Category: Uncategorized

Yes, that little speck in the shot is a surfer.

Half Moon Bay is the home of Mavericks, one of the most grueling big wave rides on the planet. The break is just up the coast from our place, about four miles or so.

Every year, the big wave contest “window” opens up on January 1st, and the 24 surfers who are going to compete go on call. What that means is the contest organizers watch the waves, and swell, and weather patterns, and when everything aligns just so, the contest goes live. At that point, the 24 chosen ones have just 24 hours to get to Half Moon Bay from wherever they are on the planet, get into their wetsuits, and ride the giants.

More on Mavericks here.

Congrats to friend, photog-extraordinaire and dancer Marcy Mendelson, whose ROOT weblog (“a global community for lovers of dance, culture, and music”) is today’s Typepad featured blog of the day. Way to go, Marcy!

photo: Marcy Mendelson

Stowe Boyd: “People are the center of the universe. Not stuff.”

“No resolutions. No promises. No predictions. No expectations.

Goodbye 2006. Hello 2007.”

–David Armano

Well put, friend.

Your results: You are Iron Man
Inventor. Businessman. Genius.


Click here to take the Superhero Personality Test

(Spiderman was a close second.)

Had the opportunity to plow through a bunch of books over the last week (Under the Black Flag, Hiaasen’s Nature Girl, the Baker Report, and am currently working on The Omnivore’s Dilemma – more on that one soon). Of all of them, however, the head-and-shoulders best was Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World. As my friend Philip would say, fannnnn-great.

Take the discovery and translation of The Secret History of the Mongols, which was hidden from civilization for almost 800 years, lay over the top of it fantastic research and storytelling by author and scholar Jack Weatherford, who traveled thousands of miles on horseback to do his research first-hand, sprinkle it with the opening up and exploration of the Mongolian territory that was the Area 51 of the Soviet Empire…ah, great stuff.

From the cultural shifts, to the storytelling, to the strategy that allowed Genghis Khan to fairly rule an entire continent with only a handful of trusted advisors and warriors, a great read, end-to-end. Highly recommended.

I’ve just come back from a long weekend, which was lovely. I didn’t get away anywhere. Instead, I opted to have some time at home to relax and recuperate. I caught up on some TV and watched a couple of movies I’ve been meaning to watch for a while (fortunately, they were available to watch but, had they been blocked for whatever reason, I know I could have gone here and worked around it with a proxy. Whilst I enjoyed it, I think I’ll be making a trip somewhere next time a long weekend comes along. You see, a friend sent me an article that lists things to do in Houston if you’re visiting and I couldn’t help but regret my decision to stay at home. Whether it’s Houston or somewhere else, I’ll definitely be having a few days away next time.

Anyway, after my long weekend I returned to an email box chock-full of stories of travel mayhem, interspersed with brief moments of airlines doing the right thing. I’ll share a few here — both good and bad. Share your stories in the comments.

From Randy Moss, “American Airlines has Bad, Horrible. Terrible, Horrific Customer Service“:

“We sprinted off of the airplane and rode the train to gate C-8 at 5:15 pm Christmas eve when we encountered one of the nastiest, rudest airline employees I have ever met in my many years as a frequent flyer. His name was Lokesh and he declared that our boarding passes were no good since we did not have a ticket. After trying to reason with him he had his assistant Denise slam the boarding door in my wifes face and told us to leave and go talk to someone who cared out in the ticketing area.At that point we met Carolyn who was sweet but not very helpful, and her supervisor whose name tag was as backwards as his ability to be helpful. After hearing that we came in from Colorado he let us know we should be thanking him that we are not in the Denver Airport. It’s attitudes like this that make me wish we could fly on a charter jet. Not only are they quicker, more luxurious but I’m almost certain that their crew is more helpful as well.

At this point I was working up an exit strategy – I to was on the phone with Continental and was getting us re-booked on Delta. Landon was a real help on the phone and got us on the 7:10 pm flight into ATL. There were only 15 or so passengers on the plane and we all got bumped up to 1st class. I can not remember the Delta ticket agents name but she stayed 15 minutes past her shift Christmas eve to help us and really embodies why I fly Delta!”

From Robert Scoble, “Travel Disaster“:

“The lines at Oakland are up to four hours long. I missed my flight and am not yet to the gate. Unbelievable.”

And this one from the news wires, “Frustrated travelers storm airport runway in Brazil“:

“Brazilian travelers responded to chronic delays at one of Sao Paulo’s airports yesterday by storming the runway and blocking a plane from taking off.”

How were your trips?

Have a great few days everybody. See you next week.

“We’ve got multiple signals… uh, front and behind… reading’s off the chart!” – Hudson

Over the weekend I was tagged by both Deb and Jake in a wave of blogtag that’s been going around the web. Fun stuff! Write down five things about yourself that others probably don’t know, and pass it on. So, without further ado…

For Deborah Schultz, who tagged me first:

• I once crashed a car because I was listening to the soundtrack to The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and literally did “a jump to the left” while driving at about 30mph. This had the unfortunate side effect of moving my right foot from the brake to the clutch. Hilarity ensued.
• In 2004-2005, I learned how to spin fire.
• I’ve never lost a game of Whack-a-Mole at Great America.
• Lisa and I and a host of friends built a teardrop trailer this year from scratch. We were pleased with the results.
• I howled with laughter when I read Lamb, by Christopher Moore. The people in my row on the airplane on which I was traveling at the time looked at me, askance.

And for Jake McKee, who tagged me next:

• Hamachi Kama Shioyaki. Yum.
• I was whitewater rafting in Costa Rica and came across a trail of leafcutter ants in the rainforest. The line of ants went out of sight down the trail and into the forest. I learned that putting a thin line of Carmex across their path messes up their whole pheromone thing, big time. They dam up, not unlike a blocked stream, unsure of where to go, until one of their scouts finds a way around the scent-dam and rediscovers their original pheromone path.
• I think El Vez is a genius. Ditto Richard Cheese. And Martin Denny.
• Once in a club in Helsinki, I was told in broken English that I dance “just like Jamiroquai.” I’m still unsure if it was a compliment or not.
• I have fed the tarpon at Robbie’s. The tarpon were large. They frightened me. I had a Rumrunner at the Tiki Bar. I felt better.

Tag! You are it!

Rachel Lyra Hospodar
Paul Greenberg
Liz Henry
David Wallace
Georgia Patrick

Santa goes down the crookedest street in the world. Heh.