relax, rewind

I recently purchased an old school Nintendo system and a handful of games from the swapmeet. Its not that I didn't like the Wii that Holly gave me, but Nintendo got me confused with someone who wanted to get off of his ass and play video games. I want to get through Piston Honda, Bald Bull and Soda Popinsky and eventually get my chance at Mike Tyson, but I want to do it while sitting on my couch and definitely without having to learn twenty buttons on two different controllers. Sometimes you just want to turn your brain off. or at least I do.

Here is the view out of my kitchen window in OB. I've been living groundhog day this last week. I always disappear when I return to SD to see my family, this time was no exception, except that we're staying on Abbott street. We're back to living in one of the one-bedroom cottages that we rent out (www.theoceanbeachcottages.com) while we pack up our belongings and I move the wife, two kids, dog, and plenty of luggage back to Costa Rica to our house in Avellanas. So for the last week my kids and wife get the bed while I get the couch, which is fine as I'm always the last to go to sleep.
I've spent most of the day today going through a grip of boxes my folks dropped off at my house when I was in Costa Rica. Everything ranging from books I had in middle school through photos from college, old tapes of our band in high school Tripple Nipple, ten year old parking tickets, moldy valentines day candy, a Sega Genisis, old school GameBoy, a f$%king Colieco Vision + Atari video game system with tons of games like Pitfall, Frogger and Qbert - couldn't believe it. I found an actual "Ross the Boss - Perot for President" tshirt, wasn't that 1992? I found photos of Adrea Allan and I at senior prom, she incredibly died a few years ago in a freak skydiving accident (no joke). Tons of college text books and notebooks with the funniest notes ever, just the most ridiculous stuff. Tons of photos, tons of bad haircuts, the best one of my dad looking like Jeremiah Johnson. Going through this stuff that had been packed for so long made me stoked in the way a horrible 80s movie does (like pretty much anything with Steve Guttenberg in it, who is just awful). Its like "holy crap that seems like forever ago", but I'm sure I'll look at photos of myself ten years from now and wonder why I was always wearing basketball shorts. The whole packing stuff for a garage sale got me reminded about when I was living on Cass and Law St and we sold everything we didn't take with us to Costa Rica the first time, this song kindof sums the feeling
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I couldn't be happier with living in Costa Rica again. Its been seven and a half years of living there, pretty important years of our lives too, so living in Costa Rica and working on the surf camp and all, life has just turned into a Central American one. The boys get free spanish lessons, I don't have to make as much money just to spend it on stupid shit anyways. I just want to surf, and whatever is going to allow for that to happen is what I'm going to do. This mantra has gotten me this far, so far so good. Holly says we have nothing in common and all I want to do is surf. In all fairness she's kindof right. Again, it got us this far. Guess we have to decide if she can deal with a pirate. argh pegleg hook for a hand and scuuuuuuuurvy!... I took the liquor store by storm around 11pm and ate two chipwhiches last night. And like 8 beers, maybe more? I chilled with Muzzy, we rode bikes down Newport to Nico's taco shop, he fell asleep on the couch (normally ok, but now its my bed). Its been hot day and night, so chilling on the porch in the evenings, its been pretty chill. Everyone is on the beach here in San Diego. Our other two cottages are packed, people driving from Lake Havasu or Riverside, just wanting to chill on the beach for a few days. I don't blame them, its been awesome. Otis has been able to chill on the porch until around 9pm when he finally goes down. Its super warm, so he chills with me in just a diaper saying Hi and Hola to people cruising by. OB is great, half of the people on bikes want to ride them, the other half have to ride them, its just classic. I've already logged two breakfast burritos from the Pier Cafe and a few sandwhiches from Casanovas on Abbott St.

There has been tons of surf. The OB Jetty was GOING OFF Friday night, I saw some huge barrels but unfortunately not from inside the tube I surfed Law Street in PB yesterday, so I've been kindof MIA. Remember those new shortboards I was selling a couple of weeks ago? They're now "slightly used, only a couple of times, still for sale". I found myself at a keg party after my surf (not really sure how that always happens), Larry McKinney was there. I met Ed, a long-time local of Wilbur/Crystal Drive in north PB, down the street where I used to live at 4920 Crystal.

I need some help. I need a home for my dog Gus. He is a great dog, he just needs more attention than we can give him. With two kids and a crazy schedule, its hard. I took him to Dog Beach this morning for about an hour, he loves chilling out in the ocean. He is a great guard dog and great with kids, we've had him with both Otis and Happy as newborns. He is 85-90 pounds or so, so we're talking about someone with a yard (even though he'll follow you around and not go far anyways). Please let me know if someone can help, we are looking to move next weekend and I'm planning on taking him with us unless the right situation arises. It will break my heart but I'm grown up enough to realize I suck at being a dog owner, Gus deserves better.

Here is my list of things I'm selling, let me know who wants what- 17inch iMac desktop, keyboard/mouse $700 - 2 used WR longboards, $450 each - nice 6'8 WR thruster $400 - very nice 6'5 WR thruster $375 (both next-to-new) - some Ikea desks - Uncle Rico's van - the list goes on. I'm trying to simplify life as much as possible. I will rent you my truck or Holly's Scion, or just take over the payments. I cannot deal with buying more crap. I'm happier living out of a couple of suitcases instead of having a basement full of unopened christmas presents, I do not want all of this crap. In an attempt to rewind back to an earlier time in the surf camp I've decided that I'm going to start guiding surf trips more often. I announced the August 8-17 Costa Rica / Panama tour on Thursday night's newsletter postcard and got a dozen requests for 4 spots within 24 hours. I. I still haven't contacted everyone back yet (John O, Rob Cohen, Ralph Tommy and Dan I will email you shortly). Obviously there aren't enough spaces for everyone, so I can put you on a waiting list for the next trip but the next trips aren't back to CR/Panama due to the swell season. The first trip is a 5 day NW Costa Rica tour in late July. The second trip is a 7 day Peru trip (same wave as with the WR Surf Team, the Terminator and Rolling Stone). This tour has a few interested parties already, can accommodate a few more guests due to it's location in the middle of nowhere, and is planned tentatively for Novemer 8-15. This is the best part of the job, so lets go surf. I hope everyone is getting enough time outside and away from the computer (I have a love/hate thing with mine). If you're in SD come by and say hi, we'll be here for about a week, otherwise you'll find me down south pura - vida - joe
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