ok new country again

Yesterday morning at 6:30am I got out of bed and opened up my laptop. When I normally book a flight, I do it at least the day before, but since I wasn't really sure what I was doing in San Jose and for how long I'd be doing it, buying a flight back to San Diego was something I was putting off. And no, my wife wasn't very happy about me buying a one-way ticket to Costa Rica. I was like "trust me, Holly, this is where my baseball collection is, of course I'm coming back". And here I am. I was pretty tired, this last week has been pretty intense. I bought three $5 dollar beers on the first leg of the trip, then during my 45 minute layover in Houston I managed to down a red wine and two vodka tonics in the President's Club before I rushed to my second flight to SD. Thank god I did that because I was stuck next to the window in a seat that didn't recline, with a huge chick in all pink sitting next to me that wouldn't let me touch that armrest for the life of me. I woke up when the plane hit the ground in San Diego, it was perfect. What is it with these all-pink sweatsuits huh? When the hell did all pink or all light-green sweatsuits become popular. Juicy huh? Whats juicy? I'm freaking confused. You move to Costa Rica for seven years and you come back to juicy pants. All I know is that I'm on expedia right now trying to book a trip back to Tamarindo this weekend. There is a ton of things happening at the surf camp right now, and since I've been gone taking my family to San Diego to have a baby and all, I've been out of the loop on the level that I'm used to. I'm still getting adjusted and it feels weird. One of the best parts of being back was the amount of time I spent in the WRSC gardens. I'm really happy to have that space to play around and learn to build ranchos and to learn so much about different types of plants and trees and what grows best in what conditions etc. I would have laughed ten years ago if you would have said I'd get a green thumb, but it is totally chilling out times a million when you're hanging out in that zen garden. Now that we're opening the Zephyr Eco Project office this week we can highlight the sustainable building projects that we're working on over there. Larry is stoked, living in CR, helping me to open the ZEP office as he's taking it all in. He and Eduardo are the best. I love Eduardo, so mellow, as a project manager he totally gets what I'm saying when I'm all scattered and don't know wtf I'm saying. This weekend was a bit crazy, the three of us spending the day Saturday driving all over San Jose buying everything from pillows and sheets to lawn furniture to beach loungers for WRSC (you guys are so stoked, finally super nice beach loungers and bar service- starts this week). All of that driving around, and then I needed to get some cash but I forgot my bank card who knows where. Anyways, normally you can go into the bank and wait in that horrible Banco Nacional "I'd rather die" line and show them your passport and get things ironed out. My luck wasn't with me in this banco nacional, and three hours wasted in the bank they tell me that they can't give me my money because I have a new passport different from the one I opened the account with. That makes no sense. The only good thing that happened was that Larry and Eduardo had the truck parked outside (we're in the middle of downtown San Jose) and they'd been there for hours just waiting, and Larry is in the back of the truck with the window down and he's on the phone, and as I come back to the truck I sneak up under the window and jump up and scare the shit out of him. He screamed and the guys on the street who saw it happen were laughing. That was the only good thing that happened, being at the bank totally sucked. Heres a couple of pictures from the trip-
The drive to San Jose is great. You have really mellow scenery during a lot of the drive when you cruise over the Tempisque River bridge. Then you get to San Jose and its 100% different.
There is always a time when its good to go to the city. I did live in San Jose for over a month when we were waiting for Otis to be born. When you get used to driving in downtown San Jose you know you've been living in Costa Rica for a while.
I know there are some website bugs still, but we're fixing them and it will all be cool as can be soon enough. If you're getting stuck in the online booking underworld don't worry, you're not alone, it will be fixed and easy to use. It actually works right now if you have the patience to go through it. Also, I'm fixing it so that when someone replies to your posting, you get an email notification. That way we can keep the posts up forever and collect peoples input over time. I am getting the posts to my blogs but figure until this works, I'll just say whats up Kent, I just emailed your ass ten minutes ago. Lets hang out with the groms tomorrow at Balboa Park because every Tuesday is free museum day (not that I'm a cheap bastard or anything). Hola Kelly Webb, so awesome to hear from you. I think that you should bring Cliff down for a trip that would be awesome. I would want it to be for when Holly and the kids were down too, they are planning to come down by the end of March. I'm down in CR over half of the time now that Happy has been born, we're kindof in a holding pattern trying to figure out what this whole having-two-kids business is all about holy crap by the way, 2 kids! Its going great seriously. Hola Joni I'll email you when things slow down for me. Mattea, as far as getting residence, the best person ever to talk to is Adrian Fernandez, my very good friend and lawyer. You can call the surf camp at 888 318 7873 and ask for his email address. Dave Levy is at the surf camp right now, so if you're coming down in the next week to ten days he'll be around and giving a few surf seminars on surfboard shaping and design. pretty cool huh? I'll tell you all the story about the homeless guy giving me a hard time for taking up two parking spots in an empty parking lot tomorrow.

back to see my good friend Best Western Irazu

how many days have I spent locked in a room, pecking away at the keyboard of my laptop to the point where my back and my brain hurt like hell? too many. I do it to myself, really. It is the only time I can truly get things done without being interrupted in one way or another. I don't have a cell phone with me thank God, and only a couple of people know the room number I'm in. The wireless internet is working, then isn't working, then is. Thats actually the only reason why I've even left the hotel room since I got here last night. I'm in San Jose, the capital of this fine country, deep in the matrix trying to make sense of everything. How much money do I have to buy pavers from Nicaragua for the WRSC boardwalk to connect to the parking lot? don't know, let me check Banco Nacional. What? I need to cough up $22,000 for the deposit for new Toyota vans? OK. My brain hurts as I look at restaurant sales and expense figures until I want to throw up california rolls. This is what you get when you take two months off to have kids. I'm still happy I did it, don't get me wrong. Its just that now I'm trying to figure out if I should fly back to San Diego tomorrow afternoon or wait until I've got some more stuff done, but the fact is I have so much shit to get done I don't see an end to it. I'm here signing a ton of paperwork that I guess only I could sign, otherwise I wouldn't have come to San Jose. I'm stoked I did though, I got some time to chill with my good friend and lawyer Adrian Fernandez. It was nice not to drive, just ride and watch the scenery. Costa Rica is amazing, there is no other way to put it. I feel that my roots have sunk in here and regardless of how white this German Irish Serb is, I've now become part Tico. San Jose is pretty normal these days since Otis was born here and I've earned myself a spot on Best Western Irazu's special list. I'm very much looking forward to Moons Over My Hammy tomorrow at Denny's by the way. This week has been pretty good in Tamarindo before I left. I surfed a bunch, there has been plenty of swell (time the trip right ironically...or maybe was just studying the swell models). The time in the gym was definitely worth it, and even though my back/leg sciatic nerve issue is still there a bit and reminding me to resolve it with sin panzas, I was able to go out each day and get some really really fun waves in front of the camp. warm water too.... Jairo the new restaurant/bar manager is cool enough, he'll fit in just fine. As I returned to town I realized that I was still pretty bummed about the way Matt K made his exit from WRSC. As a friend for many years I feel a bit used that I brought him down and showed him how to run that side of the camp, then for him to leave and force me to start over kindof bothers me. I still like the guy and he's my friend, don't get me wrong, I'm only human. Hey, did you read the forum postings about last Saturday's event at the soccer field. I guess everyone else realized that this little town was quickly growing into Hawaii. Check out these pics from www.savetamarindo.com
Thats the surf camp right there next to my shitty yellow arrow I made in photoshop. By the way, I've read the name Seetharaman Narayanan as one of the guys who made adobe photoshop, been reading his name for years as photoshop loads on my computer.
either you know what I mean or you don't. nevermind. Ok, so here's Tamarindo with all of the building projects that are planned, that they are trying to stop:
Can you still see the surf camp? Pretty soon I'll be called the little place down by the beach. Isn't that image just freaking crazy or what? Supposedly the guy who has spearheaded the Save Tamarindo project is a guy from Belgium who has owned a place in town for 12 years. He is now almost done building a 18,000 square foot house on the hill, and someone is planning a high rise in front of him. Isn't there something just a bit hypocritical about building an 18,000 square foot house and then demanding for the city to stop issuing permits for large constructions? Who the hell needs an 18,000 square foot house, anyways? That just goes to show you the mentality I'm faced with daily in this place. At the very least I'll still have that small blue speck with the waves in front of it.

RevJoe hits town

Here I am, in Costa Rica not even 24 hours, and I'm marrying a couple on the beach in front of the surf camp. Its amazing that you can get ordained instantly online. Rose Ministries, www.openordination.org, thank you. You can now call me RevJoe. OK, so let me tell you what it feels like when you return from being away from your large business for two months. It feels great. It feels overwhelming. It is a holy crap feeling that I can't explain. For some reason, now that I've just had my second child I'm feeling it even more. I'm probably just freaking out, I'll get over it. I flew down here on Saturday after spending the end of last week watching Clifford the Big Red Dog, Word World, and Dragon Tales with Otis. It got freezing on Thursday, tons of rain came down which turned into snow in hills of SD which doesn't happen that often. I picked a freezing winter to spend this much time up there, so I was happy to fly to Costa Rica for a weather change. The crazy thing though is that its currently raining here in Tamarindo, something that NEVER happens. The weather down here is normally so predictable. Who knows why? maybe Al Gore does. Last night I had to explain to Tico Hendrix that he couldn't sleep in his tent in front of room 1, that was actually kindof funny. That guy is a total nut. I'm pretty stoked as tomorrow morning I have four guys showing up to help me do a TON of gardening and landscaping on the property adjacent to the hotel. We are building a walkway to connect the public parking lot, Sand Bar, and gardens to the hotel and restaurant/bar. We're sustainably building a massage rancho and a large yoga rancho, and planning some awesome spa services on-site for the VERY near future. I know I've talked about this forever, but now I mean it. Why now? I guess you have to really be interested in something to do it fully, and in the past I've been semi interested in yoga and relaxation services, but now all I can think about is having a dope massage in the WRSC jungle. Also, I surfed yesterday for the first time in a while since my back injury, so I could totally use a yoga class to help me to constantly stretch things out. It is so chill and relaxing back in that jungle, and we'll have it open to the public in less than a week. I started a small nursery/garden there about three years, and now some of the plants have gotten huge, some of them are full blown trees. We started growing some vines at the bases of the large palm trees, and now they've grown 20 feet up! its awesome, soon it will all be cleaned up and open for surf camp guests. I'm still amazed when I go over there, that in the middle of the big, booming town of Tamarindo, there exists a jungle like the one we've grown there. I'm once again sitting on the couch of the SkyBox, so awsome. And James put my big screen in here so between that and the surf, I'm up here a ton. Oh, except to go downstairs to get a sin panza. Not enough to make me puke though, I promise. I hear Lyle playing some tunes downstairs, that guy rocks in a big way, I should cruise back down there and hang out (and get another sin panza). hasta-

Dogs vs. Mailman

Its 11:45pm and the family is sleeping, I'm on the couch half-watching Army Of Darkness. I met up with Muzzy at the Catalina Lounge for a drink tonight, just one because last Saturday I decided to have a boys night out and lost count of my drinks, had to be driven home, puked, the fun stuff like that. It was an old friend from high school having a birthday party. I saw people I hadn't literally seen since high school, which was cool but then lame when I realize the only conversation I had with Greg Smith in the last twelve years was him telling me that he saw me on the Real World on MTV a couple years back. Why couldn't I have been on something a bit cooler like American Gladiators or a cameo on Family Guy. I could be the guy dressed up as the chicken that gets into all of those fights with Peter. Everything seems to have been pushed later on in the evening, after the kids are put to sleep. I find myself going to bed at 1am or later sometimes, and then waking up when Otis gets up. Its hard to get work done during the day, as I want to chill with the family as much as I can before I take off for CR. I was going to go to Costa Rica today, then I was thinking tomorrow, but tomorrow is Valentines Day, and then also a good friend of mine from high school and growing up in Tierrasanta just had his father passed away. Its pretty tragic, he was basically the same age as my dad. It makes me want to spend extra time with my family, constantly I'm trying to remind myself how short life really is. Speaking of life, my dogs almost ate the mailman yesterday. Seriously. Our mailman is like that little Asian guy from Oceans 11, and I kindof half-expected him to do a backflip and get out of it. He had to mace Gus, which didn't really even phase him that much. That really sucked, I'm sure I'm not going to get all of my mail now. What is it between dogs and mailmen? I'm sure it goes back to prehistoric mailmen and prehistoric dogs. My dad thinks the Asian guy from Oceans 11 is the same guy from Law and Order. I haven't seen Law and Order, could someone tell me? By the way, Army Of Darkness is awful you know. I'm at least recording Richard Pryor on my dvr for later. Only in my house is it normal to just have a basketball on the ground that you could slip on, toys strewn through the entire house, my credit cards or even my phone gone missing. And when I get it back Otis has taken photos with the phone. Crazy. I mean look at him, he isn't even two years old yet, he seems all grown up now compared to Happy. Holy shit I'm a dad, when did that happen?

Happy is doing well. Sleeping and crapping and crying and thats just about it. Otis is getting older and has learned that he isn't the youngest child anymore. He is doing really well with it, but since he's just about that age where he learns how to throw fits in public, it kindof sucks when he decides to scream at the top of his lungs while I'm trying to eat my breakfast. Whatever, its still awesome to hang out with the family out at a restaurant or just going to Trader Joe's, its a bunch of little things like that that add up to memories down the road. I'm sure you've noticed that the new WRSC website is up. finally. I'm still debugging it and there are still obviously some things that are going to work, then not work, then finally work, over the next week. Tons of people have already registered on the site which is great, I'm going to be sending out some WRSC stickers and other stuff as I get the time. On Monday I was cruising on this fixed gear bike that my friend Victor made, going around Mission Bay on this ride we do, and on the boardwalk was this chick wearing a Witch's Rock Surf Camp t-shirt.

I had to stop and say whats up and introduce myself. She was super stoked, named Jonie, had just returned from WRSC a week and a half ago. I guess we didn't have space at the hotel so she stayed somewhere else in town but hung out at the camp every day and had a blast. She was raving about Edgar and Marcela, and I was thinking "yeah, you're talking about people I've had working for me for years, really cool people, I can't wait to get back down there and hang", what a trip when you see someone randomly wearing a shirt from your surf camp in Costa Rica. never had that happen? well its weird, let me tell you. Then you realize how cool it is. That reminds me, I need to get online and see whats up with tickets. Maybe the price dropped, because its damn expensive to fly over the next couple days. I'm the guy who never knows what his plans are until the night before, so I'm always buying tickets last minute which is fine except for times like now when I get screwed. oh well, at least I'll be in CR soon, maybe tomorrow, maybe Friday? swell coming this weekend.... water is 25 degrees warmer than here in SD. I'm the pale rider going to the wild west, I can't wait. I could definitely use the sun right about now.

Where I have been

Where have I been? You know where. Having another kid. Tying up loose ends as I get ready to hit the road for a few trips. Not answering my phone or my emails much. Its crazy that I've been sitting in San Diego for this long, going a bit stir crazy and not knowing when the new baby was going to come. Then a week ago today Happy was born. I'm sorry I haven't written more sooner, the effects of a second child on the household was an interesting one (in a good way). Otis has had to get used to the fact that he isn't the little guy any more, which trips me right the hell out as he's only 22 months old as it is. With Happy sleeping the most odd hours you could imagine, Holly recovering from being pregnant twice in three years, and Otis going through this transition, its finally settling in and getting normal. And me? Same as before, just getting back to trying to get this new WRSC website up for how long now?.... I thought I was going to have it up by the end of the day yesterday, but its a lot of work. This weekend it will be done, then you'll see it and see why I've been bitching about it for so long. Its awesome though, you'll like the direction we're going in for sure. I was super stoked to go through our photo archives and begin to post the photos to the new photo gallery. There are pics from WRSC over the years, tons of great waves and smiling faces. It brought back a lot of good memories. I'm so stoked. Its been a lot of work though. After Happy was born I was like "ok gotta get myself back in the game". Fortunately going to work includes flying to Costa Rica. Its been in the 40s here in San Diego and literally killing me. The back injury I'm still recovering from has improved a great deal, and the fact that I've spent 2 hours the last 30 out of 45 days at the gym strength training is preparing me for this year's south swells. 2008 is a big surfing year, didn't you hear? I'm planning my trips now, and between work in Tamarindo and the surf team trips we're planning to Panama and Peru (continuing the documentary), its going to be a lot of travel, working on the road, and surfing big waves. I'm hoping to put together some video for a project we started a few years ago called Witch's Rock Television. now what could that mean?.. you'll see soon enough. Holly and I are planning to bring Otis and Happy back down to CR by the end of next month, going to have Otis' 2 year birthday party at the surf camp. He is ready to surf, or at least he says, so we've been taking him to the pool at the YMCA and teaching him to swim. I took him a couple of days ago. Its so cool now that we have Happy because it has created more time for just Otis and I. I mean, don't get me wrong, hanging with the whole family is great. Its just been that in the past, with just Otis, and with Holly being the professional mom that she is, it was different. Now she needs to hang with Happy and feed him all of the time, and when she isn't she's always tired, so I'm trying to get Otis out of the house so that she can get some rest. Its funny because I see myself doing the same things my dad did with me when I was a little guy. I take Otis to this breakfast restaurant in Mission Valley called the Waffle Spot, just him and I. We eat waffles and color and talk. The place is ghetto but if you grew up in San Diego its an example of a place thats been around forever and a place you'll never have to worry about having to wait or seeing someone you know when you want to just chill out and eat a waffle. Then we cruise up the hill to the Presidio park and run around. It is so cool to work for yourself, spending time with your family when everyone else is working is just another reason. Being able to dictate when you need to work and when you can spend time with your family is awesome. I do turn my cell phone off and sometimes I don't listen to my messages for a week, but thats only because I have shit to do and when I'm not doing my shit, I want to chill with the family. Although....if you' go out in OB these days you might find me sipping down a sin panza at Pac Shores or the Sunshine Factory with Muzzy or Mr. Black. I'm super stoked, its like now my future can unravel again. I'm out of that holding pattern that comes along with not knowing what something is going to be like until it happens. Well, I had another kid, and it went great. He is happy and healthy, so mellow. I'm getting to spend tons of time with Otis and now that I'm getting work under wraps I'll get a few days off with the family and then fly back to Costa Rica to get rolling on some things. Larry finally moved down there this week and we're opening the Zephyr Eco Project headquarters at the surf camp. Its going to be a great way to help educate the community on environmental issues and a platform from which to lobby for positive change in Tamarindo. As I promised, here are some pics of baby Happy with my parents, one day old. That little boy has a full mop of hair, its crazy. He also has very blue eyes like his dad.
Besides having babies and working on building websites, I did manage to go to a concert with my uncle Cory on Wednesday. Cory is basically my brother since we grew up together in the same house. He just got out prison and is celebrating his one year sobriety, and I'm super happy for him. He just got a new job working for the same company my mom retired from and is working in a shipyard. We saw Pinback at House of Blues downtown, it was a pretty good show. They are from San Diego and another example of some of the good music this town turns out.
Since I'm just sitting here in San Diego and not surfing much and planning my return to the surf camp, I started thinking about how sweet it would be to have a beach concert towards the end of March. I'm I'm pretty stoked on Pinback and actually hit up the local radio station here 94.9 to talk to them about co-sponsoring it. The promotions assistant had just returned from a trip in Costa Rica, he spoke with the chief and they want me to send them a proper proposal. I think it would be pretty cool to have a Pinback show at the surf camp, but I'd also like Digital Underground to come down and hang out and play so I could smoke weed with Humpty Hump. That would be as cool as having Bob Saget as your uncle. I stayed up late last night and watched his HBO stand-up comedy special as it was the only thing on. That dude is so lame its not funny. I felt bad for the people who paid tickets to see him. The funniest thing happened to Holly and I today. Holly said she was taking Otis to the McDonald's on Midway near the Sports Arena, since they have an inside playground and with how cold it is she didn't want to have Happy chilling outside at the park. I decide to meet up with them for a coffee to hang with the family. Dude, what a dump that place is. I'm climbing inside of that two story plaything trying to show Otis how to climb up to the slides, and its all wet and smells like pee and is just so freaking nasty. It would be like sending your kids to roll around on the ground inside the OB beach public bathrooms. You think I would have noticed when I saw that you needed tokens to use the bathroom. A few hand sanitizer sessions later its funnier than hell.

Happy baby update

ps there isn't another one coming nine months from now. A little after midnight this morning I sat in the hospital room with my son Happy. What a trip to be holding a three-hour-old baby. We were expecting for Happy to be quite a bit smaller than Otis, but he was born pretty much the same size. 21 inches long, 8 pounds 8 ounces. And HUGE feet. After now having my second child I can see that I've pretty much set myself up for a life of being a parent. Wow. In a good way. But still, whoa. I'll upload more pics soon...