This cool dude I met through the blog-er-space, Stephen, has this Castles Made of Sand blog that really gets me charged in the morning.
Born in San Diego and living in Dubai, Steven mostly writes about strange places to surf: Yeman; Dubai; Morocco; anywhere in the Med. Anyway, he threw up one from the archives the other day... but this time, it's from Baja, Mexico.
Being a fellow connoisseur of edge-work Baja, I knew exactly where this footage was shot... and when I asked old Stevo, he confirmed.
The Arabs or revolting; organically. It is something new to the Arab world: people demanding their rights, opting not to stay obsequious to the biggest asshole in charge. They have my full support. But like many protests, revolutions, demonstrations, whatever, things get out of hand. It reminds me when the F.B.I was interrogating Saddam Hussein, asking how he felt about the 300,000+ Kurds he killed in the 91 uprising... Saddam, without flinching, said, "Good, of course; they were going against the government."
And so the Sunni ruling minority of Bahrain agrees: All is excused when putting down the savage-brute that goes against The Prince's rule.
I should also say that Surfing the Middle East has been submitted to Apple and it should be in the Apple App Store in a few days. I'm thinking next week... at the latest!
CBS reporter Lara Logan was sexually assaulted trying to cover the chaos in downtown Cairo this week.
Frankly, this makes me sick. I don't even know what to say here... except for the one thing I learned while in the Middle East (and it isn't even really about the Middle East).
Everyone is capable of everything... when put into the right situation. Mothers can kill. Militiamen can love. A bunch of angry Egyptians can gang rape an innocent reporter. Horror. The Horror.
This is the horror of our humanity. And the only way to make this OK is to feel the anger and know that this sort of thing should be feared and stomped out of ourselves like the very hell it is. Loathe it. Hate it. Feel sick by it. Stomp it out of our kind.
I may not have always agreed Lara Logan's point of view, but she hits a home run here on Jon Stewart's show. Best to her and her family.
Just about every Tom, Dick and Harry is making tablets these days. In fact, I took most of the day off and drove from Santa Barbara, CA, to Ventura, CA. It's about a 30 min drive... which is interesting because Barnes and Nobel just closed in Santa Barbara--as did Borders--and the new place to go is down to V-town.
But what the hell? I walked into the place and the first thing they had was a Nook, the Barnes and Nobel tablet. Funny, because if I bought the damn thing I'd never have to drive down there again. Anyway... I played with it, noticed the $250 price tag, agreed with my friend that the technology felt a few years old (compared to my iPad) and stumbled over to the "in dangered species" section of the store--the print magazine rack.
As the author of Surfing the Middle East, the first truly "enhanced media" digital eBook, I am picky about my tablets and how Surfing the Middle East will be read/viewed. If it were to be seen on the Nook, for example, I'd feel like an ass for allowing the quality to suffer from the small tablet size and bogus screen. It just isn't the same product.
And on the subject of high-end tablets, Samsung has given us a sneak peak at their "10.1" tablet. It's still a Galaxy, and a few fancy things have been added. Personally (and again), I really like the clarity of the screen. To me, that's what makes the tablet... along with the battery, 3G network, and ability to believe that they are going to do something about that goddamn screen glare! The Screen!
So I didn't go for an early AM surf this morning... and a friend, who claimed he scored "best shaped waves of the winter" yesterday, writes, via text:
Went for quick get wet sesh at rivermouth. Waist high south perfect neck snappers. Stay away!! Earth under atack by flatness!!! A far cry from Yesterday.
