Epic 42-acre “Endless Summer” ranch of surf movie icon Bruce Brown lists for $US4.75 million, “I worked hard from ’58 to ’71… why work if you don’t have to, don’t want to?”

I parked cars myself for many years, starting in south Florida and ending up at the Ritz Carlton Laguna Niguel where I was promoted to graveyard bellman only to be fired for taking acid on one of my shifts and fucking off all my nightly duties to wander around the hotel tripping on all the artwork I’d never bothered to look at before. From there I landed at the Surf and Sand in Laguna Beach where we used to do our best not to get killed running across PCH to our overflow lot to park and fetch cars. But my first valet job in Florida was classic. I worked with my two best friends and we got up to all kinds of mischief. We used to try and outdo each other when we got Ferraris or anything that had any type of HP. We’d go to the backlot and just get nuts. I actually totalled a Benz at the Ritz when my supervisor who I used to smoke weed with in the lot backed out in front of me while I was taking a corner at around 50 mph. My friend Adam, who has owned and been a captain of the Nusantara in the Ments worked w me in Florida and used to steal every single quarter he found in every single car he parked. It’s how he financed his first 3 month foray to Mainland Mex. We all used to steal any weed we found but he was next level. One time an old man got mouthy with him for taking so long to get his car on a really busy night and Adam, always the instigator, told him to shut the fuck up and the guy rushed him. Adam then proceeded to drop kick him using his fledgling MMA skills and knocked the guy out cold. The only thing that saved him and us is that he and his wife had treated the wait staff at the 5 star restaurant they were dining in like shit and when the cops came, a bunch of the staff came out and defended Adam by telling the cops how awfully rude they were. Good times! I actually got picked up by the DEA while working at the Ritz for a Conspiracy to Distribute Marijuana charge while I was parking cars. Me and some idiot friends were flying 100lb packs of shit brick weed from Mex to Florida in big Tumi suitcases way pre 9-11 when airport security was a total joke. We’d sell it at a huge profit in Florida because you can’t grow outdoor shit weed in Florida bc it’s too humid. So there was a huge market for it there with laborers and tradies who just wanted to smoke joints all day on the cheap and not have to pay $60 for an 8th that would be gone in half a day. The feds collected our friend Bill’s (our childhood friend who was such a mysogynist acne riddled full grown man with pubes and talking about banging our moms when we we 12 and being the first w a driver’s license pulling the e-brake going 50 mph on US 1 in Florida in pouring down rain and laughing like a madman as we gyrated through multiple 360s into the grassy median) trash for 6 months posing as garbagemen. He had an incinerator in the back of his house in Oceanside and all of us (except him) would burn all the shake and plastic left over from wrapping 100lb packs of brick weed. Bill, being the lazy dumbass that used to call us and make jerking off noises with his mouth when we were kids and say “I’m banging your mom”, couldn’t be fucked burning his wrap jobs and instead just threw everything in the regular trash, tons of shake, all his handwritten ledgers with financial figures for numerous jobs etc. Turns out the DEA collected 8lbs of shake (loose weed particles for those who might not be familiar with the term) over 6 months of collecting his trash. They came and scooped me up while I was parking cars at the Ritz and it was game over for a bit while I did my time and tried not to punch myself repeatedly for getting involved with the most sure fire bust individual on the planet. Anyway, yeah, I have some valet stories for sure. If I didn’t struggle with brutal depression that only drinking reprieves I could definitely write a pretty entertaining book about it all. Sorry for the novel but you triggered some memories!