"Don't Stay, Jay."

Only those currently living under rocks are unaware of the hot water entertainment giant has gotten into in Florida. The troubles all began when the Florida’s governor, Ron DeSantis signed house bill 1557, or the Parental Rights in Education bill, into law. Commonly referred to as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill by opponents, the text reads that it is an attempt to “reinforce the fundamental right of parents to make decisions regarding the upbringing and control of their children.” Namely, it prohibits “classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity” in kindergarten through the third grade.

Well, the bill was seen as a rigid slap across the face of the LGBTQ community and protested against in many corners of the nation. Disney, which happens to have many theme parks and hotels near Orlando, was initially silent but after receiving pressure from its employees vowed to help repeal the bill, issuing a statement that read:

“Florida’s HB 1557, also known as the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill, should never have passed and should never have been signed into law. Our goal as a company is for this law to be repealed by the legislature or struck down in the courts, and we remain committed to supporting the national and state organizations working to achieve that.”

Hot hot water. Ron DeSantis, harboring presidential dreams, saw Disney as a soft culture war target and viciously rounded on the company, stripping special tax statuses and threatening to put Mickey Mouse in the stocks for Floridians to pelt with rotting vegetables.

Ouch.

But this drastic turn of events, this corporate thrash, has apparently not dampened our World Surf League’s resolve to publicly oppose legislation it dislikes many, many miles away in Hawaii.

For there, on Oahu, the city of Honolulu’s rulers have just signed a bill that drastically cuts the AirBnb, VBRO business model requiring 90-day minimum stays across much of the island.

Called the “Don’t Stay, Jay” bill by opponents, Honolulu Mayor Rick Blangiardi said at a recent press conference, “We could feel the outcry from our communities across the island on what had gone on with illegal vacation rentals. [This] is to bring back our neighborhoods, where people grow up, where families are raised and not have them be mini-hotels, but be the neighborhoods they were designed to be, a source of great pride for all of us who have raised families here in Oahu.”

While the bill received overwhelming support in the house, passing 8-1, SFGate is reporting, “The World Surf League expressed opposition, arguing that the bill could pose a roadblock on all surf events held by the league in Hawaii.”

Uh oh.

Will Mayor Blangiardi, seeing an easy win, break out the leiomano and thrash CEO Erik Logan upside the head by banning World Surf League permits at Pipeline, Sunset etc.?

Consternation might be felt at the World Surf League’s Santa Monica headquarters if the three remaining employees were not busy polishing champagne flutes for tomorrow night’s premier of Make or Break.

Exciting.

Make or Break.

There was no professional surfing for you yesterday or the day before, for that matter. Today? Only Senior Vice President of Tours, Head of Competition Jessi Miley-Dyer knows for certain, and maybe her stoolies at propagandist organ Surfline, but no worries. Bushes are being planted at, or near, event site Margaret River by top seeds.

Current world number two Kanoa Igarashi was there holding a trowel. World number four Lakey Peterson, too, with small palm in presumably compostable container. Conner Coffin, just below the cut line at 23 and dreaming of the 805, had two small succulents. Very Santa Barbara.

Per the release:

Visitors know and love the Margaret River region – tucked in the rugged south-west corner of Australia – for its incredible coastline, amazing surfing breaks, spectacular granite and limestone cliffs, unique wildflowers and orchids, towering forests, and marine life.

However, increasing use of the coast by the growing number of residents and tourists, together with other threats associated with climate change, are placing significant pressures on the fragile coastal region. That’s why the World Surf League has decided to help put the spotlight on caring for the coastline of this much-loved location on surfing’s elite tour.

Before the Margaret River Pro started, a group of athletes from both the men’s and women’s tour took part in a hands-on coastal conservation activation event. The world’s best surfers were joined by youngsters from the local Cowaramup Bay Boardriders Club, who lent a hand with the dune brushing and planting. They replanted native coastal species and undertook some vital dune brushing, which involves laying down branches across sections of dune to prevent people walking in the area and to protect vegetation whilst it establishes.

Gorgeous but if metaphor, which professional surfers are the branches laid down to prevent people from waking and which are the…

…heck. I don’t even know anymore. A trowel? This performative business ranks far above my new role in life as balletomane.

Maurice Cole?

Help?

"Holding hands and kisses are absolutely necessary every single day."

The great Shaun Tomson, a man who redefined backside tuberiding at Pipeline in 1975 and who won a world title at twenty-two, has revealed his new turn as a marriage celebrant.

Tomson, who is sixty-six, and who once told Tracks magazine he could remember tubes where “I was so in control of my mind and body, that it actually felt as if I were controlling the wave itself”, explained the career switcharoo on linkedin.

A few days ago, I officiated at my first wedding and married Erin and Patch O’ Brien, right on the sandstone reef at the beautiful Windansea Beach.

The bride and groom were radiantly in love, glowing in front of the crashing surf.

This is what I read…

Many years ago, I wrote out a simple Surfer’s Code – a list of values – to inspire young people. The Code was 12 lines long – each line beginning with the words “I will.”

Surfer’s Code was a distillation of everything I had learned from surfing and ultimately was a primary reason that my life moved down my current path of empowering people.

Simple lines of metaphor like I will always paddle back out and I will take the drop with commitment.

Now, hundreds of thousands of people around the world write their own Codes to inspire themselves, their colleagues, and classmates. 

However, the Code is about self – words beginning with I will.

Marriage is about a collective, about we rather than I.

So, with the experience of my 35 years of marriage to my beautiful girl Carla, through happiness and sadness, hope and despair, and most of all deep and profound love, I thought I would create a Marriage Code for Patch and Erin.

M – MUTUAL MISSION We will be on a mutual mission to make each other happy – because happiness is one of the fundamental goals of our life

A – AFFECTION We will be affectionate – holding hands and kisses are absolutely necessary every single day – Physical connectivity keeps us together and sustains and maintains our love

R – RELAX, RENEW AND REFRESH – We will relax, renew, and refresh together and separately – sometimes separate time is needed to make together time even more special

R – ROCKSTAR We will both understand that we are a married to a rockstar and sometimes rockstars have to get their own way so we will let the small stuff slide so we can rock on another day. Some arguments are not worth having, and some battles are not worth waging. Rather just turn up the tunes and rock on with the rockstar.

I – INTELLIGENCE We will understand that no matter how intelligent we think we are, we will only be right 50/% of the time No one likes disagreements – when you dig your feet in, sometimes that ground turns to quicksand that will swallow you whole, giving you a mouthful of mud

A – ACCEPTANCE We will accept each other the way we are because that is who we both fell in love with. Like Billy Joel sings in Just the way you are: Don’t go changing, to try and please me, I could not love you any better, I love you just the way you are

G – GOOD & GOD We will be good to each other and to others too and remember God in our lives and relationship. Goodness and God means faith and hope to sustain today, tomorrow, and always.

E – EMPATHY We will have empathy and be understanding of each other during tough and challenging times – there will be tough times but when one of us, or both of us fall, together we will lift the other up, and rise together.

All very nice, although I do think of the famous quote from Ms Jerry Hall, OG supermodel, married to Mick Jagger and Rupert Murdoch, and one that does pay note to a man’s evil lizard brain.

“My mother said it was simple to keep a man, you must be a maid in the living room, a cook in the kitchen and a whore in the bedroom. I said I’d hire the other two and take care of the bedroom bit,” quipped Hall.