The Mini Beard

The Flying Beard is my beachbreak-tuned longboard model.
This Mini Beard its smaller, skinnier, scrappier little brother.

Can I use the word 'skinny' to describe a 6'0 that's 21" wide? You're damn right I can--I made it, so I can use whatever words I want. Here are some more: shred, rip, stab, punch, Claritin, zinfandel, Adventure Time, sriracha.
In a few more words, this is not at all a mushbusting mini-longboard cruiser for fat, high-tide dribblers--it's light and thin and designed for steeper waves with some push.

The Engine Room: the 2+1 with flexie fin provides a center pivot point for a really locked-in, flow-y style, while the quad setup is fast, free, and full of bucking-bronco punch.
I like both.

Black-and-white photos because art.
Also, Easter+two little girls=the inside of my house looking like the inside of a rainbow's bathroom after two-dollar burrito night, so my eyes could use the rest.
If you have to buy stuff, go local.

Of Thanksgiving, Turkeys, and Fresh Foam

Thanksgiving!

For some, the mere name conjures food porn of the highest order: turkey, duck, chicken (sometimes in the same overall package), ham, mashed potatoes, yams, and more pie than you can shake a big, pie-shaking stick at.

For others it's about family, offering thanks for the many blessings we've received during the year, and maybe having a few too many dry reislings before telling your uncle that he could probably better understand the Occupy Movement if he rolled down the windows of his Lexus and took his first deep, un-airconditioned breath of inequality. Oops!

Most of the world doesn't give a shit about Thanksgiving, though, and that's fine with me. Babies continue to be birthed, waves continue to roll toward shorelines, and my 1998 Toyota Siena minivan continues to guzzle coolant like someone I know guzzled dry reisling before having a few fateful words with their newly-estranged uncle. Oops!

And surfboards! Surfboards are dreamed-up, fantasized about, laden with impossible hopes and dreams, belabored, ordered, anticipated, then finally received in a ritual as complex as the holiday itself. The following is a journey of two fresh boards--one for Mike and one for Kelsey--delivered, surfed, and toasted during our recent Thanksgiving pilgrimage to SanO.

1. The reveal: 7'6" quad egg and 9'4" log.

2. The First Wax. Child labor makes the process faster, though much more likely to get wax in places where wax doesn't go, Like on the bottom. Or on fins. Or in finboxes. Tough call.

3. The Kicking-of-the-Tires: gonna be a good noserider! My 2yr old channeling George Greenough's hair.

4. The Hero Shot.

5. The Locating-of-the-Sweet-Spot.

6. The Staying-Out-Until-Near-Dark-and-Trading-Boards-and-Experiencing-General-Euphoria.

The seasonal spirit more than made up for the I5 traffic, though I have to admit the first spirit I hit after twelve hours of driving was a wee bit of the Talisker 10yr--another reason to give thanks.

As Artie from the Larry Sanders said of Talisker 10, "one day you will die and go to heaven. When you enter the pearly gates and meet God for the first time you will say 'hello' and he will say 'hello' back. When he does, this is what you will smell on his breath."

In my dreams God also has a post-sess saltwater nasal drip going, some serious surf hair, and a smile that says my secret spot is snapping, and I'm in a giving mood. That's an idea of heaven I could really get behind.

Thanks for reading, and hope you had a great holiday.