Cherry, Cherry

Flawless deep red resin tints are the mark of a skilled laminator.
Leslie Anderson is a skilled laminator.
This shiny slice of candy apple goodness--standing 8'4" long, 22" wide, and sporting a 2+1 fin setup for ultimate summer beachbreak fun--is available for fondling and purchase (not necessarily in that order) from the good folks at Sonoma Coast Surf Shop in downtown Petaluma. Call 707/763-3860 or stop by 9 Fourth Street; Drew and Crew will steer you right.
It even comes with a leash cord.

Up for Grabs

Newly Unattached: Broadsword 2+1.
Measurements: a svelte-yet-curvy 8'5x22x3.
Reason for Breakup: Handsome Steve's employment termination.
Likes: the ocean, long walks on smooth peaks, steep and deep pockets, big stuff, little stuff, and everything inbetween.
Dislikes: waiting in the car on hot days.
Interesting Facts: smells like red cedar, would love nothing more than a good waxjob.
Another casualty of a dispirited economy, Handsome Steve had to surrender his freshly-shaped-yet-unglassed Broadsword this week (don't worry about Steve, a man that undeniably handsome is seldom out of work for long). By stepping forth, you have the opportunity to help a board in trouble AND realize the glassjob of your most pure/prurient desires--clear, solids, stripes, swirls, bubbles, darts...etc.
This is what she looked like when freshly shaped:
If unclaimed, the board goes to the shop with a glassjob of Leslie's imaginings, which will most likely be blue, reflective of her mood since The New Man returned to Alaska until summer.
Speaking of Alaska, if your board was in yesterday's pickup/dropoff cycle, it had the opportunity to experience snow, as evidenced by this picture I took at low speeds Somewhere in Mendocino County:
The white-knuckle driving affair (perhaps brought on by the weather hubris of my last post, and pointed out by Dr. Jay in the comments section) was only overshadowed by this stunning rainbow, shot at high speeds through the window with my camera on manual setting and no possibility of looking through the viewfinder. Nailed it! (sort of).
Bonus Question: if you name the Highway 101 exit closest to this image, you receive a FREE RESIN PINLINE on your next board order. Hint: it's between San Francisco and Crescent City. One entry per surfer, please.

Rastaman Vibrations

Positive.
Tofurkris's new acquisition comes from Northern California, and has rasta resin pinlines by Leslie Anderson. A beachbreak slasher of the Broadsword variety.
My family's new acquisition comes from the pound, and has a killer dogstache. Ben's a fuzzy wolfhound of the toe-licking variety.

California Gothic

K&N sped up from Points South, dropped off a delicious MacMurray Pinot Noir (no relation, though I have indisputable ties to this clan), picked up an 8’ Broadsword in EPS for her, a 6’something Lil’ Pill for him, and loaded them up before the cork was popped or sardines tossed onto a hot grill.
Rumor had them gobbling up south swell peelers in Santa Cruz before heading toward Point Conception, giggling as every surf forecast on the planet pointed to fun, solid surf headed their way.
Their dour expressions are just a quiet consideration of the merits of riding her board as a single fin, 2+1, or quad.

Of MiniLongboards, Minivans, and Mail

Aloha Amigos, the Postal Service may rest on Sundays, but HHG does not. This is why the last Sunday of every month is Full Disclosure Day, where I fling wide the doors to the HHG inbox to allow you, faithful reader, a glimpse into the innerworkings of a machine so complex, so forceful, that Newton's Second and Third Laws barely apply.
I also give you boardporn. Like this 8'0 Broadsword which may or may not be headed to Hawaii in the near future.
Onto the first letter!
Dear HHG,
Last week my boyfriend of six years bought a pair of Crocs, which he now wears all the time. When I asked him where he got such a dumb idea, he cited a blog post where you claimed, “real watermen wear Crocs.” Not cool, brah.
Croc Blocker

Dear Croc Blocker, anyone who disparages Crocs should immediately be strapped to a carseat and forced by a three-year-old girl to listen to "Micheal Row The Boat Ashore" on repeat for, like, ten straight hours. Wait, that's my current life, but still.
The same applies to those ridiculing minivans, midlength surfboards, or sleeping in boardshorts when you don’t ‘have’ to. It is open season, however, on those allowing 'brah' to sneak into their correspendence.
Full board 'honey' tint with a chocolate resin pinline. Delicious.
Onto the next letter!
Dear HHG,
In recent posts, I’ve seen a sprinkling of what looks like a white powder on some of the surfboards on your blog. Is there dust on your lens, or should we be concerned? Mom's already called twice.
Also, you owe me $22 for pizza.
Love, L____.

Dear Big Sis,
That white powder is, in fact, foam dust, which has the interesting distinction of getting everywhere. As I write this, there are foamdust footprints on the living room carpet, there is a fine mist of foam in the laundry room where I shake out my shaping duds, and even, inexplicably, in my undies. The minivan is the worst, as it looks either like a box of powdered donuts exploded into its rich, carpeted 1996 interior, or like it was recently used as a setpiece in a Miami Vice episode.
A $20 dollar check is in the mail. I’m keeping the $2 as recompense for the googlie-eyed stickers you jacked from me in first grade.
Dear HHG,
My buddy just got back from an Alaskan fishing trip, and his freezer is rumored to be packed with over 200lbs of halibut. How can I subtly ask him to share the wealth without getting my ass kicked?
Haliburgular

Haliburgular, if we are thinking of the same dude, it’s no use to ask. There is only action. It’s quite possible that this dude’s family is usually at the park around 11am on Saturdays. It is also quite possible that the unlocked freezer sits patiently, innocently, in a garage whose key code may or may not be 2225. It has also been reported that said bro’s dog can be pacified with beef jerky and a dirty tennis ball.
Remember: you didn’t hear this from me.
Also remember: Fish Taco Tuesdays. I’m coming over.

And with that, I will close tight the inbox until next time.

The Sword Also Rises

Christofuer, a serious devotee of trim and glide, likes to surf our chilly waters without a leash, booties, or concern for his person. And although he is patently opposed to razor blades and eating animals, he is clearly enthused about the idea of quiver expansion.
This 7’11” Broadsword should fit nicely into steep beachbreaky stuff that is ill-suited for traditional logs.
While hashing out ideas for the new stick, we discovered we’d both spent four years feeding our minds (and bodies, thanks to a shared, unrestrained passion for the school's frozen yogurt dispensers) at the same tiny Mid-Atlantic college. It's comforting to know I wasn't the only freshman with a surfboard stuffed into a Central Pennsylvania dorm closet during the Clinton years.
Christofuer catches more waves in an hour than I do in a month. I seriously considered jimmying the bottom contours to slow him down and create more waveriding opportunities for the rest of us.
Tailblock of yellowheart, bloodwood, and balsa. Foiling tailblocks smells a lot better than foiling foam.

Lines Carved in Late Spring

Aloha Amigos, as we all know, spring is a time of change. Up here NOTB, the fierce Gulf of Alaska swells, exhausted from battering our shores, stagger back north to rest and reload. Our surf attention shifts to the south and, as our inland valleys heat up, fog grips our coastline. The winds are ceaseless, tearing in from the sea with the force and aggression of a pissed-off lover. It’s no coincidence the Furies in Roman Mythogy—the three goddesses of vengeance—appeared as a punishing, relentless wind that was born of the ocean. Even William Wordsworth (1770-1850), naturey-ist of Romantic poets, mentions the wind in his Lines Written in Early Spring:
The budding twigs spread out their fan,
To catch the breezy air;
And I must think, do all I can,
That there was pleasure there.
Scholars seem to argue that this line is evidence that, to Wordsworth, nature has the capacity to feel, not just be. It experiences pleasure as it welcomes this most welcome season.
Surfers would probably call bullshit. The last two lines show the speaker forcing himself to understand pleasure, and they follow the word breezy. Clearly, Wordsworth’s spring finds him in a constant state of reminding himself, amidst spring’s furious winds, that the season is indeed lovely, that his allergies will clear up pronto, and it won’t be too long before things turn offshore, the water temp creeps up a few degrees, and glassy barrels abound like so much low-hanging fruit.
A bit much? Perhaps, but Wordsworth did spend a lot of time on the south east coast of England, and there isn’t any evidence to support that he didn’t select a surf-friendly wave-sled from among the planks of a wrecked steamship and shred some coldwater peelers…
Speaking of wavesleds!
8’6 cedar stringered Broadsword for Ft. Bragg George. George is a big guy, and I like shaping boards for big guys—they know what they want, and they can kick my ass. A winning combo that keeps me on my toes.
This is the smaller (8’0), blonder cousin to George’s board. It’s headed to Hawai’i after a brief tour of our chilly waters. Wish I was, too…
There is a family resemblance in the hindquarters.
Hopefully, you're finding wind-protected nooks to practice your craft. Take comfort in knowing that the furies will eventually loose their grip, the sands will turn their collective faces to the sun as they warm, and these winds, too, shall pass.

Ate-Oh

8' Broadsword.
Caramel resin tint and chocolate resin pinline by Leslie Anderson.
2+1 fin setup.
Rounded pintail.
This board sports a logo that's been unemployed for about a decade. For some reason, Fatty had one hanging around her shop and thought it was a match. If you see someone on a board with this brand, you might want to distance yourself. My early clients were, um, spirited. And by that I mean unattractive, drunk, and prone to slothfulness.
They also tended to favor the stinkbug, which should be noted was a personal choice rather than a comment on the design or craftsmanship.

The Evil Eye

Hola amigos, I know it's been a long time since I rapped at ya, but the waters are not always head high and glassy over here at headhighglassy. I've spent much time recently in bed, and not in the good way. The days unravel like a ball of tired, dizzy yarn, punctuated by the occasional visit to the doc, who's getting closer to putting his finger on what exactly ails me, though I wouldn't recommend anyone put their finger on it, as it probably looks like this:
But boards must be dreamed of, then shaped, then glassed, then delivered. It is the wool that spins into yarn, the grain that feeds the sheep, the water that feeds the grain. It is the child who pulls on your pantleg and turns their sweet round face up to yours, the dog that circles at your feet, drops, and licks your ankle just once. I believe I have a fever. Onto the board porn!
This is Janna's new 8-something broadsword ordered for her somethingtieth birthday.
It has lots of fin options and an Evil Eye on the deck, so don't snake this nice lady if you see her shredding the waves of Northern California or Central Mexico.
Could be the fever, but did I mention Leslie reproduced this design IN RESIN?
Janna comes from a long line of waterpeople--Portuguese fishermen, to be exact--and this Evil Eye has protected them from drop-ins, kooks, and angry gods for generations. I'm going to stare it a little longer with the hope my virus will get exercised and head back into the deep and the dark from whence it came. Perhaps it will leave a little chicken soup and turn the heat up a bit on its way out...

Let's do the Numbers

Shaper's Index for February, 2009.
Average number of Tecates handed over to shaper upon pickup of up new board: 24
Average number consumed on the spot by customer, shaper, and shaper’s lovely wife: 5
Number of times in the last five years shaper has been offered a ‘giant bag of weed’ in exchange for a custom-shaped surfboard: 4
Number of times blog author has accepted said offer: 0
Average water temperature in Bodega Bay, California: 52.5
Number of sessions blog author didn’t wear booties at his home break last year: 0
Percent of sessions in which blog author did not wear 5/4 wetsuit last year: 5%
Number of times blog author has vomited due to duck-diving induced ice-cream headache: 1
Number of times blog author has left the water due to crowds in NorCal: 0
Percent of EPS blanks shaped this year: 10
Percent change from last year: -10
Chance that my buddy Gus will drop in on someone during a session: 1:1
Number of times he’s been forcibly removed from the water by a girl for said offense: 1
Ratio of full cutbacks to barrels by my buddy Jason in 10 years of surfing OBSF: 5:4,196
Number of shoulder surgeries my buddy Jason has had in ten years of surfing OBSF: 2
Percent of non-surfing friends that asked me last week if I was going to surf ‘The Maverick’s’: 50
Likelihood my glasser is not wearing her mask today: high
Last date my glasser told me she was feeling "tired": yesterday
Number of times blog author has missed a day of teaching due to irresistible wave forces: 2
Number of students blog author has seen in the water on said days: 2
Percentage of times blog author invoked the (fictional) teacher/student confidentiality agreement, “I won’t tell on you if you don’t tell on me” during said days: 100
Average number of fin boxes on boards shaped this month: 5
Percent change from February, 2009: +50
Ratio of surfed days in February before birth of first child, after birth of first child, and after birth of second child: 15:10:5
Percent this bothers blog author: 0
Chance that a board shaped this week is an 8’ cedar stringered rounded-pintail Broadsword: 1:2
Number of times a passing car has honked at blog author, who realized too late that dangly manparts were exposed while towel-changing: 2
Number of times blog author overheard unsolicited John Steinbeck references in local lineups this year: 2
Number of times blog author was called ‘dude’ in local lineups this year: 0

A Board for all Seasons

As the holidays fade into the rearview and we settle in to some serious winter weather, there are some that refuse to let the gift-giving spirit die.
SF surf enthusiast Sebastian is one such man. His single request after the shaping process: a happy birthday message to his lovely lady to be written on the stringer, then memorialized in fiberglass and resin by the talented hands of Leslie Anderson.
The gift of an 8'2" Broadsword is a romantic one, indeed. With a 4+1 fin setup, round tail, and chocalately cedar stringer (US Blanks has also been in a gift-giving mood with their cedar stringers lately) it's dependable, versatile, and capable of some seriously fun surprises well into the relationship.
It can also handle much of what Northern California can throw at us.
And right now, Northern California is throwing us rain, wind, and rip currents. By proxy it is also throwing me, personally, two very restless girls under the age of three who don't want to spend their entire weekends huddled over crayons, or helping their dad make spaghetti sauce, or watching ten minute clips of Cinderella on Youtube.
They want the impossible gift of sunshine though, right now, they'll be more than happy to settle for another round of hide 'n seek. It's the least I can do.

The Spitfire

On a warm summer’s day in 1940, Adolf Hitler commanded his air force, the Luftwaffe, to bomb the hell out of England.
The United Kingdom, with its trademark gusto, dispatched the Royal Air Force. The Battle of Britain, the first campaign ever fought entirely by aircraft, was officially underway.
The Luftwaffe had firepower, but the British had heart. King George VI and Queen Elizabeth refused to leave Buckingham Palace, inspiring the nation with their pluck. The Germans seemed indomitable with their Messerschmitt Bf 110s (nicknamed the Zerstorer or ‘Destroyer’), a fast twin-engine, long-range aircraft.
But the RAF had a feisty retort: the Spitfire.
Designed with clean lines for speed and elliptical wings for agility, the single-seater Spitfire immediately began kicking ass. It could accelerate faster than the Zerstorer, bank in tighter arcs, and fire more rounds.
The result: the RAF, powered by vigor and the Spitfire, handed the Nazis their first defeat and turned the war around. Not too shabby.
San Francisco shred enthusiast Giles is lucky enough to have a real-live war hero in his family. His stepfather served in the RAF during the Battle of Britain. Wanna know what he flew?
The Spitfire.
He was 19 years old.
Each of the color marking on a Spitfire conveys meaning--the yellow rail bands and black-and-white stripes communicated their allied association, while the British flag was represented by the red and blue circle (interesting fact: RAF and American fighter planes during WWII ditched the red part of the circle, as they could be mistaken for Japanese aircraft). The pilots put red tape over their guns to keep them from freezing, as seen in the pigment 'patches' in the nose of Giles' board.
Every color on this board is pigmented resin.
A mistress of understatement, when Leslie saw a drawing of the task before her, said only, "I'll need to order more tape."

The Writes of Spring

Ah, Spring!
What's there to say about this season that hasn't already been expressed by creative types going back a few thousand years?
The wealth of spring poems out there--the odes, the sonnets, the frantic pleas to virgins--tend to be of a similar ilk. You've got your daisies pied and violets blue (Shakespeare), your calls to Sound the Flute! (Blake), and your frenetic fears of missing out on the whole thing, as evidenced by a histrionic D.H. Lawrence, who writes: I tremble so much to hear it, that even now, on the threshold of spring, I fear I shall die!
I like Rimbaud, a volatile self-examiner who wrote an ode to spring called A Season in Hell. In it, he claims that spring imbued him with, "the frightening laugh of the idiot."
Sound familiar, surfers?
Up here NOTB, spring brings strong(er) northwest winds, cold(er) water temps, and shitti(er) waves. Desperate locals threaten to move, quit altogether or, worse, take up kiteboarding. Claritin flows like wine, wine flows like water, and water gives us the frightening laugh of the idiot.
Ah, Spring!
As I've speculated before here, surfers are subconciously prone to order boards to match the season. During a particularly wet week this part February, I got TWO orders for gray boards, one from a local, and one from a guy in the PNW--neither strangers to inclement weather.
Spring orders usually feature bursts of color. None more so than this 8ft., 2+1 BroadSword for Santa Cruz lovely lass Kaelyn, who designed the spring-y artwork for the bottom with her special guy friend, Will.
See, the artwork resembles a seed pod.
Ah, Spring!
The talented Leslie Anderson taped-off the design on the foam, then 'stained' it with pigmented resin. The result, aside from being bitchin', looks not unlike the work of children's book genius Eric Carle, of The Very Hungry Caterpillar fame.
Closeup of board.
Cover of The Mixed-Up Chameleon, which my two-year-old daughter calls, The Messy Lion.
Ah, Spring!