Surf Nation

A curfew is the only word a skater will understand. It must be implemented NOW

Astonishing news reaches me, not in my guise as Acting Editor of Cornwall Today, nor in any other of my freelance incarnations, but as a piece of scurrilous gossip, pure and simple.

I hear that over in a village that dare not speak its name, moves are afoot to introduce a curfew at night to stop children marauding the streets.

This has to be good thing. For too long now an unruly collective of five-year-olds on scooters, motorbikes and skateboards has menaced the gated retirement community (GRC) that is KP. They laugh and smile, joke and dance, take drugs and eat adults and why, for what possible good? It is high time they were stopped but rather than the imposition of a curfew - which some pedantic lawyer, somewhere, is bound to reveal as contrary to the law of the land - why don't the chief executives of the GRC build a vast skateboard pipe, lock the children in it and leave them there? Then again, as this footage shows, they might still have FUN.

A Tale of Two Covers

Rather belatedly, given that it'll be off sale in a couple of days, here is the cover of the August issue of Cornwall Today. I'm stoked to say that it seems to have sold out in most places and that the feedback has been great. 

Keep reading! The surfers among you (and this being a surf blog, that might be most of you) may know of the man pictured on the front cover of the September issue, on sale by this weekend. He's none other than longtime Sennen Cove and Gwenver lifeguard, Steve Jamieson, latterly known nationally for the exploits of his loyal lifesaving hound, Bilbo.

Back in the Day

Here's a pic by Russ Pierre from the days when everything seemed possible (as in, er, last year or thereabouts).

Necks, what a pain in the shaky, wonky, weird and sometimes downright spastic left leg they are.

Of airs and no graces

This damn neck of mine gave me a lot of grief last night. Thank God for my stash of heavy-duty painkillers. 

The reason for the recurrence of quite debilitating pain and good old electric shocks in my left hand is, I think, surfing. 

I've got in the water a fair bit lately - maybe five times in 10 or 12 days - but the cumulative effect left me in some discomfort last Thursday, after a session with Harry and his mate Josh Braddock (the lad from Lanzarote who's staying with us). 

On the beach was Aerial Attack, who snapped a few images which show that while Harry and Josh look increasingly airborne, I am heavier of midriff than ever and looking resolutely down the line rather than above and beyond it.

Not that I care. I am stoked to be in the water, just cruising around, though I am worried that the pain and shocks do not augur well. 

Yet again, I wonder: should I pack it all in? What's the point in surfing when the risks are so high? When paralysis might come my way? As I write those words, the answer is obvious. Time, at the very least, to get the docs to give me one last scan and find out once and for all how the titanium cage holding my neck together is looking.