Alan M's Got Nothing on Me!!!

You think you've got a kook magnet, Alan? After this weekend, I've got you beat!!

Since the conditions were supposed to be mediocre everywhere, I stayed at the home break. It wasn't worth my while to drive all over L.A. County and part of the O.C. looking for what I could get in my own backyard. What shocked me more than anything else—other than the kook magnet factor—was the number of bodies in the water. I was completely floored. As I've said before, it's not like there are great waves at the home break. It's not Malibu, for Christ's sake! And yet, there they all were. Everywhere you looked there was a body sitting on, or falling off, a surfboard. Today I finally said something about it to one of the bona fide locals. I learned from him that someone somewhere told the media about our spot. Apparently it's been identified as a friendly beach. To be truthful, I don't know how long it will be a friendly place. But I will address that in another blog entry when I revisit the issue of localism.

This was definitely a longboard weekend. I was on the log yesterday and then switched to the Slick today. A log is good at a beach break when it's so small that you don't even see a wave. This weekend you could see tiny little waves that tended to go up and over. That's why the Slick was the call for today.

If Alan M hadn't coined the term "kook magnet" I would have sworn I was being stalked . . . in the water. This guy and his kid followed me everywhere I went yesterday. Wherever I went, there they were. I'd paddle away. Five minutes later, I'd turn around and find them paddling straight to me. I could not shake these two. It was maddening. I'd refrain from paddling for a wave only to watch the dad completely miss it. I didn't know what to make of this guy and his attention. I finally decided to stop worrying about it, thinking it was merely my turn to deal with the kook magnet. Well, wasn't I unhappily surprised today when the guy and the kid paddled right up to me again? Unbelievable! Once again, they followed me all over the lineup. Yes, I was catching waves. Still, I wasn't the only one catching waves. It's not like I was in the only spot that was breaking. There were little bumps in the water (bumps, not real waves) up and down the beach. The guys in the crew were catching waves too. I didn't see him paddling up to them. You think that's bad? It gets worse. The little boy told the dad he wanted to paddle down a way. He'd seen his surf teacher and, for whatever reason, wanted to surf near him. Then the dad said, "Then we'd leave (my real name) out here to catch all the waves." How did he learn my name? I'm guessing he heard other people calling out my name when bumps in the water came in my direction. Nonetheless, it was disconcerting. The crowds and the kook magnet factor lead me to believe this is going to be a long, hot summer in the water.