Apologies to the reader/boss/girlfriend etc.

If you’ve felt neglected and abused, loyal BeachGrittians, I understand. You’ve been handed rubbish lately. Of course Chas flips trash better than your average hobo, and Longtom’s musings have helped soothe the dumpster-fire burn, but the fact is we (emphasis on me (and Chas and Derek)) haven’t written much of value in the past…. mmmmmm…. four-ish days.

But we have excuses!

As you know Chas is busy with cocaine. As you may not know, and as I’m writing this I’m not sure if you’re supposed to know (?), Derek is also busy with something bound and verbose. He’s so busy in fact, that he asked me to curate two (2) articles a day for a nine-day span, while he finishes a project that will someday make a great coaster.

I agreed to his request but did so with a slight reluctance. Y’see, some days surf writing is easy. Kelly calls for a cull, Robbie Maddison acts like a wealthy bellend, etc. But others days it’s hard to find something noteworthy enough to pass off as news… so we fake it. We flip and spin and jump through hoops in an attempt to amuse our wonderful readership. To do that twice in a day is not only painful for us, it’s unfair to you.

This is not where I offer some wonderful solution to an apparent problem. This is where I make further excuses on my own behalf.

Three days into my nine-day sentence, a swell popped up. Actually it was two swells — forming back-to-back in the vivacious Southern Ocean. My initial plan was to meet them in Fiji, where a wonderful local (albeit American) family has offered me their couch in exchange for… friendship? They are incredibly gracious.

I then contacted an Aussie mate, who I’d met in Panama, to see if he’d like to join. He declined, citing work and a three-week trip to South Oz in his near future, but mentioned that the Fiji swells would first make landfall at his local, and they looked good.

A few chart-checks, phone calls, and one seriously disgruntled girlfriend later, I had a return ticket from LAX to Melbin with a seven-day layover in Fiji on the way back. Two trips for the price of one, four swells in the space of two!

I took off Monday night and have been pretty non-stop ever since. As a result, I’m not only slightly behind on my quota (thank you Chas for picking up the slack!), but 90% of my posts have been blasé video garbage, which is less fun for me to write than it is for you to read.

But I finally have a lay-day, so hopefully something interesting happens in the surf world!

Oh and, you’ll hear more travel tales shortly. I promise not to follow Chas’s advice this time.