Celebrate: Middle-aged man declares 2018 to be professional surfing’s “Year of the Woman!”

Groundbreaking!

It is a bit early for these sorts of reminiscences about the year that was. 2018 still has some life yet but even still it was just declared professional surfing’s Year of the Woman by Outside magazine writer Andrew Lewis and it’d be rude of us not to celebrate by reading a li’l snippet.

This year has been groundbreaking for women’s surfing. So it was only fitting that 2018 would culminate with Gilmore being crowned world champion. Gilmore, who is 30, now ties fellow Australian Layne Beachley for the most ever women’s world title victories. By this past July, Gilmore had already foreshadowed greatness when she won her 29th tour event, more than any other woman. Surfers have a tendency to overuse the word legend to the point of meaninglessness, but when it comes to Gilmore, there is no better descriptor.

That the world’s best women surfers were dominating the airwaves on Monday no doubt deeply gratified the WSL’s new—and first woman—CEO, Sophie Goldschmidt, who announced in September that beginning next year, the WSL will be giving equal prize money to its male and female athletes. Equal pay had been one of Goldschmidt’s key mandates when she took over the WSL in 2017, along with getting surfing into the 2020 Olympic Games. To have Gilmore win the title was just the kind of you-can’t-make-this-stuff-up artistry that Goldschmidt needed to cap off 2018.

Now on to the question portion of the cut n paste.

Do women like things being declared “Year of the Woman?”

Do women like when men declare things “Year of the Woman?”

If I surprised Graham Stapelberg in the World Surf League’s Santa Monica High Tower and said, “Without looking on your phone… what is the difference between #MeToo and #TimesUp?” would he get the answer correct?

Is ex-WSL CEO Paul Speaker sad that the Year of the Woman occurred after his time even though he had two red roses placed in his cars and hotel rooms?

What will professional surfing’s 2019 get declared?

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Revealed: The great Garrett McNamara once questioned his place in the surfing world!

Motivational!

Do you ever feel glum when you look around and see all the epic people changing lives, doing important and amazing things? I sometimes do. I had big dreams, man. Dreams that once seemed so attainable. I was going to compose sonnets more beautiful than Beady Eyes. I was going to discover the biggest wave in the world and surf it like Garrett McNamara. All I ended up doing was writing Cocaine + Surfing (Buy here! The perfect gift for everyone on your Christmas list!).

A failure.

And so it buoys my very soul when I read that Garrett McNamara, the man who discovered the biggest wave in the world and surfed it, struggles with self-doubt too. It was tucked into a story about how he is going to solve the nasty too-much-plastic-in-the-ocean problem and let’s read about it.

Big wave surfer Garrett McNamara has launched a campaign to fight plastic pollution in the seas in an effort to “give back” to the ocean that gave him fame.

McNamara, who started surfing at 11, has made a name for himself for riding waves from collapsing glaciers to pioneering tow surfing and breaking the world record for the biggest wave ever surfed, in the Portuguese town of Nazare.

“Everything I have came from the ocean and I feel it’s time to give back,” McNamara, 51, told Reuters during the launch of his anti-plastic campaign in Lisbon. “The government needs to declare a state of emergency and mandate laws now.”

Originally from Massachusetts, McNamara discovered the biggest wave in the world off Nazare, 120 km north of Lisbon, and set his first record in 2011 when he rode a 78-foot (24 meters) wave. Two years later he beat it by riding a 100-foot (30 meters) wave at same spot.

McNamara’s surfing career slowed in 2016 after he fell off his board and badly fractured the humerus bone in his left arm. He questioned his place in the surfing world and is now pursuing a “bigger purpose”, he said.

With the new initiative, he hopes to encourage world leaders and companies to reduce waste and production of plastic.

Etc.

And is that why I feel like a failure? Because I am not pursuing a “bigger purpose?” My very own “special purpose?” I shall be thinking on these things for the remainder of the day.

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From the who-can-believe-it dept: Share Price of Surf Lakes has “Doubled” and “set to increase much further in value!”

Bitcoin for surfers!

If the next few years fall into place in the manner suggested in the PR literature for the various wave pool companies, there’ll be giant surf parks festooned with yoga bars, golfing greens and juice rooms on every available square of land, and on every continent.

The newest lizard at the truck stop is Surf Lakes, whose name is now prefixed with 5 Waves. You’ll remember the hoo-ha last month when a sturdy contingent of WQS-level Australian pro surfers and the former world champ Joel Parkinson flew to North Queensland to test the full-sized prototype of the Occy and Barton Lynch-endorsed wave pool.

The waves were very small, one to two feet using a generous ruler, but the reveal was stymied when the the giant plunger buckled while operating at only fifty percent capacity. Surf Lakes says the failure was a manufacturing fault, say a new part is being built and that the Yeppoon prototype will be operational by the end of January 2019.

Now, according to literature sent to potential investors, despite the breakdown,

Surf Lakes have made tremendous progress in Australia and globally, the share price has doubled and is set to increase much further in value.

Surf Lakes is already earning revenues and on track to earn millions more.

4 to 6 projects could give Surf Lakes a project pipeline of over AUD 80 million, which will in turn drive the company’s value and share price. Also, There are at least 10 other projects which aren’t far behind (plus over 100 more licensee enquiries that are being worked through).

Now let’s examine its six, likely-to-be-built-shortly, parks.

Want a piece of the action before the shares double again?

Minimum investment is AUD 100k for 500,000 shares. Investors within Australia must qualify as Sophisticated, Wholesale or Professional.
Close Date 14th December
Based on the strong investor interest the close date has been set down for 5pm on Friday 14th December 2018. All application forms must be in by this time with funds due by 31st Dec.

For full information, please download and read the Information Memorandum below. The Application Form and Instructions for investing are contained on page 72.

Please feel free to forward to your colleagues and contacts.
If you, your colleagues, your company and/or your contacts have any questions and/or would like to discuss on the telephone, please contact me [email protected]

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From the no-longer-ostentatiously-single-department: Taj Burrow Marries Gorgeous Baby Mama!

Cue the gags: "My wife can’t cook at all. She made chocolate mousse. An antler got stuck in my throat."

Yesterday, in a remarkably modest ceremony, the one-time bachelor for life Taj Burrow and his baby mama Rebecca Jobson, made indelible promises to each other under the auspices of various civil authorities.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bqs1iayB-m5/

Taj, who was the rookie of the year in 1998 and finished runner-up to the world title twice, threw a (burger) ring on Ms Jobson’s finger during a tropical vacation last February.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BQjKe4Pgvlv/

And three years ago, the flashy tour vet, who is now forty, and the gorgeous model, had a baby girl together, Arabella Rose, although the arrival of this mini cheerleader hasn’t diminished Taj’s output on video.

See…

Taj in “Acid Ejaculat!”

In “Cult of Freedom, The Taj Part”

And, here, in “Come Loofah my Stretch Marks!”

And the best part about being married? The jokes!

Let’s turn to that ol sage Rodney Dangerfield.

My marriage is on the rocks again, yeah, my wife just broke up with her boyfriend.

My wife and I were happy for 20 years. Then we met.

It’s tough to stay married. My wife kisses the dog on the lips, yet she won’t drink from my glass.

I told my wife the truth. I told her I was seeing a psychiatrist. Then she told me the truth: that she was seeing a psychiatrist, two plumbers, and a bartender.

My wife was afraid of the dark… then she saw me naked and now she’s afraid of the light.

We sleep in separate rooms, we have dinner apart, we take separate vacations – we’re doing everything we can to keep our marriage together.

My wife wants sex in the back of the car and she wants me to drive.

I haven’t spoken to my wife in years. I didn’t want to interrupt her.

My wife met me at the door the other night in a sexy negligee. Unfortunately, she was just coming home.

My wife’s jealousy is getting ridiculous. The other day she looked at my calendar and wanted to know who May was.

With my wife I don’t get no respect. I made a toast on her birthday to ‘the best woman a man ever had.’ The waiter joined me.

My wife can’t cook at all. She made chocolate mousse. An antler got stuck in my throat.

What a kid I got, I told him about the birds and the bees and he told me about the butcher and my wife.

My wife is always trying to get rid of me. The other day she told me to put the garbage out. I said to her I already did. She told me to go and keep an eye on it.

 

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From the when-life-gives-you-lemons Dept: Jamie Brisick turns the recent Malibu fires into a glorious work of art!

"And it took out my home with an almost personal vengeance..."

Jamie Brisick is one of my very favorite writers and he also just so happens to write about surf. He is also the only writer, who also happens to write about surf, to ever make my wife cry through the sheer power of words. I don’t know why but Revealed: World Number 2 Lakey Peterson Heir to the Vast Egg McMuffin Legacy! doesn’t crank the waterworks.

Am I jealous? I suppose in the same way that Oasis is jealous of The Beatles i.e. clearly out-classed at every corner so… no. And Brisick’s piece in today’s The New Yorker further establishes his John Lennon credentials (as opposed to my Noel Gallagher’s). Let’s not waste anymore time. Let’s slip right in to something a bit more comfortable.

The text message came just before 7 a.m.: “Mandatory evacuation for the entire city of Malibu.” I grabbed my car keys, wallet, phone, laptop, writing stuff, and a change of clothes. It was Friday, November 9th. I was not worried. Malibu gets a fire nearly every year. Never do they creep down the Santa Monica Mountains, leap the Pacific Coast Highway, and take out homes where I live, in Point Dume.

But this one did. And it took out my home with an almost personal vengeance. Watching KTLA news with a friend in his Venice Beach studio the following evening, he pointed at the screen. “That looks like your house.” The camera zoomed in. “That’s definitely your house.” The shot—a firefighter blasting water at my inflamed bedroom—would play on repeat throughout the weekend. I became a kind of poster child for the Woolsey Fire.

The next few days threw into sharp relief my conflicted relationship with Malibu life. Many of my fellow-evacuees landed comfortably in Venice and Santa Monica. I received invitations to festive dinners and brunches at upscale eateries. Designer fashion labels offered free clothes to folks who’d lost their homes. A two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar gift certificate for luxury bedding showed up in my in-box. Compared to the extreme loss of life in the Camp Fire, it felt way too easy. Even in evacuation mode, we kept up our tenor of self-congratulation.

Meanwhile, I could not get back into Malibu. Roads were closed on the north, south, and valley sides. The “stayers,” several of them surfer friends of mine, posted on social media about “never feeling a stronger sense of purpose” and “being honored to serve their community.” The Point Dume Bomberos, a vigilante group that formed in the fire, were saving houses. Supplies were coming in by boat; surfers were paddling them to shore on longboards. Malibu moms were cooking up hot meals in jury-rigged kitchens. I was hit with a sense of fomo/shame. I’d got out of the fire, and now all I wanted was to get back into the fire.

I got in the following day with a makeshift press pass. Driving west past Surfrider Beach, the Pacific Coast Highway eerily quiet, I watched a set of waves peel across First Point, no riders. Malibu is one of the most crowded breaks on earth. The road closure would create empty lineups akin to the pre-“Gidget” days. I reached back and pawed the nose of my five-ten twin fin.

I passed places of great personal significance: the surf spot where I got my first tube, in 1978; the former home of the Malibu Inn, where in my tormented teens I consumed a half decade’s worth of soggy oatmeal and burnt coffee hoping to get closer to a particular waitress; the rocky outcropping where my late wife and I shared one of our last meals together, a picnic of cheese and avocado sandwiches, the shore break slapping and hissing below our feet. I started surfing in the late seventies. Malibu was my playground; it’s as close to my heart as any geographical place I can think of. But to be a surfer is to be a traveller. In my early twenties, I started travelling, and pretty much kept travelling.

The first sightings of the fire were just north of Pepperdine University. The charred hills took on a certain vulnerability, vegetation gone, trees skeletal, bald black curves in the midday sun. Born and raised in L.A., now fifty-two, I have come to understand that it’s essentially a race between the Santa Ana winds and the rain. If the rain comes first, the fire hazard is mitigated. But, if the fires come first, as they had now (and as they did last year, with the Thomas Fire and the ensuing mudslides in Montecito), we’re in big trouble.

Read the rest here!

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