A vivid dream.

“Would you rather be here or back home waiting in a mile long line for Trader Joe’s canned beans and…banana chips?” I ask my young daughter as we drop luggage off in our Opera-inspired, Jacques Garcia designed Paris hotel room.

“Ummmm. What’s Trader Joe’s?” She responds while washing her hands with the supplied Hermès soap in the bathroom.

“Exactly.” I say and it’s the right answer though we are now, officially, Coronavirus refugees. Instead of being allowed on to our scheduled Air Tahiti Nui flight tomorrow we are forced to cool heels in Paris for extra days, near the Palais Garnier, a stone’s throw from le Chapelle Expiatoire.

Brutal but like our brothers and sisters fleeing war torn Syria, war torn Afghanistan, conflict ravaged west Africa we will survive.

The Coronavirus Zombie Apocalypse has reached full tilt, or a much fuller tilt than any sane person could have ever imagined. I thought the flu-esque paranoia would grip Europe and we’d shred empty palaces, empty restaurants, empty plazas, parks, zoos and museums and that has been true, all of that and more, but Europeans, or at least the French and Germans, seemed generally lassiez-faire/lass los about the whole business. Nobody panicking. Nobody over-purchasing. Life as normal but… decidedly, gloriously less crowded, or at least until midnight tonight when all restaurants shutter and theaters screening The Best of Brigette Bardot turn black.

Aside from the elderly, who pull away in horror from my own personal walking immune system booster, we have lived a vivid dream but then, overnight, flight delayed. Postponed until the next day and who knows what then? Into an America hoarding nightmare? Otherwise healthy people crushed to death by cans upon cans of Trader Joe’s beans?

Honestly, what is going to happen to all the hoarded foodstuffs, toilet paper, hand sanitizer, masks? Has stockpiling suddenly mainstreamed and will awakened Americans begin digging bunkers as soon as this virus passes or will it all end up in landfills, hastening the Global Warming Zombie Apocalypse?

Well, we may as well learn French in the meantime.

“Oh can we please learn to speak French… ples vous? That’s how they say please. I’m serious.” My young daughter says while pulling me out the door for a steak frites.

“Oui Vuitton je ne sais quoi.” I respond. “That means yes.”

My phone rings at that very moment and it is my wife, back in California.

“When are you guys coming home?”

“I don’t really know. The French are sending us to the Caribbean, theoretically, tomorrow.”

“What?” She does not sound happy. “You are NOT getting sent to some crazy quarantine island in the Caribbean with OUR daughter!”

Minutes later she’s busted us free and has us direct without even paying a gouged fare.

Charles de Gaulle to Los Angeles International.

“Your mama is better than Papillon.” I tell my young daughter as we push out into the almost warm night, the City of Lights glowing in puddles as the French, seeming to ignore social distancing norms, continuing to see life in pink.

“It took that bro a decade, or something, to escape from his crazy quarantine Caribbean island. Your mama is, historically, legendary.”

“What did Papillon do to go to the crazy whatever island?” She asks.

“Not cry when his mother died…” I respond. “Or wait. That’s my other favorite Frenchman. But your mama, classically legendary.”

An abundance of lacking caution.

“Did you know that all of East Berlin was forcibly quarantined, like we are now, except theirs lasted 30 years or some such and none of them were sick with anything other than questionable taste?” I ask my young daughter as we’re standing in front of Checkpoint Charlie, a sleight of hand Gypsy tugging on my pant leg, insisting we watch his dumb show.

“That’s super duper sad…” she says “but what did they like that was bad?”

“Well, some of the same things they like today. Sausage, theatrical rock n roll, mullets but, more importantly, this is history. We’ve become so lulled by decades of relative stability that we forget how easy we have it in comparison. 20 million people died in WW I, 75 million in WW II, and that’s nothing compared to the Black Plague…”

“Are the Black Plague a theatrical German rock n roll band?” She interjects.

“Probably.” I say and we fall into silence again, studying the graffiti. Feeling its weight.

We may be stuck in Western Europe for 30 days but, worst case scenario, we’re stuck in Western Europe for 30 days. An absolute dream and I’ve been salivating over the road trips we can take, places we can go, mountains we can ski, rivers we can surf, food we can eat, subsidized medical institutions we can tax.

Nothing against the very real threat of a Chinese manufactured cold but…

….

…….

And with the World Surf League canceling March, likely April too, what has become of fortitude? Of knowing millions of people are going to be “self-quarantined” with nothing to do?

Professional surfing could have been their savior this “you can’t script this” moment but no. World Surf League CEO and Lord Commander over the Wall of Positive Noise Erik “ELo” Logan made his first executive decision, yesterday, lopping the first month, maybe two, off the season.

The reason?

“An abundance of caution.”

“Out of an abundance of caution for the safety of our athletes, fans and staff…”

Certainly the WSL will point at Australia for shutting down events attracting more than 500 people but live professional surfing isn’t really a “thing.” Santa Monica could have easily hosted the Coronavirus Corona event, 32 surfers in the water, 3 men in the booth (’89 World Champion gifted the of his life off), all the judges in Santa Monica where they should be anyhow. A total of 40 folk very much under the limit. For the hundreds upon hundreds of jobless, school-less, entertainment-less surfers around the globe it would have been rebellious art. Others would have glommed on too with no basketball, baseball or soccer.

The unicorn moment professional surfing has been waiting for since 1976.

Official mainstreaming. Being a real sport.

But no.

“An abundance of caution” and we surfers, we true grumpy locals, know what happens anytime an abundance of caution is exercised in the lineup. Either a rightly deserved burn or a trip over the falls.

“Well, ELo just took a trip over the falls…” I mumble after some time as the Berliner wind almost blows us both into that damned Gypsy.

My young daughter looks up at me, her confusion having turned into pure annoyance over the past week.

“Never mind.” I say. “Want to go get matching tracksuits for you and mama at the Adidas flagship store?”

She nods, happy again.

I’ll find a place to embroider Covid-19 on them later.

"Bite and spit."

The wheels have come completely off the civilized world and it appears our uncivilized friends in the animal kingdom have taken note, deciding to get in on some unhinged fun. Just really lose their minds and go all out crazy. And why not? What’s to stop them? Who?

Order has been damned. Vanquished. Chaos reigns.

And as you are well aware, apex predatory Great White have long feasted on whale carcasses floating in their ocean. Ripping into that blubber and mush but very recently, and for the first time in recorded history, scientists above a research vessel cruising South Africa’s vibrant coast witnessed two Great White’s take down a live Humpback Whale or, “Songbird of the Sea”, and let’s not take any more precious time. Let’s hear directly from them in the very entertaining Marine and Freshwater Journal.

Over the next 90 minutes, both white sharks approached the whale and each attacked it while still alive. The first shark positioned its initial attack from the rear of the whale, targeting the left flank behind the pectoral fin. However, although it bit the whale and a large amount of blood was released, it immediately let it go and swam away without removing any much blubber or muscle.

It waited for about 42 minutes to allow the whale to lose blood and slow its swimming patterns before biting beneath the tailstock. But like the bite before, it let go and swam away without removing any meat or blubber. It was then that the second shark (at about 13 ft/4m in length) showed up and took this opportunity to do the same thing, scaring off the smaller shark. After these two back-to-back bites, the whale stayed very still at the surface until the second shark bumped its snout.

The whale tried to dive, dipping its head under the water’s surface and arching its body but unable to move its tail. This new shark took advantage of that and bit the tail stock again, this time sharking its head, but released the whale once blood spurted out. That last bite sealed the fate of the whale, and it sank three minutes after that final bite.

Do you weep for the beautiful Humpback, extremely endangered, or cheer the Great White and his gumption?

More to the point for us surfers, us “Operatics of the Ocean”, it has long been thought that when a Great White hits one of our kind it takes a taste then realizes its mistake and refuses to finish the meal. The whale business above, though, proved the “bite and spit” tactic first hypothesized in 1958 by the wonderful ichthyologist John McCosker who declared that the prehistoric beasts prefer to bite then hang around until its prey bleeds out before returning to the feast.

Does it make you happy to know we are, likely, as delicious as whale?