"Introducing Bob."

This has been filed under the “opinion” category but only because the biggest surf website in the entire world doesn’t have a “Demand:…” header. Or, we probably do but it wasn’t well received. Which brings us to Hurley. I only just learned yesterday that the brand’s visionary founder, and sons, have been drummed out by new owner Bluestar Alliance. That the entire family was “transitioned” to where there is only much wailing and gnashing of teeth but let us go first to a more reputable source, to the very famous Shop-Eat-Surf which turned Julia Roberts’ Eat-Pray-Love on its very head, mortifying single north of 43-years-old yogis from North County, San Diego who regard that film/book as holy literature.

Hurley family members who held key executive positions at the company are no longer at the brand under the new ownership of Bluestar Alliance.

Founder and Brand Ambassador Bob Hurley, Creative Director Ryan Hurley, Chief Marketing Officer Jeff Hurley, and Head of Product Chance King, Bob’s son-in-law, have all departed.

We have asked Bluestar several questions over the course of a few days including about who is leading the company now but have not received a reply.

Etc. but not really.

And the savvy amongst us will remember how Mr. Bob Hurley pulled the rug out from under Billabong in creating Hurley. Spectacularly. Richly. Gorgeously.

For certain he has more tricks up his sleeve. For certain he has “Bob.” The next hot super now surf brand that will undoubtedly pull the rug out from under Bluestar Alliance.

Bob.

I would buy anything they produced today.

Would buy anything literally anything.

I believe.

You do too.

Bob.

The brand that shatters our Surf Industry Apocalypse.

More as the story develops/when you see “Bob” wrapping BeachGrit.

Baby shark chop, chop, chop, chop the head...

I’ve warned you all, for months now, to stay out of the water for it is the sharks’ domain, Great White, Tiger and Bull, and they are evolving at a ruthlessly terrifying pace. Learning to keep their fins below the water in order to dodge detection. Learning to prefer men over women and not just for grossly sexist reasons but because physiology. Body mass, meat on the bones etc.

Well, some sick, twisted pervert in Cape Town, South Africa somehow dreamed that his human evolution was greater than the mighty Great White’s and took the detente there to serially kill and decapitate many of babies/juveniles but don’t take my word for it. Let us read directly from Cape Town’s own News24.

Dozens of headless sharks were found dumped on Strandfontein beach in Cape Town on Sunday morning.

According to Cape of Good Hope SPCA, the sharks were found with their heads, dorsal fins and tails severely injured. The SPCA said it had received a call to respond to the area from Law Enforcement and City of Cape Town officials earlier in the day.

The team’s inspectors arrived on scene and found the sharks laying on the shore, SPCA said in a Facebook post.

It added that the circumstances surrounding the incident were being investigated.

Now, my worry, our worry, is how the vicious Great White parents of these murdered minors will evolve yet again to deal with this ill-thought spree.

Could Austin Powers’ Dr. Evil’s prophecy not be far off?

Sharks with lasers?

More as the story develops.

Heaps thirsty.

During that final roll call, when all of the good and all of the bad of all our lives is placed upon the scales, will surfers, as a group, emerge as a beneficial sect or scurrilous trash? On the positive side we might find gifting humanity a healthy fear of Great White sharks. On the negative, maybe even on top of a very large pile including, but not limited to, Kelly Slater’s Surf Ranch plow, there will certainly be the exposure, colonization and destruction of one-time paradise Bali.

Oh we’ve all been and many of us have even taken advantage of favorable economic disparities to live gilded lives with swimming pools, servants, etc. that would have been altogether impossible in the United States or Australia. That would have never even been dreamed but there, in Bali, rupiah raining down from the sky, we practiced yoga on teak decks overlooking pristine breaks. We surfed and hash-tagged #blessed.

Well, all those swimming pools etc., all those advertisements for a perfect life attracted tourist hordes who are draining Bali of her waters and let us read hard truths. Let us look our sin directly in the eye.

Tourists are being blamed for a shortage of freshwater in drought-stricken Bali, which has seen more than half its rivers run dry.

The holiday island is still waiting for its delayed wet season to begin as a drought that’s affecting an estimated 50 million people across Indonesia continues to threaten food security, local culture and quality of life, Al-Jazeera reports.

Some 260 of Bali’s 400 rivers have run dry and the island’s largest water reserve, Lake Buyan, had dropped 3.5 metres. Meanwhile, the falling water table is causing saltwater intrusion in many areas across the island, especially in the south.

“I believe Bali is in real danger,” local journalist Anton Muhajir, who has been covering Bali’s water crisis, told Al-Jazeera.

“Some of my friends have had to move from their ancestral homes in Denpasar because the water in their wells has turned salty. At Jatiluwih, where thousands of tourists go each day to see the most beautiful rice terraces of Bali, farmers are using plastic pipes to pump in water they have to buy in the south because the springs in the mountains are drying up.

“And now we have drought, not just in Bali but in nearly every province in Indonesia.”

The blame has fallen on Bali’s tourism industry, which uses about 65 per cent of the island’s water, according to the Indonesian non-government organisation IDEP Foundation.

Etc.

And shame.

Shame on me. Shame on you. Shame on Taylor Steele who once lived in Bali with his family but only a little bit of shame because I sure would like a Christmas bottle of his organic sipping tequila Solento and…

…wait just a minute. What if tequila was served on Bali instead of water? What if the rivers, streams and reservoirs ran with 100% agave goodness?

Could surfers actually save Bali?

More as the story develops.