Here’s one of the things I love about living in San Diego: the surf report. Every morning on my drive to work, our local public radio station does news, traffic, a blurb on weather, and the surf report. The laconic voice of Scott Bass comes on for a few minutes to talk about low tide ebbing at 10:15 am, ground swell hitting the best southerly exposed beaches, and waves from one to three feet, “let’s call it knee to waist high,” he’ll say with a sigh. I have trouble imitating it, but he has a quintessentially SoCal surfer accent. Maybe I should try it while I’m in a hammock, one leg hanging out and half a beer in my hand. This past week we’ve had “epic” surf. And sure enough, Scott Bass is not available to do the surf report and why? Gone surfing! For most of last week and the early part of this week, we’ve had to make do with some uptight guy in a suit talking about shore breaks. Now I know that I will only hear Scott Bass complaining about poor surf conditions as I drive to work. If the surf is up, I’ll hear the surf report from Stuffy T. Pants.
I’ve said in this space before that Crocs are a wonderful invention for people who work on their feet. During my bread-baking days I would have to wear my Crocs while standing and watching the dough rise. Shame on me, sez Dame Fashion! Evidently Crocs are out, and stinging criticism is in (well, it will always be popular with Dame Fashion, who is nourished by the confused tears of the frumpy masses). What bugs me about this article is not the reporting but the delight the author gets from rolling his eyes at people who wore Crocs: “People knew they were ugly even as they flocked to buy them; they celebrated, they reveled in their ugliness.” I assume “their ugliness” refers to the Crocs and not the hive-mind sheep that were flocking to buy them. Yes. I’m sure that’s what the author meant. Both my pairs of Crocs are dark green, not the traffic-cone orange that Chef Batali was popularizing. And both are comfortable and indestructible. But alas, I must follow the edicts of Dame Fashion and turn in my Crocs for…what exactly? Will Chinese bound feet be THE thing for fall ’09?
One final note on popular culture. Yesterday in the City of Chino Planning Department Office, they had a window display touting the benefits of a “Staycation”. As Calvin said, some ideas don’t get into the air or even onto the runway, they just explode in the hangar. Let’s just all agree that sitting in your house and not going to work isn’t a vacation, it’s called unemployment.
Writer, architect, father, husband.
Hey now, I've been on staycation since may (ie unemployed) and its all fine and nice until your sugar daddy tells you to "get a job". I think crocs are still cool and who cares!? You are wearing them in your own home! I think we'll have to get you some hypercolor jams to go with them though…
I, for one, have the fluroescent (sp???) pink ones and am proud of it. I usually wear them to locations where I'm certain people will find them most offensive. How are they any different than pinto pony patent leather clogs??