Discussion»Questions»Recreation» People go wading, swimming, and surfing in the ocean and get bitten by sharks. Why not stay out of the ocean and go to a nice lake?
Unfortunately, there is no safe place to swim anymore. The ocean, lakes, swimming pools, hot tubs, rivers are all contaminated with something. If it isn't sharks it's the flesh eating disease or something else. I would love to swim but unless it's in a safe environment, forget it. I witnessed the YMCA allowing people in their street clothing to swim in their pool without showering first. There was debri floating in the water. That was the very last time I swam at the Y. Lakes can be contiminated with: roundup, staph, lead, mercury, pesticides, e coli, listeria etc., no thank you. All private pools are suspect. You never know what lurks in the water.
Because Oceans are not nice lakes. There is salt, for one. There are different animals to explore, different environment. Different everything. Lakes are nice. They are great if you want a peaceful atmosphere and want to be lulled into a false sense of security.
I was just watching Ted Bundy pick up and kill two different women at Lake Smammash . (SP?)
So, there are sharks everywhere. You can die on the way to the lake in your car.
AND? As Shirley Mac Laine once said, "To get to the fruit of the tree, you haver to go out on a limb".
Instead we have some EEEERIE chemical concoction/soup that looks remarkably like antifreeze. And just as toxic I'm sure. How horrible. Can this body of water be saved?
This post was edited by WM BARR . =ABSOLUTE TRASH at August 6, 2019 1:11 PM MDT
It is actually an algal bloom with cytotoxins in it. Four years ago our tap water was unfit to drink. There are no easy fixes. The main cause is farm run-off of phosphates and nitrates, both used as fertilizers. We have large farms along the Maumee River and its tributaries. All of this feeds directly into the lake. Add to that a very sunny, hot July and voila...pea soup.
This post was edited by Element 99 at August 7, 2019 5:14 PM MDT
For many it is just the novelty of swimming in the salt water. There are no surf waves in the lakes and rivers. I love my rivers but if I go to the coast I am swimming in the ocean.
The risk of dying from a shark attack is extremely low. Something like 1:3.7 million. Far lower than the chance to die from fireworks or lightning. You are far more likely to drown (1:1,134) ... no matter where you swim or bathe.
On the other hand, about 11,000 sharks are killed every HOUR by humans.
Going with the flow of the question and not getting literal about pollution, why not just stay in and read a book? Lakes have snakes--Almost as bad as sharks.
Ocean water is much more exciting than lake water; it can tell you stories of great sea battles, submarines torpedoing merchant ships of a convoy, pirate ships attacking merchant vessels and all other sorts of wild seafaring adventures. Lake waters are very boring.
I was taught that you could use a comma before the conjunction or not; either is correct. So I looked it up just now and apparently the US usually uses a comma and the UK usually does not.
I would use the comma---and I was taught that 60 years ago.
Logically, with the current punctuation 3 activities are distinguished---wading, swimming, surfing.
Without the comma, there are 2 activities distinguished---wading, swimming and surfing.
Pick a language you do not speak and ask the question with and without the comma---You would not know how many activities were referenced by the writer if he had not used the commas to let you know how many different operations were being performed.
Oops---no editing done.
This post was edited by tom jackson at August 6, 2019 6:00 PM MDT
I think you are kidding me, but if you speak all 6909 languages, simply re-type the first sentence in the question asked with 3 words of different lengths, with random, non-identical letters and punctuate it both ways and then see what is "given" by the different punctuations.
The most extensive catalog of the world’s languages, generally taken to be as authoritative as any, is that of Ethnologue (published by SIL International), whose detailed classified list as of 2009 included 6,909 distinct languages.
Element 99 
