“Are you a professional surfer?” I prod. “Pro … surfer. Huntington … Beach. First … place.” We’re in the parking lot of the West Union Sports Pub in landlocked Beaverton, Oregon.

It ain’t always easy driving drunkards home, but it’s as living.

You want to work for Uber or Lyft, you deal with the good, a little cash, flexible work hours and you deal with the bad, a spray of vomit here, a circular conversation there.

Peter Jakubowicz is a “science writer” and Lyft driver from Portland, Oregon.

In a mournful, ie cry-baby, story for Slate called The Drunk Men I Drive Around Every Night, Pete writes about meeting a “surf goggle” wearing pro surfer from Huntington Beach called James.

Come, sit on my lap, massage my legs and let’s read a little:

Pro … surfer.” I think that’s what he said after struggling to get out the second word. Sometimes I can’t make out what they’re saying, and I just nod and say “Yeah.”

His name is James. He’s wearing surf goggles and a cap pulled down over his eyes.

“Are you a professional surfer?” I prod. “Pro … surfer. Huntington … Beach. First … place.” We’re in the parking lot of the West Union Sports Pub in landlocked Beaverton, Oregon. It’s about 3 a.m. I’m his Lyft driver, or, as I have come to think of it, his designated driver on demand.

He has set a pho-and-burger joint as his destination. I suggest that most pho-and-burger joints are now closed. He says, “Go … go. Go … go.”

So, we drive there. The placed closed at 9 p.m., and we now sit in another empty parking lot. I ask him whether there’s somewhere else he wants me to take him.

He says “strip club.” I ask for a name and whether it’s open. He says “Costco.” I know Costco is neither a strip club nor open, but he persists. We head toward the nearest Costco. After a few minutes of dead time, he begins to gesticulate, seeming to indicate that this is the place.

“Right here?” I say. “In the street?” We’re surrounded by three-story condos. I stop. “You live in one of these, right?” I do want these guys to get home. He gets out, walks frantically toward the building, and then disappears through the door.

I quit for the night.

I begin my next run the following night at about 11 p.m. My first request is for a “James” at the West Union Sports Pub. The passenger gets in my car, and before I even look, he says, “Pro … surfer.” Same goggles and cap, less slurred. I refer to the night before. He has no clue who I am.

The story descends, as it must in these instances and in this epoch, into the misogyny of men.

 I usually don’t censor my riders, but if they cross a boundary like that, I’ll say, “Change the subject, bro, OK?” If they don’t, I ask them to get out.

For our readers, however, the mystery comes in the identity of James, pro surfer, HB, surf goggles, living it up in Beaverton, Oregon.

Only surfer I know living in those parts is Gerry Lopez.

And he don’t drink.

Solve mystery in comment pane below.

Read story here.

A tragedy on multiple levels.

One month ago, Britain’s VAL community was told they had to prove their expert bona-fides via a licensing system if they wanted to ride Bristol’s Wavegarden on the so-called advanced setting.

As The Wave’s Founder Nick Hounsfield told Jamie Tierney, who visited the place for BeachGrit, it isn’t technology holding the place back, it’s the surfing level of its customers.

“Quite a few people are struggling to be honest what their ability might be,” he said.

Today, a little switcharoo from the owners, announcing three days of “powerful waves” for “highly experienced” surfers.

The kicker is you won’t need a licence to ride these waves as long as you self-identity as a “highly experienced and proficient surfer, able to negotiate more powerful waves with confidence.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/B9G5CSYjzWX/?igshid=d66ubabfe2e0

And the tariff for the experience? Ninety-five pounds an hour.

Writer pulls calculator out of briefcase.

Oowee.

Two hundred Australian dollars; maybe one-fifty Americanos; four-hundred-and-twenty-five shekels for my Jewish brothers.

And the VALs lost their minds.

Via The Wave’s IG.

Wow that’s crazy money for an hour only on the expert wave.

I was really looking forward to surfing the top setting but now it’s £95 my dads says it’s too expensive. Gutted!

For £95 I can park at my local spot for 31 days at an hour a time! Think I’ll catch way more waves over that period! Go to the beach it’s way cheaper!

Advance settings are in the ocean this weekend folks. Just turn up, go with a mate and stay safe. You’ll get a day out and a meal at a restaurant for £95 you’d spend here, and be riding as many waves as you can physically cope with. Unless you’re a capitalist surfer, you should be happy…

£95 is a crazy price to pay considering you can get a flight to France and back for that much (and more)

I had tried to stick up for them and had fun on the current settings but this is a marketing and PR disaster… finally released better waves but at 95 quid an hour….

£95 an hour🤣 surf the Canary Islands for less.

That’s £95 for the day right? Not for an hour

By the way what happened to the “risk assessment” excuse for not making waves bigger before? The result of the risk assessment is it’s fine if people pay £95??

From feeling stoked and supportive to disappointed and exploited in one swift move! You guys have done so much right but this is a major error. The supposed commercials, stories around beginner sessions and safety justifications just don’t add up. Someone saw ££ signs and blew it. Big mistake and clearly alienating a lot of loyal advocates.

The tragedy here, of course, is calling a three-foot tube that chandeliers and requires supple hip flexors to squeeze into…advanced.

Don’t you think?