A Piscean Perspective

Today, in my continuing effort to become a highly compensated Senior Influencer, I want to talk about the  AqtivAqua DX Wide Swimming Goggles. 

I would've gone with a more snappy name like AqtivAqua DX 7000. 

There's something about adding a number to the end of a product name that gives it the sheen of modernity. As if it were crafted by AI robots to rigorous specifications for superior performance, the BMW people will agree with me on that. It's also a little trick employed by the writers at The Simpsons. 

By the way, with more than 30 years of dense, intricate episodes, it was a belief among myself and my old Chiat/Day partner John Shirley, that all of life's lessons could be found in this amazing anthology. Hence my rabbinical recommendation that you secure the entire Simpsons Opus 7000. 

Back to the goggles, which I purchased several weeks ago. Astute readers know that I have written at length about my swimming escapades. I am not alone in this endeavor. 

Swimming = writing.

Writing = swimming.

If you were to mosey on down to your local bookstore, we still have one in Culver City, you will find quite a number of books on those who live for chlorine. You won't find many books on lacrosse, shotputting, or even pickleball, despite its unexplainable popularity.

Swimming is, as you might have guessed, a contemplative sport. You can hear yourself breathing. In fact, that's all you hear. You can even see yourself breathing. Each exhalation produces a hypnotic roiling of carbon dioxide bubbles. Moreover, you can feel your chest expanding and your heartbeat finding a new aquatic rhythm. One that pleasantly lasts on land, long after emerging from the drink. 

In short, I love it.

And so with my return to the pool, I knew I had to get some new swim gear. Oh, and my pool, The Culver City Plunge, is absolutely beautiful...

Like an idiot, now living on a fixed income -- fixed because of ridiculous ageism inherent in the system -- I decided to buy a cheapo pair of regular goggles. I'm not interested in anti-fogging protective screens or Contoured Adjustable NoseBridges™ or any of that nonsense goggle manufacturers drone on about in order to justify a double digit price.

I just wanted to keep the stinging pool chemicals out of my eyes.

That was stupid. 

On my first few forays to Lane 5 (slow to medium swimmers) I found myself stopping every 275 meters to adjust the straps, drain the leaking, and recalibrate the nose bridge to my oversized aquiline Roman schnozz. 

And so I returned to the Amazon online mall and spent considerable time researching and reading the Google goggle reviews until I decided to plunk some hard earned digital money down on the AqtivAqua DX's. 

These folks may not know much about naming their products, or their company, but they more than make up for it in some quality built, high performing goggles. I can safely say that in the next 50 years of my swimming life I will never purchase anything but the Activ...Aktiv...Aqutiv...this brand of goggles.

They're incredibly comfortable. They don't leak. And they don't fog up. Which means I can keep an eye on the other old fat geezers in the lane next to me and not let them surpass my self-impressive pace.

I know "comparison is the thief of joy", but when you're alone in the water for 50 straight minutes of stroke after stroke after stroke (that's 2500 meters for those expecting a humblebrag), what else are you gonna do?

If you're gonna swim, and I think you should, just not at my pool because I like to have the lane all to myself, you should invest in the AqtivAqua DX goggles. 

I give them two seriously-wrinkled thumbs up.