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small but clean

Make that real small... but still clean.
Looked pleasurable out there.
No duckdiving, dry-hair paddle out, no crowds.
A few wedgy micro-wedges on offer.
Glassy.
Clear, smooth, warmish water.
Good day for your beginner friend or girly or whathaveyou.
The kind of day you'll be pining for come 14ft 17sec mid-winter craziness.
No stress. no vibes.

4 hour mega jam again last night. Two drummers, base, guitar. Pushing toward abstraction. Tease the commonplace musical forms while stretching and expanding standards of harmony and taste. Base player laying down the room-filling drones. Drums syncopating back and forth. Rock-steady boom-bit whack-a-thack. Wide open musical space for the guitar. Ethereal openness. Fill it with barely contained rage. Spice. Exuberance. Power. Soar and bend. Fill the gaps where they shouldn't be. Play the other. Discordant cacophony tinged with resolution. Flirt with resolution but don't... yet... let... it happen. Tension building and sculpting and arcing. Flat 5th passing notes. Whine on the major seven while emphasizing the minor 3rd. Strange vibrations and harmonies. THack-a-wah thack-a-wah slap funk the two bottom strings. Drone with the base player build then build on top. Good times...

Then I drove over to an art opening my friends threw at G-bar on California Street in Laurel Heights. Pretty bumpin' party. It looked like a band was set up but it was set break when I walked in. Turned out that I kind-of knew the base player and a few minutes after I walked in the door I heard him talking to the guitar player saying they didn't know where the drummer was. I told them I could play some drums so they said ok. A video projector cast psychedelic images onto the wall and the base player told me to, "watch the images and play beats according to what you see." So we just began improvising and jamming. There were about 50 or 60 people there so it was pretty cool to have that crowd-channeled energy. The only problem was that the drum set wasn't set up properly. The base-drum pedal wasn't attached to the base-drum so the whole contraption kept sliding around. Also the hi-hat was in the process of falling apart. A bit of a comedy of errors but no worries really. The female guitarist had a soft, beautiful voice. It was fun to try to support that voice with some low-key, jazzy beats. ANYWAY.. then the real drummer came back so I got up and just started watching. This one girl had sort-of been trying to make eyes at me since we said hi while ordering drinks at the bar. She was loud and gnarl-looking so I did my best to play it nice and just avoid any further interaction. (plus i already have the best girlfriend of all time!) After playing drums I sat down on this couch right in front of the band. The flirty girl came over and started dancing pretty hard right in front of me. It was weird and made me really uncomfortable and a bit embarrassed. I think she was pretty drunk so it was a bit sloppy and weird. So I got up, said lates to my friends and bailed it.

Sorry for the rant..

surf!!

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received this email from flacksf

We were broken into in Feb. parked at the lots just north of Lincoln. Middle of the day, mid week. Took wallets and cell phones out of our clothes. Used credit cards for gas and bought gift certificates at Macy's for $400. It seemed like he must have been watching us. We reported it in North Beach, were I live. Been surfing beach 7 years first time it has happened to me.

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Sharkbait check this site out

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J Ewing shot of the other OB

me first!

Posted by: msg at August 26, 2005 11:29 AM

My handle! My oh so original handle, stolen! At the least I should be flown to the UK first class as an honorary surf guest. But they forgot "s.s.", which stands for "steam ship" tsk. Thanks, e.

I'm planning for the fall. Maybe there's a way to install a zip line from the roof of this building to the lineup. Just suit up, grab a board, zzzzzzzzzzip over the great highway and splash into the lineup. None of this paddling nonesense. Yeah, that's the ticket.

Posted by: s.s. sharkbait at August 26, 2005 11:34 AM

last winter, from chuck lantz's page---see if he has a shot of you: here.

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 11:35 AM

classic e! those crazy loud girls..

at which ob would you rather be? top for me

Posted by: bagel at August 26, 2005 11:40 AM

It seems sooooo long ago that the paddle out looked like the one above. I don't miss the paddle out but I do miss the waves.

Posted by: Dennis at August 26, 2005 11:40 AM

Oh yeah, I heard Jeremiah Depesa ripped his bicep muscle off the bone in Puerto Escondido. How the hell do you do that? Duckdiving? That's gotta farkin hurt.

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 11:44 AM

this is what i am talking about

Posted by: bagel at August 26, 2005 11:46 AM

Check'd the surf flicks at 111 Minna last night. Got there late, so I missed the first one, damnit. Of those i did catch, i enjoyed the 70s-era single fin riders at OB and other local spots. Great style. Smooth flow. Nice tempo and rhythm to the riding. Graining footage too. Pretty damn neat. Doing more with less.

The last flick seemed really self-congratulatory, which = Boring. The level of athleticism is worthy of praise, but, man, people are way too obsessed with imitating contemporary style, their "crew", and their image. OB does churn out great surfers. I enjoy watching seeing fluid surfers, but I'd like to see a little less self-obsession. Though I guess that's the American way nowadays. And, doing less with more.

Tha' tapestry artwork was pretty cool too. A lot of blood, guts and tears.

Whomever it was that won that Velzy board has got to be crazy happy about that. That board had really nice lines. Beautiful board, looked fun and schweeeeet!!

Posted by: amigoism at August 26, 2005 12:06 PM

e

Finally scored up here yesterday afternoon. It's been a tough summer- the north winds have been non-stop. We got a nice swell combined with some favorable south winds and my fav. winter spot was
firing. Don't usually make the call, but had to. Called two friends- they both blew outta meetings and we nabbed waves for about 3 hours. Very good for the constitution. Also- got to see kus,d, and jackson last week. Good times in nuevo jersey but no waves.

Posted by: heff at August 26, 2005 12:14 PM

look at the surfer closest to the beach in that lantz ob shot -- barely into the whitewater, barely behind someone still standing, and already the head is down ... does that count for charging chargy?

Posted by: loon at August 26, 2005 12:17 PM

I know several 50-somethings who look just like that on such a day...years of neck/back troubles...still charging..

Fun at the 111 last night, only on the early side for me, showed the Biscuit, got to see the cool art, meet some new SF peeps.

Posted by: blakestah at August 26, 2005 12:27 PM

C'mon e! No trim too grim! Rush up!

Crazy skate park OB (that last one). What's gonna happen to the line up when they finish the LM skate park, pressure release or what?

Posted by: Burnt Reynolds at August 26, 2005 12:27 PM

Speaking of Sharkbait, one of the coolest pics I've seen in awhile (from this month's NG)

Doug Perrine

Posted by: Artifact at August 26, 2005 12:48 PM

Holy Crap! That is amazing!

Posted by: Burnt Reynolds at August 26, 2005 12:49 PM

here here


Posted by: bagel at August 26, 2005 12:53 PM

heading to victor's for a carnitas torta.

happy friday everybody

Posted by: eric at August 26, 2005 01:05 PM

Work suffered today because of the live RipCurl contest. Picture:

Posted by: SurfAuburn at August 26, 2005 01:06 PM

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 01:15 PM

That lower shark looks like it's thinking, "Don't bother me, I'm eating".

Posted by: Dennis at August 26, 2005 01:27 PM

Darn! Sorry.

Here is the picture:

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 01:36 PM

Posted by: oof at August 26, 2005 01:41 PM

Today's linuep:

Posted by: Kaiser at August 26, 2005 01:49 PM

HB is not the only Surf City USA... SC tries to also claim the title. IMHO SC should instead copyright the moniker Douchebag/Crackhead or Surfpunk USA.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/08/26/BAG46ED67B1.DTL

Posted by: traut at August 26, 2005 01:54 PM

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 02:03 PM

the shark pic is amazing

Posted by: mexi at August 26, 2005 02:06 PM


Posted by: at August 26, 2005 02:07 PM

"Operation enduring freedom" leaflet

Posted by: Mexi at August 26, 2005 02:10 PM

That shark pic doesn't even look real. It looks like CG.

Posted by: MSG at August 26, 2005 02:14 PM

A couple weeks ago on Discovery, they showed the guys actually diving and taking those pics. The photographers had to place themselves in the middle of the ball of fish and wait for a shark to swim through, clearing the area for the shots. Visibility just before the shark entered, about 1 foot. That takes balls.

Posted by: Dennis at August 26, 2005 02:25 PM

that shark pic....insane....can u imagine what the photog is thinking seeing that?!?!!

i got surf blueballs right now.

Posted by: j at August 26, 2005 02:28 PM

The other thing that was cool, the dolphins were attacking from a few feet below the surface, the sharks attacked from below the fish, and birds were attacking from the air. I guess at Little Big Horn, Custer had the same feeling as those fish in the picture.

Posted by: Dennis at August 26, 2005 02:33 PM

is this diana mattison? cool photo
http://www.pbase.com/chucklantz/image/47771405

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 02:36 PM

Posted by: who cares? at August 26, 2005 02:44 PM

burned off past the coastline...sun at the beach...yahoo!

Posted by: blakestah at August 26, 2005 02:58 PM

Posted by: break out the bikini's! at August 26, 2005 03:01 PM

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 03:03 PM

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 03:05 PM

Bstah why do you always encourage people to flock to the beach? Do you always have to "out" every time something surf/ sun etc. might inspire the masses. Why?

Restraint, this fall and forever... please!

Posted by: Concerned local at August 26, 2005 03:07 PM

Posted by: simple reason at August 26, 2005 03:13 PM

scuse me for having a little happiness at the sun shining at my place for the first time in about 6 weeks. its pretty onshore, fuggetabout surfing, but hey the sun feels pretty nice and bvb see you sunday.

Posted by: blakestah at August 26, 2005 03:20 PM

You're not excused, please be happy to yourself when it comes to current wave, wind and weather info

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 03:23 PM

ya jerks. it was nice out there for my lunch break. suckas, ha ha..but flat, oh so flat, but clean, but flat.

Posted by: bagel at August 26, 2005 03:25 PM

I agree with you concerned local. If you know surf is coming, just shut up and surf, no need to tell everyone too lazy to figure it on their own.

Posted by: another irritated local at August 26, 2005 03:26 PM

yeah, obviously this place is only for complaining how *bad* the surf is...oh and for sharing jubbilie pics

Posted by: cynic at August 26, 2005 03:32 PM

Gotta say I'm spoiled by the sun in the 510. Living out by OB, it's like you've just escaped from the insitution when you get sun. Although I'm not one for encouraging others to go out the same time I do, but being out in the the line-up on a clear morning when you can see the sun rise over the city is one of the coolest things, and you only have a few weeks a year with a legitimate sun-over the hills sunrise. Next coolest thing is being out on a clear evening when you can see the stars, after the lights come up on the Great Highway. A clear september morning has to be a great time to do a roadtrip to the wooded north coast.

Posted by: Andrew in Alameda at August 26, 2005 03:33 PM

Sunshine came softly threw the window today.......

Posted by: 3to5setsof7 at August 26, 2005 03:40 PM

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 03:44 PM

Great album that just got (re?)released:

Posted by: Hb at August 26, 2005 03:48 PM



Posted by: 3to5setsof7 at August 26, 2005 03:53 PM

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 04:06 PM

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 04:09 PM

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 04:24 PM

for those of us who read this at work, please stop posting bare tits!!!

Posted by: flades at August 26, 2005 04:26 PM

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 04:28 PM

stop reading it at work if you don' t like tits.

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 04:52 PM

One of my tight guitar bros in high school had a Flying Vee, sure sounded sweet on the UFO and Scorpion songs. You felt like a rock god with the vee cradled on your thigh doing you best Michael Schenker hammer on's.

Score and keep it quiet. Always pass the dutchie.

Posted by: 3to5setsof7 at August 26, 2005 04:52 PM

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 04:53 PM

Presented for your Friday afternoon reading pleasure, the Niceness e-book club proudly presents William Finnegan's Life Amongst the Swells

Posted by: Andrew in Alameda at August 26, 2005 04:54 PM

buurp

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 05:25 PM

Grabbed the 9'0 and found some lonely lined up micro walls Midish beach with decent shape.

I thought I saw a fin, I swear.
That was not cool.

Posted by: flap at August 26, 2005 05:34 PM

cool finnegan article andrew. thanks for posting.

Posted by: e at August 26, 2005 05:40 PM

There's a headless seal @ VFW

Posted by: Burnt Reynolds at August 26, 2005 06:17 PM

Fuck...bad enough we have to worry about sharks, now the car thief is stealing heads, too. Remember, the best way to deter a thief is to make sure you don't have anything of value in your head.

Posted by: Andrew in Alameda at August 26, 2005 06:28 PM

someone posted a while back that some scientists or other come by and take the heads of washed-up pinnipeds.

Posted by: at August 26, 2005 06:50 PM

yabba dabba doobie!

Posted by: fred flintstoned at August 26, 2005 06:55 PM

Man, the Japanese fucking ROCK! They invented this crazy ass robot that can even stabilize itself on a surfboard.

Check this shit out, mutha fuckahs!

It can do all kinds of shit, like grab a small ball and throw it! I'm gonna teach my robot how to jag me off. Just spread my legs infront of my robot and be like, "Ahhh... that's a good robot."

Posted by: MSG at August 27, 2005 12:34 AM

That robot is so cool. He kind of bobs his head like an old guy when he is climbing those stairs. If they can teach him to cross-step he could have a future in longboarding.

BTW, anybody notice the giant mole on the baseball cap girl in the Dimulle photo? I'm thinking basil cell carcinoma.

Posted by: steve at August 28, 2005 12:54 AM

I was just thinking she had a nice pooper.

Posted by: Mexi at August 28, 2005 07:34 PM
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