I was making a play for the Santa Monica Pier. The ocean was glassy smooth, tide was low, perfect conditions for my terrible and painfully slow swimming technique. Then I see this mylar balloon heading my way. Dammit, I thought to myself, out loud because no one could hear me. I can’t leave it, some sea turtle would try to eat it and choke on the thing. So the next set of waves sent it within meters of me, and next thing I knew I had a balloon.
I spent about five minutes (ok maybe ten) pretty perturbed I was going to have to detour the several hundred yards to shore to get rid of it, since it made swimming impossible. Halfway to shore it finally hit me: why don’t I just pop it and stuff the thing in my pocket?
I was basically Remedial MacGyver.