Swimming etiquette?

So, I swam today. Trying to swim a bit more often, just to stay regular and get stronger in this discipline. Swimming comes fairly natural to me, for that I am grateful. I can get in the water and swim. Not much thought needs to go into it. It's nice that way. Mostly all I do is the front crawl. Boring I suppose. But, the backstroke is just annoying since I can't tell where I'm going, and the breaststroke is just too slow. Which brings me to my question...

Is there such a thing as etiquette in the water? I know at triathlon races, if you touch someone's toes, they are supposed to let you pass them at the end. But I can't ever imagine touching someone's toes at just plain public swimming. At our pool, there are only two lanes to swim in. Most of the time, it's not a big deal, but sometimes it gets a bit busy. Like today for instance. It was crazy. Funny enough, the lanes for swimming weren't too bad, at least at first. Twice, I nearly ran into someone trying to cross through the lanes. I'm guessing they don't have a clue since they went right through the swimmers to get to the deep end. So to them, I don't worry too much. Annoying however, are the pesky breaststrokers. I mean, please, it's not a very fast swimming skill. Some people are quick, but the vast majority are slow, slow slow. And since there are only two lanes, I don't understand how someone can think they are fast and choose to swim in the fast lane. Really, you might be faster than one other person, but you are slower than anyone else!! So swim where you belong!!

I managed to swim 28 laps (there and back, or 56 lengths), before it became an issue. But at that point, it was just too much. There were three people going uber slow in the fast lane. I ended up moving to the slow lane just so I could get in a couple more laps, but then I gave up. at 30 laps, I was done. I wasn't playing dodge the breaststroker, just not worth my time. So, at 1.5km of swimming, I called it, and stopped. It was a great swim, up until the last two laps. I just wish people understood why there are signs for fast and slow. I know I'm not super fast, but I am considerably faster than the leisurely breaststrokers that decided to drive me crazy!!

Oh well, there's always next time... stay tuned for an update on where I stand as far as eating, exercise and trimming down a bit...