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| 12/17/09 King Neptune must have gotten fed up with me kvetching about no surf on the weekends, because he served up a nice little taste on Sunday. The fog was so thick I couldn’t see anything from the shore, but judging from the number of cars on the street and the number of guys walking to and from the lineup on 25th Street, there had to be something. It’s just that when it’s all cold and cloudy, I have a huge motivation problem. Plus, not being able to see anything makes it worse. Luckily I ran into John M., who was checking it at the same time, and he persuaded me to suit up and paddle out. Had a nice session and was glad to see that I still remember what to do. Thanks, Johnboy. The thing that’s got me going this week is this whole Tiger Woods gig. I’m pretty good at staying in my own little reality and not letting the outside world whiz on my Rice Krispies. I have to keep tabs on all kinds of news to do my job, but I tune out most of the cultural weirdness that will make me hurl, like American Idol, who’s dumped that Jen chick this week or why that Brad dude doesn’t love his kids. But CNN was on the tube in the locker room at the health club today, and some bonehead was telling me that the Tiger Woods scandal was on par with Nixon and O.J. Simpson. Really? Suddenly, my Rice Krispies got soggy. Tiger’s marriage means so much to this dude that he feels like Tiger misused the office of President of the United States or allegedly chopped up a couple of people with a butcher knife? The graphic under the talking head showed that Tiger made like $112 million this year. I think I hear the hounds of hell baying. No wonder Al Qaeda wants to blow us up. I really hadn’t tuned in to the whole Tiger thing because, frankly, I don’t give a rip. The dude’s a golfer. And for me, golf is something you do after you’re dead; or more precisely, while you’re dying, because it has to be boring you to death. I’m sure it’s hard, but c’mon, really, how exciting is it to hit a little ball into a hole? I mean, you can even take as many swipes as you want and nothing bad happens. The whole “I’m trying to beat my personal best” thing. Wow, hairy, dude. To inject a little sense of urgency, they should shoot you with a Taser after every hole you don’t make par. Oh, sure, you have the excitement of driving the cart while drinking, but the sport itself shouldn’t even be called a sport. It’s more like a pastime along the lines of macrame or Paint By Numbers. Or maybe they could make it exciting by turning it into an extreme sport. Tune the golf carts up so they run about 75 mph and have a tournament where there is only one ball, full contact and the object is to be the last driver still conscious. Sort of like a cross between polo, a Roman chariot race and a Road Warrior movie. Suppose Tiger really was a tiger, like that was his pro wrestling costume shtick — dressed like Spartacus but with a Cincinnati Bengals helmet — and we rooted for him because he was one hell of a golf cart driving street fighter. Over the course of a day, the competitors would completely thrash all the bushes and flowers at some tony country club while bashing each other into the dirt with 9-irons. Now I’d call that a sport. Get ’em Tiger. Don’t let that little guy crawl away… Attaboy. But don’t get me wrong: I’m glad all these people play golf. It keeps them out of the lineup. I’m pretty sure Mrs. Blog would be just as pissed at me for playing golf all the time as she is at me for surfing all the time. So I figure all those other guys are burning up their fun-passes over there on the links, and that’s just fine by me. I can paddle out in my own little private Idaho without worrying that a bunch of golfers will be floating around out there with me. The tempest in a teapot over Tiger also reinforces my belief in the superiority of our sport. Look at Kelly Slater. He’s been world champion nine times now, which is a completely unheard-of feat. He just took second in the Eddie last week. And does anybody out there know if the dude is even married or does he have a steady girlfriend or did he cheat on his English exam or kiss his third wife’s uncle’s cousin? And more to the point: Who cares? The guy consistently proves that he can paddle out anywhere in the world under any conditions and completely rip. As commercial as surfing has become, it at least seems like the surfing masses don’t judge professional surfers by their personal lives. Even if the guy was married, I can’t see a sponsor going, “Sorry, dude, CNN says you’re a freak and somebody went all postal on your SUV, so the next time you drop in on perfect Indo bombs you’ll have to do it in these other baggies.” I mean you’d have to go completely O.J. and then build a meth lab in your kitchen or something to lose your surfing sponsors. So I’m happy to be a surfer and glad I don’t have to buy a new brand of tasseled shoes because Tiger let me down. But I guess Kelly’s sponsors, being corporations, too, would cave if a bunch of self-righteous people started going on how moms and dads wouldn’t buy stuff for their kids any more. I do feel better knowing that Tiger could end up another outcast millionaire wearing a sweater vest and living in some cheesy gated community somewhere. And if it happened to Kelly, he would be doomed to spend his millions roaming the tropics in search of perfect turquoise barrels. Of course, now that I think about it, I am pissed, because they’re paying freaks like that to surf all day and I ain’t one of ’em. |
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