Empowering!

But have you ever considered what you would be doing if you were not doing what you are doing? Say you’re a teacher but then the district decided it needed to spice things up so enacted a mid-year cut wherein the lowest performing teacher would be fired during the middle of the year. Or a construction artist but, same scenario, spice needed, lowest performing workman cut mid project.What would you fall back on? Shoot for some dream or become extra practical and get a job flipping burgers?

Well, Japanese hunk Kanoa Igarashi, near-ish losing his job as a professional surfer, has telegraphed a possible shift to professional running in a just-released podcast interview with sponsor Red Bull.

You must listen here, but a sampling to get you started.

“You know, it really reminds me of surfing. I love that feeling of taking he first few steps because I know it’s going to be my time: my time to be free, my time to be myself. I can listen to the music that I want to and I can run where I want to, in any direction that I want. It’s empowering.”

Glorious but the question must be asked. When not running, who is dictating what music Igarashi is allowed to listen to, which direction he can go etc.?

Is this a signal for help?

An SOS?

Curse that Erik Logan.

Calling Leonardo Fioravanti.

As far as brand partnerships go, the Apple Watch x World Surf League is perhaps the most entertaining. From its rollout, wherein professional surfers were confused that it did not tell time, to it being criticized by a who’s who for not getting heat information correct, to the Italian who’s who, Leonardo Fioravanti receiving an alleged fine, to Chief of Executives Erik Logan patting himself on the back for its wild success, it has been pure joy.

And in this latest twist, we have dozens of abandoned Apple Watches washing up on North Shore beaches, unclaimed and unloved.

Per local KHON television, the watches are being turned into lifeguards but not being spoken for by their losers. That bit was a mystery to the Honolulu-based station, as the devices are fitted with “find my watch” technology, though I wonder if a forensic analysis was done. That is to say, if the watches were powered on and examined to see if there was a small red or blue dot featuring the word “priority” and/or some mistake with the “situation.”

Hmmmm.

In any case, the Margaret River Pro maybe kicks off in hours and the World Surf League really teased me with an email subject “Bubble Watch: What Does Slater Need at Margaret River?”

Intrigued, I opened. If he wins does he survive the dreaded midseason cut?

If he reaches the quarters?

The body only read “Heading into the final even before the Mid-season Cut*, the 11-time World Champion sits below the cut line and needs a strong result to secure his spot on tour for the rest of the year.”

“Strong result?”

Clickbait, man. The absolute worst.

*Mid-season Cut capitalization all WSL Chief of Interns i.e. Erik Logan.

Day of the living dead.

Strange times etc. The very strangest, in fact, where any semblance of sense has gone right out the window. Florida has declared war on Disney World, Kelly Slater is on the verge of becoming kicked out of professional surfing and I am in New York City on a grand ballet adventure.

A woman, loud and obnoxious, got escorted off the flight before it departed for calling various people “cunt” and not in the way you, friends, use it here. No, she spat it at stewardesses and others who dare turned their necks to see what the commotion was about. She was angry, ostensibly, that her carry-on bag was at the back of the plane and not above her seat. Well, she was spoken to, warned and then on came some deputy and shuffled her right off while she continued to slaver combative words.

Ugly.

Maybe not as ugly, though, as the zombie corpse of Surfer Magazine, recently exhumed, dripping puss and gross, hours ago, exhuming its Instagram account.

You’ll recall when the business was shuttered, some 128 weeks ago, after a post declaring that, for the first time in history, Surfer would endorse a political candidate, who happened to be Joe Biden. At the time, the “bible of the sport” was owned by Donald Trump pal David Pecker and surf watchers assumed that its death was tied to the lightly leftist turn.

It was not, just a simple nasty business move of loading various debt from elsewhere onto the title then killing it dead, where it should have remained if not for a “tech powered” media company with an alleged naughty CEO.

Very quietly the Instagram account has been reanimated with a post of Kelly Slater. That was followed another silly offering which was followed by a third.

Comments are almost non-existent but concern is growing that vulnerable adult learners will become deceived and think the decomposed nonsense is representative.

Unseemly.