You’ve always wanted to jump on the back of one. But admit it, you’ve sort of always wanted to punch one, too. Now's your chance. Let’s make this video game for everyone who gets the crap scared out of them when those little pretenders pop up next to us. (And, yeah, we know it's a pilot whale.) | Photo: EIA

Kickstarter: Dolphin Slayer Video Game!

By Steve Rees

7 years ago

And other Kickstarter campaigns we'd love to see!

The following investment opportunities are not real and intended only for entertainment purposes (unless you think otherwise, you know what I mean?).

Hello, boys and girls. Thanks for visiting my Kickstarter page.

I’ve got a few new products just for us surfers and I want YOU to be a part. I want to spread the wealth to all my tri-finned friends. Why? Because I care. Because we’re bound together by the tides. And nothing is stronger than that.

Except cash. We just need a little green to get us going, pals.

Getting in on this action is gonna cost a measly couple of bucks, but well worth it on the back end. Whaddya gonna do with those bills in your pocket, anyway?

Buy wax? Scrape that off of your neighbor’s boards at night?

You gotta jump on one of these. Big cash guaranteed, friends.

A NEW GAMING SERIES

Dolphin Slayer:

You’ve always wanted to jump on the back of one. But admit it, you’ve sort of always wanted to punch one, too. Now’s your chance. Let’s make this video game for everyone who gets the crap scared out of them when those little pretenders, one of these wannabe threshers pops up next to us. “Oh, look at me, everyone. My trachea is anterior of my brain.” Big deal. Gimme some money to put this game into production. Digital payback.

Climate Assassins:

Grand theft what? Famed diver Jacques Mayol said, “We are inseparable from mother earth. We are one.” But he never made it to level three. This one’ll be on shelves within a couple months. You can waste your time with junk like memorizing right-angle postulates, considering a reverse mortgage, and learning how to read. Or you can lay some cash down and make a killing.

Landfill-Seafill:

Remember when you and your friends used to put pieces of pumpernickel bread on your shoes and wait for a seagull to come by so you could kick it? It’s like that kind of fun, only better. In our new online concept, players can compete against the best virtual polluters in the world. Give what you can. Take the rest.

DISPOSABLE WETSUITS

Supposedly, one in three hundred people in the U.S. have a peanut allergy. Well, guess what? Boo-hoo. The other 299 of us have bigger problems than a little throat swelling – like what to do with old, dry-rotting wetsuits.

So, here’s the gig: These wetsuits have a brick-sized pouch on the inside. When you’re done with the suit, just quietly slip a few rocks in the pouch and let it peacefully sink down on top of your favorite break. Just Pop and Drop, baby! Instant reef and your wetsuit is never seen again. No mess and it’s gone for good. Just like in Landfill-Seafill! Here’s your opportunity to be a part of the solution. And it’s just good science.

DISPOSABLE WETSUIT CRAP BAG

You want disruptive technology? How ‘bout a little built-in breakaway crap bag fo ya? How’s that for disruptive? How many times have you borrowed your friend’s seal -lined wetsuit only to return in with your leftovers still in it? Awkward, right? But not anymore. This little neoprene add-on can rip right off after you take care of business. Just tear the velcro seal and toss it away. No mess, no explanations. Just watch as the bag floats away peacefully down the line. Biodiversity at its finest.

PAVE THE BAY CAMPAIGN

Ok, forget about the wetsuit thing for a second. You want a real investment, don’t you? That bridge in San Fran is just one big hassle – and – you – know – it. Oh, sure. You say, “Shouldn’t we be transforming our world into something greater? Shouldn’t we be evolving as a species?” Evolving? Darwin married his cousin. What we really want is easy access to waves, am I right? Bang. Toll-bridge cash, every day, baby. Help me get this done.

SUPER-SAVER SURF ADVENTURES

My uncle Bert told me stories about his trips to South America in the sixties. Unfortunately, Uncle Bert ended up getting arrested for seeing too many colors. Now you can go on a great surf trip like Bert, too, but without the jail time or melting face. Paraguay awaits!

Yes, South America, friend. Land of endless lefts. Of course, you can waste your money draggin’ your board on the rocks all the way back up the point at Chicama, eat a fried guinea pig on the way while you’re at it. Or… visit me in Paraguay! No crowded waves, no long paddles, no nothing. That’s right. No sardine-packed line ups, no problems.

GUARANTEED!*

PUMPERNICKEL

I need five bucks for some pumpernickel. Meet me at O-side Pier. Saturday.

*Not guaranteed.

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For music and fun!

Kelly Slater Surf Ranch Opens to Public!

By Chas Smith

7 years ago

Six am to 11 pm every day! Fifty jobs!

Bored with normal vacations? Tired of the same old same old? Sick of going along with the crowd? Well has Kelly Slater ever got an idea for you! His Lemoore, California Surf Ranch is set to open to the public and, trust me, it won’t disappoint. I know because my ex-wife lived near Lemoore, a hot, middle-of-California cow town some 120 miles from the beach.

But don’t take my word for it. Let’s read the local paper!

With some major upgrades and tweeks to the wave generation options, Slater and his investors now plan to expand the operation year-round and open 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. according to a new conditional use permit application filed with the county this summer.

The application says the ranch will be staffed with 50 employees, who will continue to do development of prototype wave generation systems.

It also says the facility will have a recreational use as well, offering competitive surfing events with outdoor music and camping for visitors. They are asking for a permit to hold large events – attracting as many as 8,000 visitors, six times a year.

Called Surf Ranch, the application says:

“Operations under this SRCUP will permit up to six events per calendar year, including recreational and competitive surfing events, and ancillary music performances during a two-to-four day period (i.e. Thursday through Sunday evening). Event operation time will be from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. Attendance is estimated to be up to 8,000 guests per day, over a two-to-four day period. Temporary bleachers, sound equipment, and lighting equipment may be setup for events and live music performances. Parking will be provided on site during the events. Contracted services will include traffic control, security, temporary lighting, potable water, portable toilets, wash stations, and trash services for each event. “

The project would also use the abandoned golf course to the east of the ranch located north of Jackson Avenue and west of 18th Avenue.

8000 guests per day over a two-to-four day period? It sounds like Kelly Slater is going to create a new Coachella/Splendor in the Grass/Guantanamo Bay Super All-Star Jam!

Of course I basically reported this one month ago but then it was just whispers on a warm wind. Now it is fact!

Will you go to his music festival? Who do you think will headline?

Also, it probably won’t be called “Kelly Slater Music Fest” but what do you think it should be called?

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Sketch of what might appear on The Inertia over the weekend.

Rumor: Inertia to criminalize US Open!

By Chas Smith

7 years ago

Mountain blog allegedly thinks those who attend event should be locked up!

Venice-adjacent’s favorite safe space is taking its team to Huntington Beach this weekend for the grand finale of the U.S. Open of Surfing. Of course The Inertia’s gluten free bread n coconut butter is yoga n exposing those who harm animals but the alt-left website also allegedly covers surfing. And they are allegedly set to cover the biggest surf event in the whole world by sending a police sketch artist instead of a photographer.

That’s right. A deeply entrenched source told me of Zach Weisberg and co’s plan. The overarching theme will apparently be that those who both attend and participate in the U.S. Open of Surfing, most from California’s inland towns, hard-working, blue collar, salt of the earth, Trump Country folk are criminals. Bad, dirty, criminals. This sort of broad categorization and shaming, race-baiting even, is in line with the mountain climbing blog’s ethos but still shocking to see in such bald form.

Or wait. Maybe the deeply entrenched source told me that The Inertia was going to bring a caricature artist instead of a photographer. That the overarching theme will apparently be those who both attend and participate in the U.S. Open of Surfing, men and women who work with their hands and attend community colleges are clowns. Amusement park clowns there for coastal-adjacent liberal elites to openly mock.

Sad.

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Debate: Is Loving Sharks So Wrong?

By Steve Rees

7 years ago

Man who loves sharks rides on back of the biggest of them all!

“Can’t we all just get along?”

Rodney King’s clarion call (well, almost clarion: his jaw was wired shut) has finally reached the Middle East. While King was referring to us, the dictum rings true for another pairing:

Shark and man together.

Kelly wants them culled (on Reunion), but maybe he should consider the approach of Iranian fisherman Rahmat Hosseini. Last week Hosseini might have just changed the dynamic between people and sharks.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BWK0DPMlIvo/?taken-by=rahmat.hosseini.71

Of course, Instagram people became very mad.

Erin.michele1: What the hell is wrong with you?! This is disgusting and horrific. I’m surprised you are even still alive with your level of stupidity you have.

sandraphalicia: This is ANIMAL ABUSE!!! You think that it liked the whale shark to have taken it
for a surfboard?

pj.jabines: What IDIOTS would do just to gain popularity.

golddustkitten: You belong in jail!

luvislandsbb: dirty arabs abusing animals classic durka durka jihad.

VanRees: I haven’t been this sick since listening to The Surfers “Alone by a Tree” (OK. I wrote this.)

There were countless other insensitive posts, far too funny to include, but you get the idea.

Maybe these angry humanists are right. Hosseini’s act is not courageous, but rather a barbaric expression of our contempt for nature.

But let’s not be depressive.

What say you? New sport or arrestable offense?

Is petting animals with your feet wrong?

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Is this you, a two-bed villa with gorgeous infinity pool and an interior that will make you swoon every single damn time your ten dollar a day butler opens the door? | Photo: selongselo.com

Wow: Lombok Goes Hollywood!

By Derek Rielly

7 years ago

Come live in colonial splendour on Indonesia's "Island of 1,000 mosques"!

First the surfers came to Indonesia, then the tourists, and now the bankers.

(Of course, erudite readers will complain that this is not completely true. The Portuguese and then the Dutch came, plundered, enslaved and so on before Sukarno showed ’em the door in 1949.)

But for the sake of modern Indonesia, that’s the lineage.

Let me ask. Are you a habitué of Bali and beyond?

Do you enjoy the terrific deals you can get on a hunk of land and a modernist villa right there on the beach? It ain’t what it used to be in Bali, half-a-million bucks used to buy you a palance, now it’s a villa way off the sand.

The smart money is headed to Lombok, home to Desert Point and only forty clicks across the Lombok Strait from Bali.

And, today, in the newspaper, The Australian Financial Review, there is an excellent story that confirms the rise of the Australian banker in the gentrification, no wait, that came with the tourists, the wolficiation, of Indonesia’s pretty islands.

Let’s wet our toes momentarily into the piece entitled The Australian bankers who built their own luxury resort in South Lombok.

Australians Andrew Corkery and James Nash were typical young gun investment bankers who liked to work and play hard. They met as traders in Hong Kong in 2006 and, like so many others their age, were soon making an annual Bali pilgrimage to surf, relax and drink Japanese beer far from the madding stock exchange.

“We wanted to invest in Bali but couldn’t make the numbers work,” Corkery reflects. “Then we went to South Lombok in 2010 for a surfing trip and it just made sense.”

“But there’s reason to clink beer necks: four of the villas have been completed, with many more sold off the plan. Investors pay $US500,000 ($632,000) on average for a two-bedroom villa spanning 250 square metres, although they are building villas of up to seven bedrooms, the largest home being 910 square metres.”

Can you imagine living out your days in splendour, the lord of the manor, while little brown men and women scuttle back and forth with your citrus-y cocktails, you admiring how they keep those uniforms so white?

Oh I could!

And do you think the people of this island of four million muslims, promoted by the Indonesian government as a sharia paradise and where hotels have signs pointing to Mecca, korans in the rooms, MTV is banned, unmarried couples are turned away etc, are thrilled when hunks of their ancestral land is cut off to be filled with “exclusive communities”?

Eat beach grit spam!