I know I am preaching to the converted, because the sort of people who read
swimming news groups don't commit the sort of crimes I shall speak of. Most
readers won't be victims either, so bear with me while I look for a bit of
sympathy from the net's swimming elite, for an old splasher who has to swim
in public sessions.

For all you club swimmers who may not know, public sessions are the annoying
times when the club is expelled from the pool in favour of the sort of
people who arrive carrying a soggy looking carrier bag and with the furtive
look of someone sneaking in to a mucky film. Being a bit over the hill and
yet not wishing to admit it, I have to swim in such sessions, because I just
can't get to the club enough. However, I bring the legacy of club behaviour
with me inasmuch as I expect other people to behave properly; but they 
don't.
If you should have the misfortune to have to swim with the public some
pointers on who to avoid may help.

The most obvious category to avoid is women with hairdos. They display herd
behaviour, and 'swim' four abreast, catching up on the week's gossip. The
most heinous crime you can commit is to dampen their hair or face. I did
once by accident, and was kicked in the groin in punishment. In retaliation
I accidentally splashed even harder on my next length, only to have a full
set of long varnished nails slashed down my back. My wife believed my
explanation of the scars, god bless her.

Don't be fooled either if they wear a shower cap, it's even worse because it
shows they mean to stay. They invariably swim a stately breast stroke,
characterised by a slow leg kick which pushes the water down with the top of
the feet while keeping the toes and heels firmly together - anything more
would be unladylike. This is of course near useless for exercise, and they
can't understand why their legs continue to look like jodhpurs.

With or without the shower cap they will regularly congregate at the ends of
the pool for a proper talk, always choosing the bit where you want to
perform your tumble turns.

Men can be just as bad in their way. Here there are two danger signs. The
first is a pair of baggy shorts, the second is anyone on the poolside
clutching his towel. The towel on the poolside is the sporting equivalent of
a comfort blanket, and is a dead give-away. If you see someone in baggy
shorts and clutching a towel approaching the water, get out; you won't stand
and earthly. They will thrash violently in the water, oblivious of everyone
else in the pool, and yet go almost nowhere. It hasn't dawned on them that
wearing the equivalent of a parachute in the water makes about as much sense
as going jogging with a rickshaw strapped to your backside. If they do make
any progress it will probably be across the pool, when everyone else wants
to do lengths. In a fit of public spiritedness I once offered advice to one
such fellow to swim lengths. He then proceeded diagonally. I went on to
explain the purpose of the stripes on the pool bottom, only to be told that
in 10 years he had never noticed them before. I was not surprised to
recognise him some days later among a group of UFO spotters on the hills
above the town.

More innocent, but equally dangerous is the short sighted swimmer. I have to
declare the reason for my sympathy is that I am very short sighted myself .
In the days before I found out that contact lenses are perfectly safe under
a good pair of goggles, I was quite dangerous myself. My wife and I used to
swim a lot when we were courting, and she took the precaution of having a
very bright and distinctive costume so I could locate her in the great fuzzy
mass of pink bits, which was all I could see. This worked well until one day
another girl in an identical costume beat her in to the pool. I was only
saved from a serious charge by my wife's hurried explanation and the natural
tendency of women to believe each other over anything a man might say. God
bless her, again. Swimmers with poor eyesight can be spotted by the red
marks on the bridge of their nose, and their tendency to walk in to pillars.
Please be patient if you find one blundering about in the wrong changing
room, it's pointless being a voyeur without your glasses on anyway.

The final menace is the pretentious swimmer. They can't be spotted in
advance, but as soon as they strike out you'll see them. I call them
pretentious, because their stroke looks more like a hand ballet than a means
of propulsion. Also, they tend to swim with their eyes blissfully shut.  On
front crawl they will bring their arm forward on the recovery as if
launching a javelin, but pause above the water with backward bent fingers,
to then elegantly lay the hand on the water and watch it disappear like
Ophelia . What happens under the water is less important to them than how
they look to the lifeguard. On breast stroke they adopt an exaggerated
glide, lifting the face fully clear of the water each stroke to display a
smile of inner nirvana. It is the legs which do the harm though. Their
breast stroke kick is three lanes wide, and always perfectly timed to
coincide with your painful bits when overtaking them.

The final feature I would point out is common to all those types I have
mentioned. It is their rudeness. Whenever I try to point out the error of
their ways to them you just wouldn't believe the things they say. I mean, 
it's
every citizen's duty to offer advice to those who need it, isn't it? I have
worked this to advantage now though. I have offered enough advice to enough
people now that, though I still can't avoid them, they've started avoiding
me.