East Side Surfblog

Danielle blog

If you have just emerged from your annual weeklong stay in your subterranean sweat lodge out in the Southwest desert, you will undoubtedly be happy to learn that we have a major swell on the way. You’d better throw all your charms and talismans in the closet and tighten up your chinstrap.

So far, the models for Hurricane Danielle and her consort, Earl, show them both tracking off the coast into the North Atlantic, which, as a homeowner, suits me just fine. I think Danielle is far enough along in her path to go ahead and breathe a sigh of relief that she’s missed us, but Earl is a little young yet for me to become complacent. Plus, Earl sounds like a Southern name to me, and I hope he don’t come home for a visit.

Putting the homeowner concerns on the shelf for a minute, I can say that the swell forecast is showing the first of the swell dribbling in on Saturday and staying around all of next week, which also suits me just fine.

It does look, however, like there will be a pretty significant wind event going along with this swell. Northeast winds in the 20 mph range for the weekend and blowing pretty good all next week, too. Beach erosion anyone? So be prepared to do a lot of paddling and walking against the wind. The one call that looks to be worth some merit is to scamper up to the Outer Banks. Just for sport, you could watch the north side get battered, but it looks to me like Frisco will be well overhead with that NE wind kind of offshore on the south side because of the bend in the Cape. Better take your Swimmies, ’cause that’s one heck of a paddle out when it’s that size. Plus you can reward yourself with bear claws from the Gingerbread House. Mmmmmmm...

This weekend is also the annual Governor’s Cup Surfing Contest. The preliminary rounds on Saturday should take place in some decent surf and, if my prediction is correct, the finals on Sunday might be held in some kind of epic Victory at Sea gale. At least it won’t be boring. This is the first one that I can remember that will ever be held in something that has the potential to be big.

So if all that chanting and crystal-gazing you did underground last week is responsible for the waves coming, we thank you. Just remember to take that roll of quarters out of your tracksuit before you wash it. They make a heck of a racket in the clothes dryer.

Dune blog

Last weekend sure dumped a lot of rain on us. Enough to have me crouching out in the Tiki bar like the aged Duke Leto Atreides on the water-covered planet Caladan, my mind working to foil the latest Harkonnen plot to disrupt the spice harvest on the desert planet Arrakis.

At least the rain will diminish the chances of Mrs. Blog being devoured by a sandworm during the hazardous desert crossing of what used to be known as my backyard. Now she’s more likely to be carried off to some swampy den by mosquitoes the size of hawks.

Of course, thinking there is any surf here is just about as much science fiction as anyone could read in a book. So being a scientist, and any talk of surf being fiction, I did go paddle out on the longboard and get my shins tubed until the fin dragged in the sand. I rode it, so according to Vinnie’s law of rideability that made it rideable, I guess.

I wish I could give you some hope of something decent for aquatic thrills, but it looks to me as if there isn’t anything on the horizon for the weekend, and the surf forecasting sites don’t show anything interesting until about a week from now. But that’s so far away that anything could change.

You could always hop in the car and make the run up to Hatteras. Frisco looks like it will have something in the waist to stomach range for the next couple of days, and if you don’t have the dough for gas, you can always hitch a ride on a sandworm.

Scared blog

I’d like to thank the P&C for writing the third installment of their annual Scare the Bejeezus Out of the Landlubbers series. The whole hordes-of-hungry-sharks-swirling-about-offshore-waiting-to-tear-chunks-out-of-parts-you-may-need-later was brilliant enough, but when mated with the jillions-of-jellyfish-tentacles-groping-blindly-at-your-writhing-torso-of-agony story, it was enough to render the water at my usual spot entirely free of humans for the whole weekend. Brilliant. I salute them.

At least it was empty for the hour or so I surfed each day. But, now that I think of it, there was also this dude who had to be from Latvia or something, standing in stomach-deep water slapping himself on the back like you see in those movies where they have those Russian baths. But he probably couldn’t read English and was therefore blithely unaware of the dangers below. To be fair, I did see that big blacktip that’s been haunting the lineup for the past couple of months. So I paddled in and stood on the beach for a while to watch the foreign dude get eaten. But it was taking too long, so I got bored and bailed.

Then, just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water, they lobbed out the Portuguese man-of-war story. Now it’s not a jillion tentacles, but just one, and you will be fried like a Sunday chicken. They’re really spoiling me. Especially since the swell models are showing what looks to be a tasty little swell headed our way. Would it be too much to hope that the crowds are too creeped out by the Columbus Crew’s Neptune’s Murderous Minions series to venture out at all?

So, not taking any chances on leaving crowd control up to them, and being your full-service Surfblogger, I feel it’s my duty to warn all the people who get in my way of the unknown peril that awaits them.

So gather ’round and listen up. It’s been swept under the rug by the authorities for years, but did you know that thousands — perhaps hundreds of thousands — of beachgoers have returned from a sojourn at the shore only to find that they now have SAND IN THEIR EARS??

I know, I know, it’s horrible. And the pressures of polite society have kept this hushed-up for generations. But I feel it is my duty to expose the dark, shameful underbelly of the shoreline, because when left untreated, the hapless victims will hear: THE SOUND OF DIGGING — FOREVER.

Plus, the only known cure is to have one of these available at the local hospital.

The repeated treatments can be painful and are not always successful, so your silent screams and uncontrollable twitching while having your tender, precious membranes sucked out of your throbbing skull by a cordless, scented Shop-Vac will have no effect on Nurse Diesel. But at least she will loosen the restraints every 30 minutes so you can get some feeling back into your extremities. SO BE WARNED.

Everyone who has a tendency to stand slack-jawed in the impact zone during the first decent swell in a couple of weeks will be much safer at the mall this weekend. I hear they have all kinds of groovy flicks over at the Cineplex and the popcorn is especially tasty this time of year. And even though the floor might be sticky, NOTHING UNDER YOUR CHAIR THAT YOU CAN’T SEE WANTS TO EAT YOU. And you can eat your gummy bears in the nice air conditioning.