Making Friends With The Neighbours

A story about surfing and the Mercy family (directed by Samia Goudie ) .

I saw this video over at Surfsister's blog but you can find out more about Erin Ashley and the Worm's town here .

Good things come to those who wait. But the latest Kurungabaa will be going into print very soon, so if you do want to read the latest issue then you better get onto the website and order yourself a copy ...

A song. I wanted to find a clip for The Well, but this is another one of my favourites. The words are lovely. And Paul McNeil made such beautiful images to go with it too. What I love about Bill Callahan is that despite everything, he always finds a way to leave you with everything that you thought you had lost. I think that it's amazing that he can write such beautiful words and make such beautiful music, that manages to tear me apart and then put me back together again.

Rell Sunn shows us how to nose-ride... ...and, let's admit it, generally how to surf.

Recently, at my local break, a young boy got hit in the back the head with a board and ended up with a shattered skull that required the insertion of 5 titanium plates. The offending board and associated carelessness, it is claimed, belonged to a beginner. I wasn't there and have only heard about it in the last few days and it is all over the news and I'm not going to post the picture, but that is about the sum of it and any way you look at it, it's not cool. What it has ignited is a discussion about the nature of increasingly busy and populated surfbreaks and the potential threats they pose. For example, Ben at In Byron Bay Today has been commentating the issue ( here and here ), and over at Real Surf , there is a 12-page-and-growing forum thread debating the topic. People seem to be upset and engaged and have clearly been thinking about many of the issues for some time. While the idea of this discussion makes sense, what is frightening is many of the ideas and methods ...

I read this some months ago now, but have been thinking about it again lately... From an ASP press release from 10th October 2009 Prize money at the ASP World Tour and ASP Women’s World Tour level is set for a substantial increase in 2010. Base prize money for the ASP World Tour events will increase from the current US$340,000 to US$400,000 in 2010, taking the total prize pool on 10 events from $3,400,000 to $4,000,000 per annum. On the ASP Women’s World Tour, total prize pool will increase from US$630,000 to $800,000 in 2010. Along with the increase in event prize purse, an additional US$100,000 bonus will be awarded to the year-end ASP World Champion, as well as an additional US$30,000 bonus to the year-end ASP Women’s World Champion. I realise that there are differences in the numbers of surfers allowed on each tour, but nonetheless, the disparities in the rewards on offer seem overly significant.

A story about home, by Brett Caller ... Every year in my home town Urunga we can expect at least one massive flood. In 2009 we recieved 6 floods in total. Urunga lies at the mouth of both the Bellinger and Kalang rivers and due to the 6 floods the beaches north and south of the mouth are now littered with just about everything from trees, oyster leases, the local river rat boat, Driftwood and washed up cows. Every year a local guy that we call Grogan who is a fellow that I guess you could call a drifter rides his bike along the beaches collecting timber to build his log shacks that the council likes to burn down. This year Grogan located a new million dollar building site and constructed a two bedroom, one bathroom, double lock up car port shack with an olympic size pool out the front. Ha ha its pretty amazing I reckon I could probably live in there.

I love tacky postcards - kangaroos riding bikes, nude people skiing, koalas surfing - so I am always on the lookout for new and amusing treasures to send to friends. I found this one down at my local shop the other day and thought it fit the bill, Wow. Or perhaps more importantly, why? Does it make you want to visit? No, I didn't think so. And yet, the caption on the back says - The waves at Byron Bay are famous among surfing enthusiasts. And this next one one depicts quite a number of the above-mentioned surfing enthusiasts, while failing to actually inspiring much enthusiasm itself...

Yesterday I went surfing with some friends. We were all on mals , including Bruce, who I had only just met. Bruce surfs a lot, but this was the first time he'd ever ridden a longboard ! As we dried off and changed back at our cars, I asked him if he enjoyed it? Yeah! It was fun. It was harder than I thought, but fun. Easy to paddle though. And I like that I was surfing with so many girls! These kinds of conversations still, after so much talking and thinking about it, astound me. Even though I know they shouldn't. Don't you usually surf with any women? No! Never! But it was cool having so many chicks out there. Why? So you can perve ? Yeah, a bit. Haha ! But it was just nice not to only be out there with dudes. It sucks that I usually only get to surf with guys. I've never been unlucky enough to only surf with guys in the water. Being a woman means that if I'm surfing, then there is always going to be a woman in the lineup. I don't know what that means, but app...

For Rose, Randall and Dave... Maybe posting this song will get it out of my head!!

Last week I was out in the water when a guy paddled up and started chatting. He seemed kind of familiar with me, but I had no idea of who he was (which isn't unusual - this kind of thing happens to me quite often actually, because I am terrible at remembering faces). He was friendly though - he was calling me into waves and kept paddling over, and to be honest it was weirding me out until he eventually raised the point I'm assuming he'd been wanting to make since he saw me out there, Remember that guy who was hassling you in the surf here that day? I looked at him. Blank. Then, ohhhhh !! Now I remember! He was mates with that Hero-type character last year. Oh yeah, I reminisced. He was a dick. Well, he got kicked out of our boardriders ! Really! For being a dick and hassling women? Nope. For hassling an old guy. They told him to get lost. Oh well. Maybe it's the hit his ego needed. Nah, he's still hassling people. He's a real nightmare... See! It wasn't j...