Surf's Up!

The ocean draws people like light draws moths on a sweet, sticky, southern night..  Especially when there is something like THE US OPEN OF SURFING GOING ON.
Yes, that's right.  Today I went to the quarter finals and finals of junior surfing.  These kids were the best of the best. They were SO good. I would have put a video up here but I forgot my camera. ;)
There were so many people at the beach. It was almost like I was actually in the sea, because of the current I was fighting.  There were all kinds there, and most of them were half naked. I'm sorry to put it so bluntly, but it's true.  It seems like the more skin showing, the better around here. A lot of the people I saw had "Free Hugs" written across there midriffs in lipstick or eyeliner.
The air was filled with dust, which from afar looked like a dark cloud of smog, but once I got into it I realized it was only half smog, and the rest was sand-dust kicked up into the air by the ever flowing crowd.
It was better once we got down to the water's edge,  the air was cleaner and the surf washing up onto the sand was nicely refreshing. We got there just as the final heat of the junior women's was wrapping up, and we watched as the two girls fought for the waves.  We stood in the three-foot-area of sand that we claimed as our own for two hours, watching the people ride and dance and play on the waves.
I have to say the coolest event was probably the junior men's long boarding.  You can do so many more cool tricks when you are londg boarding.  There's a lot you can do on short boards, but these guys were dancing back and forth on their boards. There's this trick called "hang ten" which has now also become quite the phrase in Cali, but it's where, when you're riding the wave, you walk all the way out to the front end of your board and hang all ten toes over the edge. And these guys would walk out to the front of their board, shuffle back, and forth, back, and forth.  They looked like they were dancing on the waves.
Eventually, all the standing in the sun and watching the wave-riders caused our stomachs to grumble, so we made our way up the boardwalk to Wahoo's Fish Tacos. THE best taco I've had, in, a long time. Well, The waves are calling.  Have a good night everyone!