Wednesday, February 24, 2016

5-8ft Please?


My wife says I always complain.  "Not enough waves".  "Waves are too small".  "Waves were inconsistent".  "Water is too cold".  Yeah, I complain a lot.  And I have a gripe with El Nino:

Dear El Nino (or boy which ever you choose):

Come on kid, another big fucking swell?  Tell you the truth, I've paddled out in all of your swells this winter, and I've got accustomed to them, but I'm a proletariat surfer, not a pro.  And for every one of your waves that I catch, I get ten of them on the head, thrown to the bottom or I'm yell at your waves  to "Break damn it!!!" But that doesn't help because they somehow always find the top of my head.  I'm almost 40, and my levels of testosterone are pretty leveled out.  All I'm looking for is a fun filled three days here and there.  If I sound defensive, kid, I'm sorry.  But I've sort of had it up to here with all your shitty tantrums.  And half of your big ass swells have been junk anyway.  Sorry to be so harsh, but I have my reasons.  Maybe it's just been a bad week (It's been a really bad fucking week, kid).  Or maybe it's just my lower back which doesn't want to heal, but fuck, can we just get a swell that is 5-8ft?

Sincerely,

B.D.


Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Pusoy Dos and Waves


"Pusoy Dos".  It's a Filipino card game us kids played during family gatherings when all the adults were either praying and saying their Hail Mary's, gossiping about the neighbors (or each other) or Karaoking the night away.  As we grew up, this game grew up with us.  Now days, Filipino and Island kids forgot all about this game and settle for their iphones filled with Mindcraft, Facebook and Instagram to suffice their boredom.  But not us "Manongs".  It's in our blood and D.N.A.

At our south of the border "home away from home", in between surfing, eating Lumpia and Pancit, talking story and surfing, a mad Pusoy Dos game was brewing.  The phrase "Daly City High School" was chanted often and the Two of Diamonds was secretly being held in between all of the pairs, straights and full houses.  The rookies came to play, and by the end of the trip, they were holding their own with us seasoned Manongs.

But when we needed to surf, there were plenty of waves and not much of a crowd.  And being that it is February, the water was warm, warm enough to watch a person at the northern peak surf in board shorts while the Santa Ana Winds blew just enough heat to make it a good eighty degrees with spitting off shore winds.  That surf though, speaking in Pusoy Dos terms, was a Two of Diamonds.

Sequence #1, but no cigar: 



I would love to say it happened, but as them haters call it:  "GoPro or never happened".

Steve aka "Herny Herny":



Herny about to make some poor soul pay for not paddling into the wash.
Herny talked about this kook the entire trip.

Herny going short board.

Herny snatching my wave.  On our first wave of the trip, we shared a good one all the way to the Jetty.

Yours truly fully edited and filtered: 


High on green.
Images can be deceptive.

Twins:


Herny on a cutback.

BD on a cutback.

Extras:


That's defined as a "set".

BD trying to make it happen.
Score.

Relaxed to the max.

Herny going for it.

Even the boogies got their's!
Photo credit goes to my wife.  She eat a lot of free la plancha camarone tacos on this trip.

Final Thoughts:

Last but not least, we learn a lot of cool things on each surf trip, whether its a new spot on the wave to draw a line on or a new placement of our heal to put on the board to make our turns more sharp.  But on this trip I learned the most endearing term, of love and respect:  "Jaat Khali".  Yeah, man.  It's deep.  Thanks Shaffey!