About a month before we left for this trip I bought a new wetsuit. My wetsuit purchases mirror my clothes purchases these days. Price outweighs style every time…

So with some ‘Com ocean’ wetties on special at the local camping store for just $60 I was right there. I purchased a ‘large’ without even trying it on and headed home happy with my purchase – a real bargain! I should have tried it on as it was clearly made for a ‘large’ Asian man… and was a tad tight for me. However 2 surfs got it worn in and it was feeling good.

Then on my third surf – yesterday morning – the zip broke – just as I was about to paddle out… Bummer… And the receipt is in a filing cabinet at home.

We needed to get a new tap for the camper as the old one had lost it’s pumping action so I headed down to BCF to get the tap and try to exchange the wetsuit.

I picked up the tap and then spent the next 30 minutes waiting for the BCF crew to sort out wetsuit. They spoke to their supplier who agreed to an exchange, but then they couldn’t find that exact model in stock… So the manager got involved and tried to find a solution. I waited patiently in the hope that things would work out well… And the BCG people worked hard to sort things out… It was taking a long time and I was doing my best not to get annoyed.

When the manager came to see me after half an hour of confusing phone calls back and forward she informed me that the reason they couldn’t find the exact match was because I had purchased it as Anaconda… They are the sole distributors of ‘Com Ocean’ wetsuits…

As the words left her mouth I had that embarassing and excruciating memory of having actually bought the wetsuit in their Osborne Park store…

Did I feel like a knob?!…

After some apologies (and relief that I hadn’t become pushy with them) I headed off to Anaconda where they did a straight exchange and sent me on my way. Sadly they didn’t have an XL so I am back wearing an L and hoping the zip doesn’t bugger up.

If it does then at least I will go to the right shop this time!