What's a "lap" anyway?

If a "lap" is out and back, then I did ten laps this morning. My arms are pathetic. I hope to ramp up slowly.

Before 8AM, there are three swim lanes: slow, medium, and fast. This morning I learned I am solidly medium. I held my place with the guys in that lane just fine.

Now if only I could swim "right"

I have developed a weird style that has arms from, oh, the breaststroke or the butterfly or something, and a scissor-kick from the sidestroke. My head bobs on every stroke; at the high point I breathe, and even at the low point my eyes are usually still out of the water. (That last is very handy for me. I veer if I'm not looking.) I'm bothered by the asymmetry of the scissor-kick, but not enough that I spend time doing it the opposite way.

I have almost completely forgotten how to do the basic crawl. I can flutter-kick, and I am comfortable doing that when I am on a kickboard, but the flutter-kick doesn't go well with what my arms want to do. The arm and head motion of the crawl feels very wrong to me, and besides, it puts water in my ears. I am convinced this is the main purpose of the crawl. :-)