TooMuchStuff

vagabondsurf.com
It's about life - not "lifestyle"

TOO MUCH STUFF

There is just too much stuff happening sometimes. Summer is racing in here in the Northern Hemisphere, and so are the Things Which Must Be Done. Sometimes it seems like 90% of what I do is just support for what the website is supposed to be doing. A trip to the beach becomes an immediate battle between good and evil - take a board or take a camera. Surf or shoot. One for the soul and one for the money, someday maybe...

Top off all this with some odd things in the news. First was a tapeworm story that I won't get too deep into, other than to say the tapeworm didn't like the yogurt diet the ill host put him on and decided to leave. Email me if you want more details or search News of the Disgusting.

Then British scientists are publishing a study that says whales were originally land animals which resembled pigs, but had inner ear changes which helped them evolve into "acrobatic swimmers". Specifically it says the semicircular canals in their inner ears are much smaller for their body size than those of other mammals, which seems to be what lets them do what they do now.

So maybe there is some hope for those surfers with expanding waistlines and advanced cases of Surfer's Ear...

The next little thing had to do with some budget statistics for the U.S. Forest Service. It was part of an AP article headlining with "Forest Service Cutting Rangers". The Forest Serveice, according to this article, currently has a budget of $4.92 Billion dollars a year, of which $35.3 Million is earmarked for wilderness (read park) management.

Is it me, or does something seem out of balance with those figures? Figure Tobey McGuire is supposedly going to start getting $20 million dollars per movie based on wearing a Spider-Man costume...soemthing seems horribly screwed up here. Any $20 million dollar a movie actors or actresses want to kick something in to the Forest Service wilderness management budget? Adopt a forest ranger?

The last thing, and the item which has driven me to abandon the phones and tackle landscaping projects, was a Los Angeles Times front page article on how Mexico's FONATUR plans to pepper both coasts of Baja with marinas in hopes of drawing rich U.S. boaters and their holding tanks of ill gotten booty. This topic is too big for this little page, but statistics seem to say their planning and projections are faulty.

According to the article, the Surfrider Foundation is now involved, so maybe you can get more detailed information from them. Among the proposed marina sites with surf applications are the following: Santa Rosalillita, Puerto Canoas, Punta Abreojos, Magdalena Bay, and Scorpion Bay.

Plans like this in California during the 1960's included proposals for Harbors of Refuge in such obvious places like Malibu. Heard about or remember Killer Dana? It's now Dana Harbor. So don't think it can't happen...

Aiyee! Time to hit the beach!

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