Here are some things that are new here:

• more prominent promotion of our Twitter and Facebook profiles
• a refreshed front page with random feature posts
• comments now can have avatars. Avatars get pulled from Gravatar
• Videos will show up in posts in larger formats.

There are going to be a few more small changes coming in the near future. So I ask for your patience if things don’t appear “normal”. One of the major new features I’m working on is making the site enabled for mobile users. This way, you can view content from this site right on your iPhone, iPad or other mobile device.

Some of the things that are going to be different, you’ll see less ads. In 2010, I gave away many ads in hopes to show advertisers the potential traffic to their sites from this one. With this new redesign, I’m no longer giving away ad space.

You will also notice a Donate page. You might be asking yourself, why are you asking for donations? I went back and forth on this topic. The new framework for this blog wasn’t free. Combine that with cost of web hosting and maintenance fees, the annual expenses of providing this service to you continues to climb. Any little help I can get will help keep the lights on and is greatly appreciated.

Please feel free to share your thoughts and opinions on this new design.

Thanks to everyone who has supported me throughout the year. Your friendship and kindness are greatly appreciated. Here is a quick video entry wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

Some Favorite Videos

• Diving the Vernon (Lake Michigan)
• Diving the SS Wisconsin (Lake Michigan)
• Diving the SS Florida (Lake Huron)
• Car Ferry Milwaukee Wheelhouse (Lake Michigan)
• Inside the SS Wisconsin (Lake Michigan)
• Scooter Fun (Haigh Quarry)

See you underwater next year!!!

Dear Santa,

I have been extra good this year. I didn’t torment that many of my scuba diving students. I kept the no mask skills in cold water to a minimum. Only the best students got the air gun. I totally rocked on deco for my technical dives. Throughout all of the classes I taught this year, everyone had a great time and I helped bring peace and love to the diving community. Since I have been such a good boy, below are a few pieces of scuba diving equipment that I would like for Christmas this year.

1. More air storage bottles
2. Full helium bottles for as far as the eye can see
3. Unlimited fills of 18/45
4. A snazzy new dry suit
5. A fill station panel
6. Heated vest for that snazzy new dry suit
7. Another Scubapro regulator for yet another deco bottle

I hope you can see it in your heart to remove me from the naughty list and put me back on the good list. I didn’t appreciate the lump of coal you had my wife throw at me last year.

Your Friend,
Duane

P.S. To all of my scuba diving friends out there, what’s on your Christmas list to Santa?

Over the past couple years, growth of this blog has increased significantly. When I first launched it, little did I realize that it would get more traffic than my main web site; Precision Diving. As I have watched this site grow and traffic increased, it has come to a point that this site has reached a plateau. Not because of content or stalled traffic, but because of the limitations of the blog platform and theme design.

So, it’s time for a redesign for the site. This redesign will be from the ground up, including the platform architecture, theme design, even the RSS feed. I’m just starting to think about the new changes and I am asking for your help.

• What changes would you like to see?
• Is there enough color or too much color?
• Are images showing up properly?
• Are pages loading fast enough?
• What do you want on here?
• Do you want more videos?

You can either post your thoughts in the comments section or use the contact form to send me your ideas. I don’t have a time line set up yet for when I’ll get everything done. But with no diving over the winter, I’ll have plenty of time to work on everything. As I progress, I may hit up some of you for help testing the new design. So make sure you express your ideas.

How Often Would You Like Updates

I wanted to post this article I found. It is pretty interesting. I’ve never heard of sink holes in the bottom of the Great Lakes, but apparently they exists. Here is a quick snippet of the article. The link to the full article is below.

Robert Ballard, discoverer of the sunken Titanic, and a team of researchers set out in 2001 to map shipwrecks offshore of Michigan in Lake Huron’s Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary. A geologist by training, Ballard took notice when imagery from the team’s side-scan sonar revealed dozens of large depressions in the lakebed.

Upon further inspection, the depressions proved to be sinkholes. Researchers were surprised to find some of them teeming with brilliant purple bacteria and other peculiar, seemingly primitive organisms (see March Bay View Compass). Similar life forms previously had been found only in extreme places like the deep sea and Antarctica.

Full Article:
Land, Lakes Linked Underground by Sinkholes

Dive Safe,
Duane
Precision Diving