Saturday at Island Beach

[Carl Christensen]

Yep, as per Steve, DC gave up some rides Saturday. John D says Sulpher did too and that there was only one boat on the water meaning little in the way of cross chop. Meanwhile DC had swell going every which way. Yes, the jet skis, wave runners and wake board boats were circling interminably in an exhaust frenzied, asphyxiating manifestation of human whirling disease that has proven so hard to eradicate. At least some of them have sufficient control to give wide berth to those of us without steering wheels and throttles. It seemed like probably one in 10 waves was wind generated, the rest were white-trash-white-caps.

Sailing was good though and after 2 fairly solid hours of riding I was ready to call my itch scratched when the tendon on my base decided to quit suffering through all those tacks and jibes and parted company from its mast foot on the farthest side of Deer Crick leaving me with a collection of windsurfing stuff loosely strung together, not unlike an expensive double concave Tom Sawyer raft, drifting haplessly in the best wind of the day directly towards Charleston. From that side of the lake you have a great view of the little train that billows greasy black smoke into the mountain air as it goes by making everything look like a picture postcard from the old country. Good old Rob Smith sailed by to see me and was kind enough to ask what exactly it was I was doing. I had decided to lie in the water and watch the brave pilots of the Heber Air Show strafe by, burning more fuel in 10 minutes than my minivan does in 4 years of driving to Deer Creek, since at the moment I was fresh out of those little tiny bolts that hold tendons in. And prospects for finding one were slim. Rob generously volunteered to sail back to Island Beach and civilization, (such as it is), to fetch another base that might work (or might not), from his own personal pile-of-stuff. I thought that was mighty friendly of him and watched him glide away as the velocity of my drifting towards Midway increased because now the wind had got even better.

Realizing that as shark bait it would be easy to end up road kill under some drunk’s $50,000 day cruiser or worse yet (and more undignified), their 8 man water wienie, it became increasingly attractive to attempt something, which in this case was to uphaul the now semi detached 9.0 on the Hyper in death chop and at least enjoy the opportunity to go down fighting. Ladies and gentlemen, my advice is to check that little bolt at the bottom of your tendon, and every other little bolt rather than to be put in these situations but it must be said that the valiant though tiny tether line did strain courageously until a semblance of rig uprightness was achieved, thus allowing a slow but decidedly pleasant sail/grind back to the grassy side of the lake, (the side with the bathrooms, anchored wave runners and all the other amenities I had not expected to see up close for quite some time).
Quite decent really, since I wasn’t sliced to ribbons by a stainless steel three bladed prop after all. There was Brett was sailing all over the place with a mermaid figurehead riding the front of his Starboard, (his daughter?), large groups of people getting in touch with nature without their remote controls, and, behold, like a vision, my baby blue 200,000 mile minivan waiting obediently, (the windshield is cracked, it’s real noisy because the driver’s door doesn’t close all the way, and the fan belt has developed a less than endearing squeal but will go 85mph until it overheats). It was like nothing ever happened and I guess it hadn’t. If you get back to the beach in one piece did you really break down in the first place?

[rob smith]

It does indeed take a work of prose to adequately describe all the nuances of dealing with other non-linear variables both human and non, entropy (for the little that i understand) and... even sailing. I figured if Carl were not on a plane or assisting someone else, there must be a good reason. Isn't is amazing how such a small piece of a screw for the tendon can be instrumental in causing the demise of the well oiled machine. Fortunately, this was resolved without much delay by relying on the safety leashes that skirt the tendon. I have had to use this once and as long as the board is protected from the blunt base piece, then you should be okay. I was getting a little concerned as the wind was backing off a bit and My time (in and out of the grassy knoll)may have gotten you a few univited evaluations of the underside or side of the the less caring boats and waverunners.

So, glad you made it in without too much to worry about. It was noted that you returned not less than 15 minutes to re-assay the set up with with pushes coming in at those funny angles and accelerating around the hills. I will in the future check my screws to assure simple break downs risks are reduced. Brett was doing great shuttling the little mignon back and forth on about the same plane as I. Jeff and SO (sorry the name) were also getting in the straps and reinvigorating the soul (thats what it is isn't it). Funny how we can all be in the same area and experience a very different outcome or session.

My professional notes nowadays are short, concise, quite career centric (meaning, it may be difficult to decipher if you don't have a key for all of the acrynyms etc.) and so we occasionally get caught expanding the experience beyond what may be expedient. It is sometimes refreshing to open up our limited writing skills. I had some in college and actually got some good marks on some (i.e. fractal methodology in assessing developmental psycholocy, the ontology of consequentialism and the epistemology of athleticism. I bet if you ran your spell/grammar check on some of your phrases (exhaust frenzied, asphyxiating manifestation of human whirling disease) this may put you over the top of the average paper reader (e.g. the Tribune)

So thanks for letting us muse over trivial but impactual events. who knows, this may be a catalyst for someone else to draw from.

[RickHeninger]

Thems was good writtens!


I rather enjoyed your ARTICLES!

[Carl Christensen]

yeah, and I like your cat.

[RickHeninger]

That cat is just a hairless that was on some website... Close up this pic is pretty funny looking... The thumb doesn't do it any justice... But it's just how I feel somedays! I do have a couple brown tabbys... One that fetches like a dog, but they have hair... Don't ask me why I put the cat up there! Random.