Bad Santa
Santa: You got some lip on you midget. Rory: Yeah? Well these lips were on your wife's pussy last night. Why don't you dust that thing off once in a while? Asshole!

Happy Chronica! Xmas for Grown-ups!

Cheap thoughtless gifts, living room UFC, hopeless self-pity and more!

Two days left until Christmas, one for those of you stuck on the other side of the dateline. Get all your shopping done? Looking forward to an awkward day spent with family? All excited to celebrate the birth of the son of god?

No? Neither am I, but that’s okay, because I don’t celebrate Christmas. I celebrate Chronica, a holiday which appeared to me in a dream slightly over a decade ago, and which the wife and I have been observing ever since. I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating, Chronica is not a portmanteau of Christmas and Hanukkah. The phonetic similarities are pure coincidence.

Did you know, I’ve never had a Jewish friend? How weird is that? I’ve never had a black friend, either, but I grew up a surf crazed little grom in a series of Southern California coastal suburbs, then moved to Hawaii, so that makes a little sense. There aren’t a ton of black people in Hawaii, and the SoCal police do an effective, if terribly racist, job of keeping brothers East of PCH.

I once was pulled over for playing Tupac while crossing that line into Manhattan Beach, on my way home from a Christmas party at one of my father in law’s car dealerships. Cop flashed his lights, then strolled up to the car, saw my lily white complexion, and told me to have a nice night. I’m definitely playing life on easy mode, the pig didn’t even run my name or plates. If he had he’d have seen that I had a warrant out for my arrest thanks to some confusion surrounding a seat belt ticket I’d received a couple months prior.

But we’re here to talk about Chronica, the best holiday around. Why worship a hippy Jew who wouldn’t stop running his mouth when you can spend a day focused on yourself? Chronica is not about love, or family, or togetherness. It’s a celebration of the “I,” a day to let your id run free, unrestrained by the daily necessity of cooperation with your fellow man.

I once was pulled over for playing Tupac. Cop flashed his lights, then strolled up to the car, saw my lily white complexion, and told me to have a nice night. I’m definitely playing life on easy mode, the pig didn’t even run my name or plates. If he had he’d have seen that I had a warrant out for my arrest thanks to some confusion surrounding a seat belt ticket I’d received a couple months prior.

It’s also a living holiday, constantly changing to better reflect your wants. The only true Chronica tradition is its insistence that tradition is stupid and leads always to stagnation.

Chronica morning is greeted with the smoking of the trees. No screaming children happily tearing through gifts, no tree, no lights (fire hazards, both), no childlike sense of wonder. Chronica, at its root, is a day like any other, and is thus best viewed through a haze of intoxication.

Once you’re well and truly lit, it’s time to sing the Chronica song. The song must be improvised, a capella, and lays out what you’ll do to anyone who crosses you in the coming year. Think of it as a sort of verbal haka. Your goal is to intimidate those around you, ensuring they’ll succumb to your will until the next Chronica rolls around.

The head of the household challenges all comers to a winner take all, no holds barred, fight for supremacy in the middle of the living room. Because I’m, literally, twice my wife’s size, and watch a lot of UFC, I’m pretty much an elite level fighter and have never been defeated!

Right about now is a good time your first cocktail of the day. Usually mimosas, though the postman dropped off a bottle of Cognac yesterday (thanks Derek!) so this year is gonna feature something a little harder.

Next is the Chronica erotic dance, wherein you demonstrate your virility through sexy moves. Pelvic thrusting and grunting is encouraged, though not required.

Then the Chronica feast! Oh, the splendor! All your favorite foods, eaten with abandon, until you can’t jam another morsel down your gullet. The feast will vary for each person, but it must include Chronica sandwiches (bacon on white bread with extra mayo, smashed flat) and a gallon of store bought chocolate milk.

Now that you’re high, stuffed with food, and more than a little drunk, it’s time for the feats of strength. I’ve, obviously, stolen the idea from an episode of Seinfeld, but it’s good fun. The head of the household challenges all comers to a winner take all, no holds barred, fight for supremacy in the middle of the living room. Because I’m, literally, twice my wife’s size, and watch a lot of UFC, I’m pretty much an elite level fighter and have never been defeated!

A proper recitation should leave your “loved ones” mired in a pool of hopeless self pity. In true Chronica majesty the point is to make yourself feel better by knocking the emotional legs out from under those around you.

No rematches are allowed, so the current head of household must resort to outright viciousness in order to defend his, or her, position in the pecking order. A loss cannot be avenged until next Chronica.

On to the recitation of demands. Each person has the opportunity to tell those gathered the ways in which they failed over the course of the prior year, and lay out a series of outlandish expectations for the next. A proper recitation should leave your “loved ones” mired in a pool of hopeless self pity. In true Chronica majesty the point is to make yourself feel better by knocking the emotional legs out from under those around you.

Penultimate is the giving of the bribe. Rather than give gifts to those you love, the bribe is given to ensure a person doesn’t come after you in the coming year. Mind games are encouraged. You can give cheap, thoughtless, gifts to establish dominance, even make the ultimate statement, “I don’t need any of you people,” by buying lavish gifts for yourself, alone.

Children get nothing, due to their weak stature and inability to seek redress for slights. It is recommended that you shower gifts on any teenagers present, as their pubescent strength, combined with a total inability to grasp consequences, makes them especially terrifying in the context of Chronica.

Finally, it’s time to begin drinking in earnest and make a series of slurred, increasingly unintelligible, obligatory holiday phone calls to friends and family.

Chronica is complete when you’ve passed out drunk on the couch, typically around 3 PM.

Load Comments

“The League of Extra-Ord Poo Men!”

Christian Fletcher, Ozzie Wright, Dion Aigus… new world champ Adriano De Souza!

Has a major stylistic shift happened in surfing with the Adriano de Souza victory? A massive sea change? The sort of surfing generally praised over the last few decades is like ballet, in my studied opinion. Fluid, graceful, essentially feminine. But is there something new that works? Legs wider apart? Bottom pointed outward?

“Fucken hell the Poo Man Conspiracy…” wrote the brilliant Nick Carroll in our message board recently “…The League of Extraordinary Poo Men. Founding members Christian Fletcher and Ozzie Wright. They pretty much get away with murder those poo men.”

The “poo stance” as it has come to be called is a very functional position. Hard to fall off with such a stable base! And the wonderful Adriano de Souza employed that stance to the highest victory. Christian Fletcher employed it too when he was hucking in the pages of the magazines, early on, and world tour competitors threw up such a stink! They refused to recognize his art.

But it is now recognized?

A conspiracy? Maybe.

Do you think kids will get wider and wider and wider on their boards? Will surfing look like sumo wrestling in the near future?

UPDATE:

Matt Warshaw, surf historian, artist and renaissance man informed me today that the League of Extraordinary Poo Men has a founder!

unnamed

Greg “Da Bull” Noll.

Load Comments

Buy: Chunk of Popular US Surf Mag!

Want to go to stiff parties and receive free tail pads in the mail?

I love that social media does 90% of my work for me. I don’t know how it worked backed in the day. I assume life was an exhausting series of phone calls and bro-sessions dedicated to chasing down stories.

Or maybe your day was spent sitting around waiting for sponsors to call and spoon feed you propaganda. I don’t know, the only real experience I have in publishing prior to the digital revolution was in the skate media, and that’s a whole different world.

But, if you’ve got a spare chunk of cash and would like to experience the hell that is trying to wring a profit from a dying medium, now is the time to buy in. According to my facebook feed, Skip Snead is looking to unload his 35% stake in Ghetto Juice.

Screen Shot 2015-12-23 at 4.23.01 pm

What is Ghetto Juice?

I’ll admit, it’s been a few years since I’ve seen a copy. But, assuming things haven’t changed, it’s a fun little ‘zine dedicated to the hellishly white coastal conservative stronghold that is Orange County, California. A new issue drops every month and a half, and their website claims a circulation 15,000 strong.

While I wouldn’t go running to mortgage your house for the capital, a sufficiently deep pocketed individual could have some fun with it. If you’ve got a few tens (maybe hundreds) of thousands of dollars floating around, and are keyed in to a good tax guy, I’m sure you could write off the loss each year and essentially turn it into a hobby that kind of pays for itself.

Whether that’s the actual print run, or the result of the mental gymnastics typical to circulation numbers (“We print 5,000 issues, but figure each one is seen by, I don’t know, three people?”) is anybody’s guess.

But there’s some upside potential to the investment.

Is it likely that a niche print ‘zine will ever catapult you to the heights of the surf industry? Probably not. But you can rest assured you’ll be drowning in free gear and spend your nights awash in a sea of industry party invites. Which is pretty cool, up until you actually get to meet a few of your heroes and realize they’re just normal, flawed, human beings.

Of course, consult that tax guy first, I’m no expert. I do know that my total inability to turn writing into a paying career keeps the missus and me from jumping into the next tax bracket, which is nice. And actually saves us more in taxes than I’m likely to earn in the few areas, outside of writing, for which I have any qualifications.

Which are waiting tables and selling surfboards. A kind of depressing realization, at thirty five years old. Talk about putting all your eggs in one basket.

This BeachGrit thing better pay off or I’m gonna be fifty, desperately trying to beat a drug test for an entry level job at the local grocery store, before I know it.

Load Comments

Kelly Slater wave pool
Kid creates Kelly Slater Wave Co Instagram account and hopes maybe he might get an invite to the pool. Uh, nope.

Blood Libel: Slater Wave Co v Child Pirate!

Kelly Slater takes on kid who steals Instagram handle… 

Two days ago, the surf world was, rightly, sent into raptures over Kelly Slater’s wave pool in Lemoore, California. All that ground mist and heavenly glow!

Did it make you sit erect in the saddle and take a deep breath?

Maybe you went searching for Kelly Slater Wave Co on Instagram so you could boil in the photos?

Yesterday, a BeachGrit reader sent the following story about a little surfer whose industry and, yeah, piracy, got him a personal hit from Kelly Slater.

Let’s examine.

“In short my best friend son while in Puerto Rico for family surf trip this past week hears about Kelly’s wave. Goes to Instagram to follow ‘Kelly Slater Wave Co’ Instagram feed representing the new endeavor.

 “I can only imagine the story goes like this!  Salty wet buckled up riding in the back seat after a very crowded session at Wilderness, and having to listen to 47’ish father play by play of every wave he didn’t get while riding his Tomo Vader.
“So what is a tech savvy grom suppose to do with all this down time between sessions. The little southern gentlemen decides he’s going to help Kelly&Co. start an Instagram account. ‘I got this who know’s maybe even get an invite to ride that wave.’
Unknown-3
“Pulls a couple still clips from other sources on the web tap tap done. Car comes to screeching halt father mutters about new spot less crowded lets catch some waves before your mom starts texting us.
“Check’s new Instagram account 500 followers. This thing is going off. Teens are all about their follower numbers. Several online rags link to new Instagram account including Inertia. More followers! It grows to over 1000. This kid is feeling it. Right? Caribbean sun/air and blooming Instagram account! Life is fucking killer!
Unknown-1
“An IG ghoul smells something…”
Unknown-2
“Finally all good things come to an end. Kelly catches wind ‘Who are you guys? Who runs this account? Soon young grom blocked from his own creation with in a matter hours from Kelly’s question. Fired before he could shralp that new man made wonder!
Unknown
…oh, and remember river surfing? The inspiration for Greg Webber’s pool? The cheapest way for everyday hacks like you and me to get some wave pool-esque jams? Let’s blast back into the past!

 

 

Load Comments

Which is Surfer and which The Inertia?

Blood Feud: Surfer vs. The Inertia!

Fists almost flew on the North Shore. Well, not fists probably but whatever.

It is the holiday season when families gather together in peaceful harmony and celebrate each other. Oh come all ye faithful, joyful and triumphant…

Unless!

Those families happen to have the surname Surfer or The Inertia then it’s blood feud time, baby!

This story came to be by way of an employee who is no longer engaged and I will re-tell as I heard because it is just too good.

In December, when the surf world gathers on Oahu’s North Shore, Surfer and The Inertia gathered there too at the Turtle Bay Resort. Zach Weisberg, founder of The Inertia, was once an editor at Surfer and felt a little miffed at the way he was let go and with some still in the Surfer family. “They’re all kooks…” he told his charges as he buttoned up his fresh Hawaiian shirt. “Yeah kooks…” his main lieutenant responded as he also buttoned up his fresh Hawaiian shirt.

The Inertia crew then made their way to Turtle Bay’s ballroom for Surfer Poll. They were, in fact, all wearing Hawaiian shirts (true) and as they walked shoulder to shoulder the main lieutenant grabbed one of the new hires by the Hawaiian shirt collar and said, “See here, if anything goes down in there tonight with those Surfer kooks we need to know whose side your on.”

The new hire, as it happened, had many friends in the Surfer camp. He had grown up with some of them in Orange County and had worked with some of them also. But there ain’t no atheists in foxholes and there certainly ain’t no brotherly love in a blood feud so The Inertia lieutenant had to know who he could count on in there if things went pear shaped.

The new hire looked at him, laughed, and said, “No.”

Thankfully nothing did go pear shaped. The Inertia staff stayed in tight formation and so did the Surfer staff, eyeing each other but no limp-wristed slaps were dished.

Just think, though, if there had been a rumble at Turtle Bay! Just picture the look on Hawaiian faces if the staffs of Surfer and The Inertia had exploded into a full physical altercation!

It would have been the greatest day in surf history. Well, there’s always next year.

 

Load Comments