Big Dilemma

Here's a serious problem, or at least the potential for one. I would appreciate any advice I can get.

I live in Los Angeles, and I've had NBA league pass in order to help me catch all the Rockets games.

I've also tried to take up surfing. Anyway the days of borrowing a friends extra board are coming to a close. I need to be able to go out more, and have my own board to really improve to the next level of surfing.

I'm going on Monday to possibly get a board. The wife is upset about spending a huge chunk of change(up to $600) while we are saving to buy a house. Today she was talking crazy like if I got the surf board we might have to get rid of NBA league pass to save money. She admits that I should get a surfboard but that I should wait until it gets closer to time to buy the house etc. But this summer I've been going surfing quite a bit, and I have some time off of work now, when I can really get a lot of use out of the new board.

I don't know how many people out there surf at all, but replace surf board with a first set of golf clubs or whatever your hobby is. Now I still have some time, and there may be a way to slowly work on getting both.

But if I'm faced with a choice, I don't know what I'd do. Everytime I think about the surf board, I can't think of facing a whole season without being able to watch all the Rockets games. At the same time when I think of going to Christmas without getting to go surfing except for the occasion when a friend with an extra board is going, I go crazy too.

One hope is that I find a used longboard for a good price, and won't have to make a decision.

Any ideas on what I should do?

 

Who would want to live in a world as dark as that?

 

There is no doubt that I have a sweet life. Sadly that's not my only problem. It's just the one that I most trust my bbs mates to help me solve.

 

I definitely hope to, but it's hard to find one in good condition that also happens to be 9ft. tri-fins, and a 3" thickness. If I find a used one that meets that criteria I will snap it up.

 

Cool, I was reading the surf reports today. I didn't check Florida, but I know they had good waves around SC today.

I've always been average to slightly above average, atheletically. I've been a professional dancer and active, so I didn't think it would be too hard. But it has taken a while to get comfortable. There is a lot to it. I guess it's like learning anything. You can always be getting better, and there is always more to learn. I think it's not so hard to learn to get up the first or second day riding the whitewater.

But when you are ready to start catching the wave and riding the wave from the line-up it's hard. I went surfing three times before I ever caught one real wave from the line up. I would try on several of them but without much success. Then once you learn how to catch the wave, it's much harder to read which way it's going to break than I would have previously thought. Everyone tells me it just takes a lot of time. I can read the direction of the break correctly about 70% of the time now. But most of the time when I catch the wave I may not be at the right angle or able to stand up quickly enough to ride the wave to it's fullest potential.

Paddling is definitely something that I need to improve and is hard to get good at. If you want to practice try swimming a lot without using your legs, in the ocean if possible.

Anyway what they usually don't show you in the surf movies is that you will get clobbered and beat up paddling out to the line-up. There are ways to not get beat up as bad by incoming waves, but you still take a beating. Sometimes you just paddle through while a big powerful wave crashes on you, sometimes with a long board you roll over using the board like a turtle shell to protect you then roll back over when the wave passes and keep paddling. Even that was tiring for my out of shap ass. Then paddling for each wave can be tiring too. But the more you practice the easier it gets and the more you learn how to lessen the effect of the waves crashing on you etc.

All this stuff is for a longboard, which is easier to learn on. Shortboards are slightly different, and harder to paddle. I'm not an expert by any means so try and talk to more experienced surfers too if you get a chance.

Coming from Texas and having most of my ocean experience coming in Galveston, and surrounding beaches, I was in for a real shock when I felt the power of the waves in SoCal. The water is freezing, and the waves are very powerful. Even on so-called 'small' days the water has no problems knocking a person over and putting them through a washing machine like tumble cycle. After a while you can get used to it, and learn to roll with it, but it's a shock after the soft gentleness of the gulf coast.

My neice learned in Florida at a surf camp. I don't know how often you go there but if you get a chance I would definitely test it out and see if you like it. It's really a lot of fun, and I'm as hooked as someone can be right now.

If you ever come out to California anywhere near Los Angeles I'll take my future board out to the beach and let you try on that. The feeling of catching a wave is really something great. The way it sweeps you up and starts speeding you along is amazing.

One of my friends who grew up here told me it's the slowest learning curve of anything he's ever tried. But I have fun at every step along the way, and I'll keep trying until I'm at least decent at it.

Even if I didn't like the surfing I do like the wildlife. I've been closer to wild dolphins than I've ever been in my life. One time a seal came within 10 feet, and was just watching me waiting. It's head was out of the water just staring at me. It was pretty funny, and even though that was one of the days I missed all of the waves I tried for, I enjoyed it.

Sorry for rambling on, but I'm really stoked about surfing and since I don't have a board to go, I guess I think about it a little too much right now.