Airing out the Inbox

Sophocles once quipped, “The true mark of a man lies in his email activity.” Amen. Modern social anthropologists, like yourselves, long ago forsook sifting through the garbage of humanity in search of answers, choosing instead to focus their lenses of scientific voyeurism onto more digital affairs. Is someone aligning themselves with terrorists? Check their email. Is there one amongst us who shops Amazon with Les Affaires abandon? It’s in the inbox. Do thoughts of adding girth to his flaccid schvantz occupy the lion’s share of your teenager’s time? I wouldn’t recommend it, but a quick AOL search would reveal the answer. You see, only email can fill in the blank spaces on the map our character.
That is why, under the banner of honesty and full disclosure, every third Tuesday I fling open the doors of the HHG inbox from the past few weeks. Onward into the unknown!

Dear HHG,
Is it possible my husband Paul ordered another board from you within the last month? I ask because there’s a blue longboard with double pinlines in the garage that I haven’t seen before. When I ask him about it, he just mumbles and points at our son. He's eight.
Thank you,
Paul’s Wife Who Is Saving Up For The Down Payment On A New House
Dear PWWISUPFTDPOANH,
Under the Shaper’s Disclosure Act of 1999, it is not compulsory for me to answer your query. However, I will say that as of last week, Paul is one step closer to a free sandwich*. Also, when he picked up something the other day (not saying what it was that he slipped into his new 9’6 board bag), he did mention how much he loved you, and how understanding you are. Maybe not in those exact words, but still.
*The HHGSC (HeadHighGlassySandwichClub) offers a free sandwich** from Traverso's, a Santa Rosa tradition for four generations, for customers who reach a certain number of board orders. In order to stave off a run on new orders, I won't give the exact number, though it's between five and seven.
**Sandwich includes one (non-alcoholic) drink, but no chips, as chips are ridiculous.
This may, or may not be your husband's new stick.

Dear HHG,
Is Shakespeare’s Sonnet 73 the best fall-related ode?
Yours in poetry,
Tina from Marina

Hi TfM,
No. It is clear Shakespeare never visited California during this most lovely of seasons when he penned, “when yellow leaves, or none, or few do hang/Upon those boughs which shake against the cold…”
Instead, let me recommend Keats’ To Autumn. At just 24 years old, he nailed it right from the opener: “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness…”
Huzzah!

HHG,
How do you know when you’re getting old?
Fondly,
Humbolt-er Every Day

HED,
Do you make strange noises when you sit down?
Do you ever wish your board were 2” thicker?
Have you ever opted out from a surf session to work in your vegetable garden?
Wait, that might just be me...

Dear HHG,
I’m thinking about relocating—does Sonoma County have good surf?
Sincerely,
California Dreamin’

Dear CD,
No, SoCo does not have good surf. Especially last week.
San Diego does, though!
What we do have is excellent wine. Let me recommend Trentadue’s Old Patch Red (2005). A 2008 Sonoma County Harvest Fair winner in Best of Class, and a steal at Bottle Barn right now for $9.99. The convenient screw top makes it even more appealing as a daily drinker.

And with that, I seal the HHG inbox for another month.
Don’t forget this Thursday’s Surf Movie Night at Santa Rosa’s Toad ‘n The Hole Pub in historic Railroad Square. This month’s feature is going to be solid. Festivities begin around darkish.

Twins

Ever since the first zygote divided into two separate embryos, humans have reserved special places in their rites and mythologies for twins.
The Igbo peoples of Nigeria saw twins as a curse, and would sacrifice them to the forest (as detailed in Chinua Achebe’s excellent novel Things Fall Apart).
The Navajo honor twins as descendants of the twin gods of sun and moon, believing that they will help restore order to the chaos of the world.
Americans like to stick a fake goatee on one of them and call them Evil.
Dr. Spock’s evil twin showed up in 1967, sporting the trademark Evil-Twin Beard.
Cartman's evil twin broke social boundaries, becoming the first elementary school kid with an Evil-Twin Beard to go prime time.
Surfers have our own preoccupacy with twins--twin fins, twin pins, Twinzers, the Hobgoods. Even our own Leslie Anderson isn't immune to their thrall, as evidenced by a pair of longboards that recently left her shop.
Jason's diamond tail log with 3/4" red cedar stringer seems to have shared some embryonic developing time with its twin below, blogged about here:
Both were shaped by hand in Sonoma county with smaller Northcoast waves in mind . Both feature single fin goodness, volan glasswork, and resin art by Leslie.
But what is perhaps most intriguing about twins is how they differ--which one is more popular with the ladies, which one is more fearless in the hockey rink, which one dances with their tongue out.
The differences in the above boards are equally intriguing—the bigass cedar stringer vs. the high density foam one, the diamond tail vs. the rounded pin, the clean shaven vs. the goateed one (one of these is not actually a design feature).
Although some may see one of the above boards as an evil incarnation of the other, I prefer the Navajo interpretation that twins are two parts of the same whole. That they, together, can separate the good from the evil, and order where before existed only chaos.
Or at least score us some waves when it’s head high or under.

Long Board and a Short Sentence

Like most of us, Ted’s aquatic aesthetic mirrors his terrestrial one. In the water, his lines are clean, sparse. His movements always seek the economical. I once saw him track so high on a wave that it seemed reckless, but his fin trail was a thing of beauty—a lazer-straight scratch etched into an impossibly steep wall.
On land, Ted has brought the voicemail board order to a similar artform. His messages are so spare that they, too, flirt with recklessness. How else could you interpret his first voicemail order?
“Ripstick.”
Or this single-syllabic beauty from a few years ago:
“Fish.”
This gem came in last year, wide-open in its interpretational range:
“Quad.”
Sometimes Ted’s voice seems disguised, as if trying to limit the actual breath he's expending.
Thankfully Ted opened up a bit with last week’s message. Compared to the others, it seemed more Tom Robbins than Ernest Hemingway.
“Hi Pro-Log. Styro.”
Still, I had to admire the effort. Beside the abbreviations for 'performance' and 'longboard,' he substituted ‘EPS’ for ‘styro,’ saving himself a syllable.
Nice.

ReSession

Up here in Sonoma County, we think about wine a lot. When asked about the impending recession, a local grower told me not to worry. "When the economy is bad, people want to have a drink," he said. "When the economy is good, people want to have a drink." He was old and wearing the crustiest Wranglers I'd ever seen, so I took his word for it. This was not the first time I'd heard this argument.
Some of us spend a lot of time up here thinking about surfing, and a similar logic can be applied: we surf to heal, to mourn, to express frustration or anger or fear or love or joy, we surf to celebrate, and we surf to feel connected to something greater than ourselves. A lot of people surf because they want to, but most surfers surf because they have to. It is how we make sense, and it can't be slowed by lagging economies, or falling housing markets, or births or deaths or aging bodies.
So, as another recession gathers energy and surges up behind us, it's our responsibility to put our heads down and paddle, drop in, and point it to the shoulder. And, as we paddle back out for more, it's our responsibility to hoot for the next guy or gal dropping in. What else are we going to do?
Of course, the best way to do this would be on some fresh foam, like this sugary little 5'11" diamond tail. New boards pump money into local economies, support American businesses, and rejuvenate life-giving stoke. The American businesses at work here are Ice9 Blanks, which offers, in my opinion, the best foam available today. They're a sugar-based MDI foam (no petroleum), so their carbon footprint is better than traditional polyurethane foams. They're strong and light and snappy and a pleasure to shape. This board will be glassed with Resin Research epoxy resin, eliminating VOCs, and producing a much 'greener' board than is being mass produced at the moment.
Of course, Leslie will do the glassing. Her labor charges are mostly divided up between her lizards, snakes, cats, chickens, dogs, Bob, and carnivorous plants, so you'll be hooking them up, too. Keep it local!
On a less triumphant note, my lovely wife is suffering from a cold right now. This is the sad shopping list tacked to the fridge that greeted me this morning...