Parker: “20 Reasons to be Thankful!”

Rory Parker gives thanks to "my big ol dick," "my whore of a wife", Dane Reynolds and more!

A million years ago a bunch of buckle wearing zealots fled Europe because their toxic take on Chiristianity was no longer welcome on the continent. They arrived in America, mooched a meal off the indigenous inhabitants, burned a few women at the stake. Other stuff happened.

Fast forward a few years, and I’m gonna eat a shit load of food to celebrate with a good friend who was kind enough to invite us into his home for the holiday.

Thanksgiving is, strangely, a day I actively try to be thankful for the wonderful life I live. I spend most of my time in a doom and gloom, everything-sucks, mindset. Nice to take a break for a minute.

Yesterday I was combing the island for disposable creme brulee tins. Three hours of searching, came up empty. Was getting pretty upset about it, mere moments away from cursing the heavens, when I got a nice little moment of clarity.  The lack of those little metallic cups was, literally, the worst problem in my life. Talk about totally lacking perspective.

Keeping that in mind, here are twenty things I’m thankful for:

Evening glass-offs

evening glass offs

Sticky Bumps tropical flavor

Butter

My ancestors were on the winning side of every massacre/genocide they were involved in.

Shaved vaginas

New surfboards

Free surfboard

My french bulldog, Mr Debs
french-bulldog

Mason Ho

Futures fins (thanks for the box of gear, guys!)

teampage_main_image_johnjohn10

Black truffle goat cheese

My whore of a wife

Drugs

Spearfishing

My big ol’ dick

microphone-dick

Planned Parenthood

BeachGrit readers, even though I often hate you fuckers.

My ghetto bidet rig

The ocean. Just in general. Such a wonderfully near-magic pile of water.

Kona winds

Fluid 21st century gender roles

Strong coffee

Health insurance

Air rifle gun law loopholes

Dane Reynolds (I finally got around to watching Chapter 11)

Chapter 11 from Marine Layer on Vimeo.

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John John Florence

Rare: John John Reality TV Show!

"John John is a mess and he's so gross!"

Ain’t it weird how the world works? A game of inches. Missing success or disaster with a single step.

How many times have you had a brush with death? How many missed opportunities keep you awake at night? If you’d made different choices, would your life be much different?

Would it be much better?

I had no idea that Alex Florence once tried to wrangle her kids onto a reality show. Called it My Three Sons. Kind of a weird move. That type of exposure ain’t great for a growing boy. Child stars traditionally face a pretty grim reality upon maturity. I imagine child reality stars would face similar. Probably worse.

I wonder how John John’s career would have proceeded, had Hollywood come knocking?

Fifteen years old, height of awkward, living in a small community where privacy is already scarce. Everyone knows everything, true secrets in short supply.

Florence was already a name at that point, but no more so than any highly hyped phenom.

“The next Slater” was being thrown around, but we’d heard that before.

He was the first to break the curse. Became a freak, already sure to be a legend.

Would everything have gone the same way had he suffered to see his every adolescent misstep documented?

Would he have been mocked by peers?

Teased and judged?

Would he have burnt out, picked up and addiction, dwindled away into another tale of wasted potential?

Would he still be the greatest surfer in the world, or just another sad reality show sidenote?

Thank the good lord jeebus we’ll never know.

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Where did he hide his McDonalds? Only God knows!
Where did he hide his McDonalds? Only God knows!

Record: Ando spends $60 at McDonalds!

It's Thanksgiving in America. Craig "Ando" Anderson once also got super gluttonous!

It is Thanksgiving in America. A time when families gather and eat as absolutely much as they can. Stuffing their guts full. Craig Anderson, even though he is Australian, once did the same thing. This exchange was recorded seven years ago. Let’s eavesdrop…

Craig Anderson says, “Me and Matt spend sixty bucks on Maccas the other night.”

Ollie, Craig’s friends, asks what they got.

Craig says, “Everything.”

Matt, Craig’s one time filmer says, “I didn’t think it was possible to spend sixty dollars at McDonalds. It was really next level.”

Craig butts in, “Matt had a couple of double quarter pounder meals. It was three in the morning and we were driving back from South Oz.”

Ollie asks Craig what he had and Craig tells him. “I had…three coffees…I had…a double cheeseburger meal…uhhhhh…two chicken meals…and a toasted sandwich.”

Ollie, amazed, says, “You had meals on all of ‘em? You were doubling up on fries and drinks?”

Craig says, “Ah no. I just had coffee and only one fries.”

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little surfer boy

Memoir: The Little Surfer Boy at #10!

Rejection ain't easy. Especially when it spikes the heart of a kid… 

The married couple liked to “jog.” The husband had been to America and had brought back an enthusiasm for the new fad years before it was to reach the isolated suburbs of Western Australia. (He imported a thirst for “swinging” too, although his wife was uncooperative.)

Just before the sun rose every morning, the couple would circle the 500- metre crescent where they lived six times.

Every Saturday, as they passed number 10, they would wave at a boy whom they estimated to be seven years old, but who was actually 10, squatting on top of the cream brick letterbox, as if ready to spring an attack on an unknown enemy.

Sometimes, the boy’s shivering was visible and this wasn’t surprising with his uniform of boardshorts, singlet, visor and thongs, even in winter. On the coldest mornings, he would be wrapped in a towel that had the words Ocean and Earth written across it in large block letters. Other days, the towel would be folded on top of the surfboard that leaned against the letterbox. If you were to stop and watch the boy you would see that he checked the large yellow plastic watch on his wrist every few seconds.

By then, the sun was well above the horizon now and the boy’s shivering had stopped. His freckled face would be cut into a grimace as the sun hit his eyes. If the couple had ever stopped to see what happened next, they would’ve seen the boy’s mother hurry up the driveway in a dressing gown that ballooned in the morning offshore, whisper in the boy’s ear, help him down from the letterbox, and hold his hand as she led him inside, the boy’s surfboard hanging from a strap on his shoulder.

Most Saturdays, they would see the boy still sitting there even after they’d jogged their six laps, had gone home for breakfast, and were now taking their Afghan – another American influence – for a walk.

By then, the sun was well above the horizon now and the boy’s shivering had stopped. His freckled face would be cut into a grimace as the sun hit his eyes. If the couple had ever stopped to see what happened next, they would’ve seen the boy’s mother hurry up the driveway in a dressing gown that ballooned in the morning offshore, whisper in the boy’s ear, help him down from the letterbox, and hold his hand as she led him inside, the boy’s surfboard hanging from a strap on his shoulder.

The boy would walk back into his room, prop his surfboard against the wall in the corner, nose down, just as he’d seen it done in the surf shop, and lay down on his bed, looking at the trees outside his window and waiting for the onshore change that always came by nine am.

He would have liked to call his friend, but he was afraid, so afraid, of a definitive rejection. Because, even now, even two hours after the appointed pick-up time, his ears were attuned to any sort of crackle that might signal the arrival of a VW.

Rarely, perhaps once ever six Saturdays, the couple would see the boy climbing into a bright orange Volkswagen station wagon, an older boy smiling at him as he shifted into the back seat. A bearded man would tie his surfboard onto the roof with short lengths of rope.

The boy’s failed vigils disturbed the husband and he often spoke about it with his wife.

Why does the Rielly boy wait for a lift that hardly ever comes?

His wife would shrug and liken it to their passion for “jogging.”

But, it upset her, too.

He was too young to be rejected so blithely.

For the boy’s part, he never felt rejected or ignored.

Of course, he felt sad. And sometimes the sadness was so overwhelming he pushed his face into his pillow until it was damp with tears.

But, only because when you live in Perth and your surfing is limited to weekends and you miss that early offshore window, fuck, wouldn’t you cry too?

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Pillage: the WSL plunders Hawaii!

Like the missionaries and Dole before them, the WSL takes takes takes!

Thanksgiving is a time, in the United States, when families come together and reflect on their good fortune. Or, if you are the World Surf League, contributes to the age-old plundering of Hawaiian resources.

As first reported here, your favorite professional surfing tour partnered with almost hotel Airbnb last year. The coupling began quietly, names simply interlocking on a step-and-repeat and links back and forth between websites (maybe I never clicked).

This year, though, the relationship is being used to actively screw Hawaii out of much needed tax dollars! An “experience” is being offered by the family of the League’s Regional Manager which promises:

We’ll immerse ourselves in surf culture around the Banzai Pipeline. We’ll meet professional surfers, explore Oahu’s North Shore with locals, and get VIP access to a world-class sporting event.

It sounds absolutely fabulous (sign up here) featuring a BBQ with Kieren Perrow, outer reef jetski exploration, Pipeline VIP tickets, surf lesson with Sunny Garcia and stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from the local economy!

Hawaii Business recently published a story, Lodgers n’ Tax Dodgers, about the toll that vacation rentals take on a system that relies heavily on hotel tax dollars for education, welfare, roads, hopitals, etc. etc. etc.

$115.6 million in TAT taxes generated by short-term vacation rentals. Use the same calculation for the 4 percent excise tax, and that brings the total to $165.6 million. That theoretically is what should be paid by short-term vacation rentals; the state Taxation Department did not say how much is actually paid, but observers suggest only a fraction of the applicable taxes are collected.

Furthermore, the state collected $420.97 million in TAT in the latest fiscal year; that figure was close to the total we calculated for TAT paid by hotels, condo hotels, timeshares, hostels, apartment hotels and other “traditional” accommodations, indicating there is money missing from other sources.

Does this surprise? That the WSL maybe partakes in dodgy business practices?

Maybe!

But still, on this Thanksgiving holiday, I’m grateful to WSL CEO Paul Speaker for… for… ummm… for being too chicken to ever meet me face to face. Oh how I loathe turkey!

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