Breaking: Queensland authorities find
Covid-19 fragments in coastal sewage sparking panic as Australians
gather for “Invasion Day” protests!
By Chas Smith
"Australians all let us rejoice for we are young
and free..."
But oh rats. Mere hours ago we learned of 2x
world championship Tyler Wright’s impassioned call
to her fellow countrypersons to forego traditional Australia Day
celebrations and attended protests for Invasion Day instead.
“Jan 26th is Invasion Day…” she wrote. “My fellow white and non
indigenous Australian friends where are you all showing up for
Invasion Day marches? If you can’t make one, how else are you
showing up for First Nations people everyday? Unity comes after
accountability and truth telling. Let’s hold each other
accountable. Let’s all do better to dismantle individual, systemic,
structural and institutionalised racism founded in white
supremacy.”
Woke n wonderful… except…….
Oh nuts.
Queensland authorities from Maroochydore in the south to as far
north as Cairns found fragments
of Covid-19 in the sewage sparking panic as it
suggests undetected cases are roaming amongst the general
population and very likely heeding Tyler Wright’s call to show up
everyday.
Queensland recorded zero locally acquired cases of coronavirus
on Tuesday but an alert was issued after fragments of the virus
were detected at seven sewage treatment plants in the state and
then a large Invasion Day march took place in Brisbane.
Much testing is being encouraged as the fragments could be from
persons who had already had the disease but could also suggest the
lightly-symptomed are out holding other persons accountable,
dismantling individual, systemic, structural and institutionalized
racism etc.
Yeopersons work, no doubt.
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Shocking amount of native surf sense
growing naturally in Minnesota’s frigid north: “I think it’s
important to be conscious of yourself and your impact on others,
especially if they’ve been surfing these waves longer than you and
you’re a newcomer!”
By Chas Smith
Heaven on earth.
Every year, or some such, the world is
re-treated to almost unbelievable stories of men and women who
surf, surf, in the Great Lakes and do it in winter,
winter, when there is snow on the shore. The genre is
generally forgettable with the same tropes rolled out consistently
(surfing seeming like a summer activity with its participants
festooned in short-pants, winter storms actually required to create
waves, the fact wetsuits exist etc.) and boring except,
except, I just stumbled upon one
from Duluth, Minnesota wherein the featured surfers
possess a shocking amount of native sense and let us meet Big Wave
Dave Rostvold and Joe Herron.
Rostvold is a shaper who works out of Castle Glass Surfboards
and says, “It kind of feels like a fairytale. Surfing is a dream
for a lot of people around the world. To be able to do it here in
the Midwest, that’s a dream come true.”
Poetic, no?
Herron is a photographer who once
saw surfers plying their pastime on Lake Superior and “asked
permission to photograph them” because he knew surfers “are
justifiably protective of their knowledge, especially in the North
Shore’s frigid waters. Good waves are a finite resource, and
mastering simple maneuvers, like popping up into a standing
position, can be deeply humbling.”
Thoughtful, no?
Herron became so enchanted that he began surfing himself though
adds, “It’s funny—I can both see that I’ve improved immensely since
I started, but I’m also still really bad. It’s very tough, it’s
physically demanding, it can be scary, but certain people just
enjoy those kinds of activities.”
Certain people like us, no?
The piece segues into the standard “waves on lakes need high
wind, the sort that is only produced with winter storms” etc. but
flips back around to Rostvold and Herron who basically encourage
beginners not to, point to a kook spot for them to go if they must
and declare, “I think it’s important to be conscious of yourself
and your impact on others, especially if they’ve been surfing these
waves longer than you and you’re a newcomer. You shouldn’t be
putting yourself in a position that could hurt someone else. I
think selflessness should be the first goal, then it’s ‘Can I catch
a wave?'”
Wise, no?
The sort of wisdom that is more and more difficult to find in
our Wavestorm clogged oceans.
Does it make you think lake surfing is the dream come true for
you?
A fine home in Duluth will run you 200k.
Smart money.
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Two-time world surfing champion Tyler
Wright heats up surf fans with Australia Day post critical of
country’s “genocidal history, “institutional racism” and “white
supremacy”!
By Derek Rielly
"No pride in genocide!"
The two-time world champ Tyler Wright has again fired up
against the forces of rabid prejudice in a post denouncing
Australia as genocidal, racist and its annual day of celebration a
symbol of the country’s structural and
institutionalised white supremacy.
For non-Australian readers, and for many Australians too, I
suppose, who might be unaware of the date’s significance, January
26 represents the day in 1788 when eleven prison hulks from England
arrived in Sydney Cove to establish a penal colony.
This penal colony has since become one of the world’s most
stable democracies, free healthcare, school, and so on. A
free-wheeling capitalist society wrapped in the loving arms of a
generous welfare state.
For our indigenous brothers and sisters, the arrival of the
European was a catastrophe, a disaster still unfurling two
centuries later.
Ain’t no secret there.
From Tyler,
Jan 26th is Invasion Day. My fellow white and non indigenous
Australian friends where are you all showing up for Invasion Day
marches? If you can’t make one, how else are you showing up for
First Nations people everyday? Lets show @scottmorrisonmp that
there is No Pride in Genocide, celebrating on jan 26th is ignorant
of our colonial and genocidal history. Unity comes after
accountability and truth telling. Let’s hold each other
accountable. Let’s all do better to dismantle individual, systemic,
structural and institutionalised racism founded in white
supremacy.
Apart from the usual high-profile groupies, rank and file fans
weren’t so convinced.
Good or bad, history is history. I’m proud of our country,
what it stands for and what we’ve been able to achieve. I feel this
post is ridiculous and divisive but being a free country we are all
entitled to our own opinions and we have to right to freely express
our thoughts. Why do we have to apologise for everything? We should
celebrate that there has been good and bad, but through it all, our
country is an amazing place for everybody. I find it difficult to
believe there’s systematic racism, everybody in this country has
the same opportunities and choices and it’s up to you what you want
to make of it. Happy Australia Day everybody.
Ill be celebrating Aussie day on the 26th January like
everyone else should be. Yes I’m ABORIGINAL and I’m over all this
crap about changing the date. History is history, move on and enjoy
life. Cant change the past
Haha aussie black lives matter movement. Maybe it will
completely divide your country like it did mine. Good luck virtue
signaling just like the 🇺🇸
Thanks but no thanks!!! Love this Country for everything and
everyone who is part regardless of Nationality,colour or what ever
else you are!! Was nice following you but catch ya
later!!🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺
Very divisive comment, how about coming together like Warren
Mundine is advocating
One fan asked,
Can you be more specific about the systemic, structural and
institutionalised racism that you see? As you mention
that this was founded in white supremacy, do you think white
supremacy is a problem that still exists in Australia
today? Is there another date that you would suggest for an
Australia Day celebration?
And received this reply,
I think it’s more a focus on outrage, hate, division, blame
and generally telling young indigenous kids that the world is
against them. I’m sure Tyler feels good about the virtue signalling
though……..
You’ll remember, four months ago, when Tyler dropped a knee at
the Tweed Heads Pro for for four hundred and thirty-nine seconds in
solitary with Black Lives Matter, the number representing “one
second for every First Nations person in Australia who has lost
their life in police custody since 1991.”
Tyler correctly raised the issue of black deaths in custody,
something that’s been in the public consciousness in Australia
since a royal commission was called in 1987 after a horror run of
indigenous Australians dying while in police custody.
And, now, “Overall, the rate of Indigenous deaths in custody has
reduced since 1991, as of June 2020 lower than the rate of death of
non-Indigenous people.”
Of 2608 total deaths in police custody between 1979 and 2018,
roughly five hundred of ‘em were indigenous.
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Used to drive down a dirt track with a car
full of mates, punk tapes blaring the soundtracks from surf videos,
timing the hand break yank perfectly to skid to a stop just in
front the wooden barriers in the carpark. Then the mad sprint to be
the first to check the waves.
Surf-lit: “God, when did he stop striding
and start shuffling? He used to run, sprint down this hill to check
the waves. Used to.”
By Dan Dob
A dying man's last surf.
The old man shuffles down the slight
incline.
God, when did he stop striding and start shuffling. He used to
run, sprint down this hill to check the waves.
Used to.
Used to drive down a dirt track with a car full of mates, punk
tapes blaring the soundtracks from surf videos, timing the hand
break yank perfectly to skid to a stop just in front the wooden
barriers in the carpark.
Then the mad sprint to be the first to check the waves.
Conditions in the little cove on the way in gave a fair
indication of what you were in for, but until you set eyes on the
little reef ledge, you could never be totally sure.
Resigned to the slow shuffle of the aged, but the old impulse to
run, to sprint, tickles the back of the cortex. A Pavlovian
response.
Mentally willing, but physically weak.
So the shuffle nearly increases a little in speed.
Still, a slower pace enables one to notice the details that are
often missed with haste. The little circular grove of trees to the
right? A generational meeting place for the area’s traditional
custodians before whitey starting sniffing into the area chasing
red cedar.
The wooden rotunda where he once found a local chef hanging from
the beams early one new year’s morning on the way to a surf
check.
The way the granite pavers laid so long ago don’t quite match
the length of a normal step, making the shuffling even more awkward
now.
The narrow track, fringed by coastal bansksias and low grass,
opening up to the foreshore headland. The headland of a countless
viewings and shit talk, story swaps, and debate on conditions.
He should have got married here, not in the church with the
mealy mouthed old priest who couldn’t even remember his name during
the ceremony.
His place of worship and devotion.
The sickies pulled from work, arguments and pleading and
bartering with the wife to fit in a go-out when he just knew it was
on.
Taking the kids diving the ledge when it was flat, showing them
the best way to get in and out as their confidence and ability grew
to joining him in the line-up too.
Hug the big round rock, and if you come in too wide, don’t try
to paddle against the sweep, you have to go out and come around
again.
Watch the crevice halfway out to the jump spot as you walk up,
it’s covered in water, but it’s there, ready to be fallen in and
twist a knee or ankle.
He stands on the edge of the slight cliff face, in line with the
edge of coastal heath that never seemed to grow any larger, even
after all these years.
This was his line of sight marker for the deepest makable
take-off spot, adjusted five metres either way to allow for south
or east in the swell direction.
Days spent out there just to learn, to become intimate with the
what makes the ledge tick, building the base of understanding that
comes to be called local knowledge.
Days all now past.
His days all now past. Wife passed a year prior.
The big C.
The same evil shit now riddling his body. Considering how much
time he’d spent in the sun, it was always coming.
He surveys the track down the headland. Dirt and winding, but
not that far.
Manageable.
Maybe it’s time for one last go out.
One final session.
Eyes close, a few deep lungfuls of air, for a few moments in his
memories he’s fifteen again.
One last look around at his place on earth.
He starts to shuffle down the headland to the jump rock.
One last go out. One final session.
This is the way and the place he wants to go out.
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Breaking: World Surf League CEO Erik Logan
uses Bernie Sanders’ latest viral moment to highlight own barrel
savvy!
By Chas Smith
Very cool.
How good are selfies posted onto social media
with the intention of getting praise hidden so poorly under a
blanket of awareness-raising, challenge-accepting, meme-propagation
as to be art in and of themselves?
I love the Ice Bucket Challenge and its extremely toned,
shirtless men and women doing their part for amyotrophic lateral
sclerosis, any #TBT carefully selected for hotness though captioned
“OMG, guys, don’t know what I was thinking here…”, influencers at
protests…
… and World Surf League CEO Erik Logan hopping on to Bernie
Sanders’ latest viral moment to, bald-faced, highlight his own
barrel riding savvy (above).
You certainly saw Bernie Sanders at the recent inauguration,
dressed in a Burton jacket, knitted mittens and face mask. The
People couldn’t get enough and he popped up in boats…
…on the moon…
…this guy’s hands…
…and barreled at Surf Ranch courtesy of Logan.
Very cool, funny and topical all at the same time.