwood to shore and expect a Milk-Bone.

Seriously, how do they coordinate the ads with the posts and threads? Did some computer program see the word "Milk-Bone" and thus up pop the ads "Pet Calm," Risperdol Legal Advisors," "Dog Scared of Thunder?" and "Love Swimming?" I'm finding the scared dog ads very amusing. Ourswimmer, I hope you take heart that there is medication or treatment for you, should you bring a piece of driftwood to shore and expect a Milk-Bone. I saw an ad headed "Dog swimming"--I did't check to see whether it was advertising something new and exciting: footage of a dog swimming (although I knew of a springer spaniel that would go way out into open water such that her owners got worried about her... but she'd always come back)... Or maybe it's an ad for teaching your dog to swim? Or your dog teaching you to swim? Or it's a swimming technique that I used to hear called the Dog Paddle. Hmmm...

Off Florida in the month of May - shark season. They are close to shore and feeding, hence why they have the shark tournaments that time of year, easy to catch 'em. The annual Hurricane Man race and the Sarasota Shark Tournament are only a short drive and a week apart... lots of large sharks are caught and killed for sport and money... Bull, Great Hammerhead (endangered species), Lemon. My OW experience is still quite limited but I swam off the central Gulf throughout May and got spooked a couple of times. Over active imagination and sharks on the brain... Sorta off topic but some great news; due to lots of pressure from organizations like Shark Safe, Shark Savers, and Shark Free Marinas it looks like shark tournys in FL are going to be all mostly Catch & Release now and more sharks are being added to the Protected/No Catch list this Fall; Great Hammerhead, and hopefully Tigers too.