Happy Birthday To... Me!

Shark Week Becomes Squalene Chum

We are only a few days away from one of the most loathsome weeks for surfers. A week of nightly TV that most of us salty, nasal drippers do everything to avoid. It happens every summer, that one week where the fun vibe in the lineup gets a bit frosty and sketchy; where freaky thoughts about oversized fish with multiple rows of sharp teeth swim through our collective domes.

It’s Shark Week on Discovery Channel. Oh, how I love this freakin’ week… Read More - Da Bob - YEW

Only Pottz Can Save Pro… Surfing!

Last week the WSL officially announced the death of this year’s 2020 tour and a retooled 2021 list of events... But lets get real, only Martin Potter can save Pro Surfing! Here is a serious question for all you Pro Surfer lovers out there… Since the onset of COVID-19 and the shutdown of the World Surf League’s 2020 Pro Tour… Have you really missed Pro Surfing? Did you miss the sunny opening leg on Australia’s Gold Coast or her cold slabs at Bells or Margaret River? Maybe the itch you were looking to scratch was some live Indo? Or were you looking to gawk at the sandy thongs of Brazil’s Oi Rio Pro!?! I know I miss J-Bay… I miss everything about that cold, sharky, right hand point break! Teahupo’o? Slater’s ranch in Lemoore? No! The European Leg? Da Pipe Masters? Be honest… No You Don’t! Didn’t! Haven’t! Read More - Da Bob - Medium

Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Model Makes Waves At 56 - YEW!

SI has included, amongst its usual bevy of young beauties, the most attractive 56 year old swimsuit model I have ever gazed upon.

by Da Bob for YEW Of course...  I look forward to this annual pageant of beauty ever year. However, the older I get, the crustier I grow, the more uncomfortable and creepy I feel about ogling SI’s annual Swimsuit Edition.  In short, I just don’t feel right about gawking at the assets of Generation Z. Read More - Da Bob - YEW

Chummy Uncle Hobart

My family’s deadly history with sharks goes way back to this photo taken in 1916. That’s my Great Uncle Hobart, whom I sadly never got a chance to meet. My Grandfather claimed that Hobart was the chummiest, best looking waterman of his generation. A turn of the century bronze god, but cursed with a vain vanity and thirst for fame! He tragically died after this photo was taken - as these fossilized jaws accidentally snapped shut, cutting him into two bloody pieces. 

Please show Uncle Hobart some love and visit Rusted Aloha’s store... linked in my bio… Ohhhh Uncle Hobart… You are forever missed. Love, Rusty!

Tanned & Toned… to Chubby Chaser!

In my tanned and toned Twenties, I was lucky to marry to a young, sexy surf goddess… We shared sandy days and salty nights.

Later, in my mature… middle-age years… I met and wed a romantic lady who loved to stroke my balding dome. Now in my sunset and packing a few more ~ chunks in my trunks ~ I am blessed to have wife #3… and even more blessed that she’s a titillating… “Chubby Chaser”!

Old Guys Rule... Through All The Pain & Medication

by Rusty

The crusty crew of surfers I normally paddle out with have had a lot to deal with lately. Many of us salt & peppered degenerates have really taken a physical beating this year. Our collective seasons of surfing have led up to... one slider replacing both knees, another to swap his calcified hip for space-age titanium and just the other day, a newly minted grandfather, to “Cheater-Five” his way to the emergency room with a dislocated hip. All of these high doses of medication and pain has caused me to seriously question one of surfing’s most marketable slogans, “Old Guys Rule!”

Do we really rule? This old guy has witnessed a significant amount of pain and must fully admit that his own personal threshold for such things is, no bueno.

After surveying a few older guys than myself these past weeks, I have discovered one common thread amongst the healthier old guys; that is, no serious, oxidized, slider has ever squeezed into one of those doomed, cotton-blend, t-shirts.

According to one ageless soul surfer - that I, as an aging grasshopper sit at the feet of - there is only one way to deal with this hex... Fire! “My grand kids love to buy me these kookie shirts and I love those little boogers,” he said with joy and pride beaming from his eyes. “I would never purposely break their little hearts, but for my own personal safety and those in the line-up around me, I torch those communist made pieces of cotton on the grill. As a sacrifice to the surf gods!” And for that sage piece of pain avoidance, I say “Amen!”

Lastly, this is for all my surf brothers who are still in traction or slightly induced comas... The hippy, hippy shakes of 1965′s “Beach Girls and the Monster” - video remix by The Copper Tones.

https://twitter.com/RustedAloha

Patiently… Dealing With Life’s Kooks

by Rusty

There is a Zen thing all true surfers seem to tap into at some point during their salty existence. This happens when the impatience of youth surrenders to the power of Mother Nature. When a true surfer recognizes and accepts the swells, tides, waxing & waning moons… This centered place of Zen can only be learned over time; time spent searching for the right position to catch watery ripples of energy, seconds of time spent joyfully sliding, trimming and riding that amazing energy. The more time us flawed humans spend diving into the ocean, the more we discover how small we really are, in this big and crazy world. For the open minded, this all translates into the graceful gift of patience.

So, how come the older I get, the more impatient I grow everywhere else in my life?

I have no patience for my neighbors… Please mow your lawns and take down last year’s Christmas lights!

No patience for all you kooks on my freeway!

No patience for people who walk around while staring at their cellphones!

I have not patience for anything Bluetooth!!!

No patience for my expensive “High-Speed” internet! Freaking load already!

No patience for the gum-chewing blonde pharmacy assistant, who always forgets to refill my life-depending meds!.

No patience for $4.50 Grande Lattes! Hey kid, all I want is a black cup of coffee... To go!

No patience for airport security… How many TSA kooks does it take to waive a magnetic wand around my junk?

No patience for the “New Math” my grandkids don’t understand!

No patience for 909ers who show up at San O’s during a good swell and create a never ending line just to get down the hill… Pick up your trash & go home!

Oh shit… where’s my Xanax? I need to go surfing and get my thumping blood pressure under control.

Aloha Kooks!!!

This is dedicated to all you 909er’s (951, 657, 760…) You know exactly who you are! Surf Punks - My Beach

https://twitter.com/RustedAloha

When did Weed become Kush?

by Rusty

I share this story as a cautionary tale for all of my rusted brethren to heed; and when I say “rusted”, I mean the old school, vintage crew of malcontents that I am honored to still creep, or rather creak, around with. Gentleman, because of some crazy, technical circumstances, I recently discovered that the weed kids are smoking today, is some powerful shit!

As with most stories involving drugs, this all begins very innocently… And as a caveat, to those readers who may not know me personally, I am very fond of Mother Earth’s wacky tobaccy. The truth is, that I have been inhaling since my buddy, Rocco the “Roach”, passed me a joint while sitting in a dank, swampy delta near the Cambodian border… It was only my third day in country and nothing could make that place any better, but it sure helped.

But that was 1968… And this bad trip happen last week, 2016.

Ok, so back to the innocent beginning of this story. My favorite of three wives recently bought me a new sound system. It’s what Barney at Best Buy called a, “A wireless home entertainment system.” I guess my wife got tired of my stereo and classic Hi-Fi speakers taking up half the space in our living room. Even though, I especially felt that the speakers nicely accentuated our shag carpeting and lava lamp, but she disagreed.

This new sound system has basically has two pieces, a speaker bar and sub-woofer, but no freaking wires to connect them. After a few hours of trial and error and a few beers, I finally figured out how to hook-up the speaker bar to our TV, avoiding a serious spousal crisis - She must never, ever miss her telenovelas!

Everything basically stayed the same for the next three weeks… speaker bar hooked up, woofer behind the couch, inoperative and next to a huge box of technical instructions.

That is, until one sunny afternoon, when I cut out of work early to slide a few Boneyard peelers. It was a classic sessh, logging at high tide with a bunch of the old crew. As always a few young interlopers, “Jetty-Rats”, crashed our geezer party; led in particular, by one kid, whom I have watched grow up for many seasons. He is the spawn of a great family that I have known forever. A respectful young man who rips Salt Creek on a shortie and oozes serious style on a log everywhere else.

For whatever reason I shared with him in the line-up my wireless dilemma and he gave me a few pointers to fix it. Then afterwards in the parking lot, while we were packing away our boards in the day’s last light, he offered to fallow me home and fix my technical headache.

We got to my place and Wham-Bam-Thank-You-Mam, the kid hooked up the sub-woofer, adjusted the sound and room settings; even hooked up my old turntable and showed me how to operate everything from my smartphone (now if I could only make the font bigger on that “smart” phone, I’d be stoked!)

The kid got everything working and did it all within ten minutes of walking through my casa’s door, barefoot!

Afterwards, while we were flipping through some of my old vinyl the kid spotted something I normally have tucked away... “Stella”… my favorite of many bongs, like wives, I have collected throughout the years. The kids eye’s were completely transfixed on that smoking apparatus! He reached for it and with the complete reverence of a Kung-Fu Grasshopper asked if he could spark that sucker up! I, being the good influence, I have always been in this young man’s life... Agreed.

Trust me, this is still all very innocent… This kid is actually in his early twenties, a graduate of a local university and works hard as some kind of app coder in the tech industry. I am not subverting some unknowing tween. In fact, it was I, who unknowingly was being introduced to elements by this kid that will forever color my world.

We took Stella out to the back patio and I loaded up the bowl up with my standard herb, buds that I still get from my buddy, Roach (He has been my lifelong friend and weed supplier. Actually, since his retirement, Rocco's product has gotten even smoother. I think much of it has to do with how he intermingles his home-grown weed amongst his award winning roses.)

We both shared a few hits that I really enjoyed, yet the kid seemed disappointed.

“Rusty, I need to bring you into the 21st century dude,” the kid mumble as he got up and walked out to his truck.

He came back to the patio with a zip lock baggy of buds and a what looked like an ID.

“Rusty, this is my Medical Marijuana card,” he slid across the table. “And this is what eases my ‘Anxiety’. Without it, I would have never graduated last year.”

The professional looking sticker on the side of the bag read,  “Cannatonic Granddaddy Purple Kush.”

Well, he opened that baggy and sprinkled just a little bit of it into Stella’s bowl and we began to hit that kush hard! Drawing in smooth, silky purple hits of medical grade marijuana. It was Goodddddd!

Then this old fart hit the Granddaddy wall… or most of that shameful wall crashed down upon me… brick by brick!

I don’t know what really happen, I Can’t Remember!!!

My favorite third wife informed me the next morning that she came home and found the kid and I on the back patio. I apparently was higher than all of the Merry Pranksters who partook in Ken Kesey’s Kool Acid Test. She and the kid carried me into the living room where I proceeded to blast my favorite Barry Manilow album on my new wireless home entertainment system.

The wife nicely got rid of the kid and things only got worse… my clothes came off as Barry began to croon about “Mandy”. She threaten to divorce me, and Stella, as I attempted to reignite it during “Copacabana”, which then caused me to bust into a chorus of “I Can’t Smile Without My Bong.”

My wife clearly had her hands full. She told me that somewhere around Manilow’s tune, “I Write The Songs”, she locked herself in our bedroom, with the bong, and called my previous wives for advice.

I guess the cannatonic portion of the purple kush kicked in as side two of Manilow Greatest Hits scratched the end. I pasted out, face down, nude, on the couch only to be awoken by a kiss on the cheek from my favorite wife. Her affection overwhelmed my aching head. Then she slapped my bare ass and screamed at me, “You are now officially forbidden to ever smoke dope with anyone more than 40 years your junior!”

To which I replied, “Oh, Mandy!”

Aloha.

Barry Manilow - Mandy

The Toyes - Smoke Two Joints