now that i’m pretty devoted to surfing, i tend to read a lot about shark attacks. this isn’t a good idea. i don’t care. when sharks attack people in places where we’ve surfed or when the attacks are particularly awful, i send out articles to the friends i normally surf with. so when we were looking for a name for the beach-with-no-name today, i suggested ’shark pit’ thinking that it if we started calling it that and it spread, it might keep crowds at bay.

the jetty was packed but the shark pit was empty (it’s working already!), so we decided to surf it. as we were walking down to the beach, the water got really dark and choppy and looked, you know, like where sharks would swim. then as we were trying to find a good place to start the day’s surf session, we spotted a giant dead sea lion (the shape of which is remarkably similar to the shape of my board). though it probably died of natural causes, it’s still going to lend credence to the shark pit legend.

about an hour and a half in, we spotted something long and sleek swimming through the water. now i was questioning whether or not ’shark pit’ was tempting fate, but it was just another sea lion looking for his dead buddy. he popped his head up, gave us a quizzical look, and swam away. we didn’t see him again, probably because he became another victim of the shark pit.

you’d think that after eight days of surfing in mexico that i’d be sick of it but i woke up this morning thinking that i’d much rather be surfing in mexico. turns out that dropping out of the normal routine was the best thing i could do for myself. i didn’t find out who won the superbowl until wednesday. i didn’t find out that romney dropped out of the race until sunday. when i set the alarm on my phone each night to wake me up for a sunrise surf session, my phone would remind me of all the meetings that i had missed that day and you know what? eh.

today marks the first day back to a fairly busy life. i can’t say that i ever wanted to be a weekend warrior/dude who needs vacations to get some stress reduction, but i guess that’s sort of how it turned out. also eh.

see you next year, long left break.

see you next year, senor iguana.

on sunday, mattquann and i went up to the strait of juan de fuca (who was greek, apparently) to do some surfing. it was really gorgeous. snow-capped mountains in the background, bald eagles circling overhead. the sea temperature was in the mid-40s and the air temperature was in the mid-30s, below freezing with wind chill.

matt and i both bought some overlayers with hoods to further insulate us. we were in the water for three hours. my core stayed warm, my feet froze. it took three hours after we got out of the water for my feet to feel normal again. i’m pretty sure that got me sick. there are germs everywhere, you just have to make sure that you protect your immune system. i did not. i paid the price. this cold is incredibly bad.

i have to lay low for the next week so that i’m recovered for the nine-day mexico surf trip. according to the surf forecast, the water temperature should be 86. yes, double. i know i haven’t gotten there yet, but i’m telling you now that i might not ever come back.

my new favorite northwet hobby is surfing in the rain. matt, tim, and i took off for westport at a very civilized 10am.

it rained. the whole time. not just in rainy elma, wa.

rained the whole time in westport, wa (our usual surf spot), and the whole time on the ride back.

and while i didn’t notice contact at any point during the day, when i got home there was a very faint scratch right down the center of my nose.

if someone asked me if i was a gear junkie, my first reaction would probably be to say no. but then i’d think about it for maybe one second and then say yes. i don’t want to be a gear junkie, but i tend to do a lot of things that require a lot of gear. and having your own gear is almost always better than renting.

i knew i was going surfing today, so i figured that i could continue to rent a board or i could buy one. of course, i opted to buy. so now i am the proud owner of seven-feet-and-six-inches of kelly-green fiberglass. i rode it today. it seems to glow in the water, it’s fast and it turns well. the pointed nose does make it hard to catch slow, mushy waves though and unfortunately, that’s what today was. still, i am happy with my purchase. the guy in the surfshop said that this is a good board to build my quiver of boards around. and while the four bikes in the living room might indicate otherwise, i think i’m sticking with one board.

tonight i called my brother. he sounded out of it. i asked if he had just woken up from a nap and he replied, “tss! no, motherfucker, i’m watching shark week!”

i get it. for some, it’s the best week of the year. surprised that he’s still so into it since he started surfing.

there’s an easy way to tell dave and i apart — he’s the fat one.

we surfed and camped out in westport this past weekend. surfing is more addictive than anything i’ve done in a long time. more addictive than yoga. only slightly less addictive than very-long-distance running. i bought a wetsuit. soon i’ll have a surfboard, though the lack of space in this apartment is delaying that purchase. hopefully we’ll have a surf rental out there at some point because camping in the rain is less fun than camping in the not rain.

we surfed twice on saturday, once in the morning for a few hours and then again near sunset. i got drilled as much as i got up, but the ratio of ‘up : drilled’ is definitely improving. the rain and the mushy waves stopped us from surfing on sunday morning so we packed it in and came back to seattle.

mia surfed in the morning and then took cool photos in the afternoon.