Relief and scientific advancement!
Growing up, some of us thought that the best way to Live the Life was to shirk the demands of school.
Others see more than a swell or two ahead.
Take, for example, BeachGrit’s Chas Smith, a degree in advanced linguistics and a former UCLA teacher, or Aaron James, author of Surfing with Sartre. James holds a PhD from Harvard.
And now, Cliff Kapono, a surfing doctoral candidate at University of California, San Diego.
Cliff, like Chas and Dr. James, uses his job as a foil to sustain a life of surfing. Cliff’s little scam includes traveling around the world — serendipitously to serious breaks — to do his research for the “good of mankind.”
Recently, Cliff was interviewed by the New York Times.
Let’s examine.
LA JOLLA, Calif. — On a recent trip, Cliff Kapono hit some of the more popular surf breaks in Ireland, England and Morocco. He’s proudly Native Hawaiian and no stranger to the hunt for the perfect wave. But this time he was chasing something even more unusual: microbial swabs from fellow surfers.
Mr. Kapono, a 29-year-old biochemist earning his doctorate at the University of California, San Diego, heads up the Surfer Biome Project, a unique effort to determine whether routine exposure to the ocean alters the microbial communities of the body, and whether those alterations might have consequences for surfers — and for the rest of us.
Mr. Kapono has collected more than 500 samples by rubbing cotton-tipped swabs over the heads, mouths, navels and other parts of surfers’ bodies, as well as their boards. Volunteers also donate a fecal sample.
Did you guess? (Hint: It’s the last paragraph. The whole last paragraph.)
While we all applaud Kapono for making waves part of his work, we probably wouldn’t want to shake his hand.
“Volunteers also donate a fecal sample?”
How far is too far to Live the Life?
My friends and I use to frequent a research hospital on weekends to finance trips to Tamarindo. Charming blue-checked medical gown, some TV, ping-pong gambling, a couple of injections of whatever and a $750 check to cash on Monday.
Easy money.
But can you imagine waiting on the beach to ask, “Hey, can I have some of your poop?”
And, therefore, the question of the day is, what would you do for cash?
How far have you gone?
If Cliff wants surfer’s shit, he should head over the Stab comments section where Baldy is soliciting for magic spells and Joiny is accusing ‘left wing media’ for faking climate change. Job done. Pretty toxic feacal matter though.
I spent 18 days in a research lab testing a generic blood pressure medicine when I was 18. They took over 100 blood samples and recorded all of my heartbeats with the 2 complete sets of ecg pads that were on my chest for 23 1/2 hours a day. I started missing every 5th heartbeat and I had scars from where the pads caused festering and eventually would remove the skin underneath when they were peeled off. I made some friends, played lots of cards, ate well and got paid $1500.
White Kanye may have phoned this one in, but he’s been knocking it out of the park for the most part.
BG commenters are like a bitchier version of The View. Waiting for someone they don’t like to show a weakness, and then using their stiletto heels to gore them.
Lest you wax nostalgic over MC, you fuckers (me included) regularly eviscerated him; only after he left did you turn him into a saint. I know for a fact MC once cried on Chas’ shoulder. Ok, maybe I don’t know this, but it could have happened.
You guys need to hire a woman writer, or bring back MC. This is getting ridiculous
They need to ask Jordy. Jordy’s dumps are mastadonic
lived in my car season after season
You just supplied your own fecal sample in the form of words, Steve.
I write for the Inertia on the side
I thought the Inertia was just a front.
It is, for me to sell coke filled roller blades to the French
Dude, the inertia is barely a font.
You can collect my chlamydia sample out of your girlfriends arse, Steve. Fuck wit.
“How far is too far to Live the Life?”
I’ll draw the line at being subjected to your writing for much longer. It’s shit. It’s not something wrong. It’s manything wrong. Fuck I miss MC as the third wheel. At least he approached writing with a semblence of self-control. You? Yeah, not so much. MC improved and grooved. You? Yeah, not so much. Please tell me you’re JP Currie. At least that would bring explanation to this shit we bear witness to. Just stop. Stop premising every goddamn article you write with the same shit structure of bashing someone else’s actions in order to present the shittiest literary scheme of perspective. The only scam I see is you pal.
Derek…Chas…seriously guys! I really enjoyed MC’s writing. It was genuine. It was received with genuinely commented “MC is getting better!”. Not just from me. Bring MC back. He helped BG be better. For fucks sake, you anti-depressed the fuck out of MC’s depressed confidence and it showed to me, as audience, that good writing starts with a good mentor. Mentor was a good role for you and Derek. Being mentored was a good role for MC. Cause MC’s shit didn’t stink.
When you’re good at something you move onto better things, like MC scoring a somewhat better paying (I presume) and more stable (again, presumably) job at Stab. Chas and Dez can’t compete with that.