Diving May Cause Temporary Regression to Infancy Shocker

“If you don’t let me use my strobes I’ll scream and scream until I can’t scream anymore…so there!”

In breaking news at The Scuba Monkey’s top-secret research labs (next to Nangtong Supermarket, ask for Bob, the guy with the red beard and glasses) new research has revealed that that boarding a diving vessel can have an adverse effect on mental age and cognitive ability.

In a sample of average holiday divers from Australia to the Red Sea it was found that normal, rational, adult humans who normally hold down responsible jobs in day-to-day life transform into mentally challenged 8 year old children on boarding a diving safari boat.

Sally Arseface, a 31 year Financial Advisor, from Toronto, Canada, said “In my normal working life I can manage to set an alarm clock, get washed, dressed AND catch my bus to work like a normal adult – where I then manage a team of 8 people.” “However”, she said shaking her head, “as soon as I set foot on the boat I appear to have morphed into a petulant 7 year old girl who eats Haribo and chain-watches ‘Frozen’ on DVD. I can’t manage to wake up when scheduled without a wake up call from my Dad, sorry, Instructor. And I can’t arrive on time for a dive briefing despite normally catching a bus twice a day in the ‘real world’. I really have no idea what has happened to me…baffling.”

“Ok, so you’ve eaten now. Now they’ll be a briefing in 30 mins ok?”

Mike Weaselface, a 47 year old IT consultant from Norway and complete prat said “Back home in Norway I work in the corporate world and am able to follow simple instructions, guidelines and rules without any problem. I drive my car within the rule of the road. I work in my business within the professional guidelines set out, I’m polite with colleagues and yet… as soon as we arrived at the dive centre myself and my wife inexplicably began behaving like a pair of complete twats. My wife threw her cert cards at the instructor like a petulant teenager who’s been told she’s grounded. And then when advised to dive as instructed within local guidelines and not flash delicate marine life, touch coral and follow local ecological guidelines we both began stamping our feet on the boat and throwing a hissy-fit to the tour leader like a pair of toddlers denied ice-cream. It’s embarrassing really.”

Rene Bignose, 53, from Lyon, said “I’ve regressed so far back to infancy since arriving at the dive centre I can’t even manage to dress myself on the boat and have to have a team of local staff put on my wetsuit and fins. I’m like some sort of retard. I even went so far as to leave all the windows open in my cabin when it was raining so that the electric fan would catch fire because I have the mental age of a 4 year old now.”

“I don’t know where I left my weight belt!”

Arlene Cousteau, 35, a local instructor, said “It’s strange seeing grown adults not even be able to keep track of where they left their towel or t-shirt. It’s like a temporary lobotomy on check-in. Some days we’re left with 20 Forrest Gumps on the boat. Still, you have to humour them or in this day and age they’ll write a snotty review on Trip Advisor if the water is too salty or the fish don’t look fishy enough for them. Bless ‘em.”

Should Have Gone To Specsavers

Invisible to most novice divers.

In breaking news today at The Scuba Monkey’s top-secret research labs (just off the A12, near the Texaco Fuel Station and Wild Bean Café, ask for ‘Bob’, red-beard, glasses, you know the bloke…) groundbreaking new evidence has been uncovered regarding novice divers.

Previous schools of thought has assumed that completing your introductory one or two scuba diving courses had no bearing on the students’ eyesight or powers of perception. However, recent evidence has suggested that being a novice diver in the 10-100 dive range can drastically impair vision and memory.

Dr. A Hedgehog of Scuba Monkey Labs commented “…in recent tests these new divers went through a transformation following their basic training. Not only did they, seemingly overnight and for no reason, develop an over-inflated sense of their own diving ability – which in today’s narcissistic society is perfectly normal – but more surprisingly appeared to lose a large proportion of their vision or memory when diving.’

A narcissistic idiot earlier today.

Asked to elaborate, Dr A Hedgehog said “As you’re aware, an experienced diver can usually enjoy the full underwater experience regardless of environment; the topography, the ambience, the water movement, the variety of life from small hermit crabs, dancing shrimps and nudibranchs to schooling fish and beyond, the history of the wreck, the interaction with fellow divers, the peace and tranquility and the sheer wonder of simply being underwater all are enough to keep the experienced diver amused…usually for the whole duration of the dive.”

“However”, he said shaking his head sadly, “this 10-100 logged dives demographic seem unable to focus on anything in-water aside their own, personal, diving needs and bragging rights on the boat – and are only able to physically see something if it is aquatic life greater than 3-4m in size that is physically pointed out to them with the accompaniment of a repeated ting-ting-ting sound – a bit like Pavlov’s dog. Astounding.”

Beautiful Bluefin Trevally…they’ll never see them.

We caught up with a diver just surfaced from a dive in the Indian Ocean. Boarding the boat from a stunning dive where Turtles, Peacock Mantis Shrimps, Trevally, Moray and a school of over 100 barracuda were present, Fabrice Crotch, 27, an enormous twat from Switzerland who works in accounting said “I’m an Advanced Open Water diver with 25 dives and I didn’t see a Whale Shark on that dive. In fact I didn’t see anything. Boring. I did manage to kick the other members of my dive group on the head several times and set off the ascent alarm on my computer though, so not all is lost.”

The crowned-prince of twats.

Asked by our research team if he had any other recollection of the dive he rolled his eyes threw his mask randomly on the floor in with someone else’s equipment to cause delays searching for it prior to the next dive, before picking up his iPhone and standing in the middle of the dive deck obstructing everyone else.

We next managed to catch up with Terry Balls, 42, a Carpet-fitter, UKIP voter and irritating arse from Barnsley, UK, at Scapa Flow, Europe’s premier wreck diving site. As he was lifted back onto the boat from a dive on the historic German Battlecruiser, SMS Dresden, we managed to grab Terry’s first words: “It was a bit cold… The instructor said something about a gun or anchor capstan or something, but I didn’t see it…pretty boring.”

“I can’t see a Barracuda – how can you expect me to see a fan coral?? Don’t worry a new one will grow in a few decades.”

This phenomena is still being investigated by the world’s leading Ophthalmologists and Neurologists to decipher causality but there appears to be a strong link between being an inexperienced diver in combination with being an enormous idiot.

Instructor Carlotta Gonzales Fernandez from Tossa de Mar, 33, said, “…these new divers seem to have an uncanny ability to filter out anything smaller than a large eagle ray. I once took my group through a school of dozens of hunting trevally and afterwards they said the dive was boring and they’d seen nothing. Yes, they were idiots.”

BSAC Diver Buys New Equipment!

Bob Cobblenob yesterday “I don’t know what came over me”.

In breaking diving news today it was announced that BSAC diver Bob Cobblenob, 48, from Tyneside, put his hand in his pocket and bought a NEW BCD and Drysuit without having a gun to his head.

Stunned onlookers at Scuba Shack Dive Emporium, just north of Sunderland, were there to speak with The Scuba Monkey’s reporters at the scene.

Jane Serkis, 46, an Instructor of several years said “I spat my mouthful of tea over the masks and snorkels display when I saw the transaction take place. It was just such a terrible shock to the system.” Shaking her head in disbelief and swallowing a beta-blocker, she added “Not only was it a new BCD, it wasn’t a Buddy BCD – it was a Scubapro or Mares. It was a modern design and everything. I couldn’t believe my eyes!”

Kim Stevenson, 42, also an experienced Instructor added “I thought I was f*cking dreaming. He bought a BCD. A modern black one with integrated weights, D rings, and a sleek, body-hugging design. Then he went on to buy a proper Drysuit. I’ve never seen anything like it from a BSAC diver.” Still shaking with shock as he tried to light a cigarette, Kim said “Usually they buy a 15 year old second-hand Drysuit off ebay that looks like a bin bag and then wonder why they have to spend £300 getting it in working order – so this was totally out of character. He’ll probably be barred from his local club for not having an old membrane suit with so many blobs of Black Witch holding it together that it looks like someone’s been using him for target practice with a paintball gun.”

“It’s cheaper to buy one fin off ebay. Yes, you swim around in circles, but on the plus side you do save nearly £40”

Shop owner Joe was still being administered oxygen and was in the recovery position as we spoke to him. Lifting his head he said “It was a crazy day. Crazy. He didn’t even moan or haggle for discount for 3 hours – or try to tell me what was wrong with the diving industry as he saw it. My world has turned upside down. They’ll be servicing their regs next!” he joked, before sliding into unconsciousness.