This is a Blog about Surf Lessons

Hello to my two followers and to anyone who checks this site because you've picked up my card at either Mollusk Surfshop in Brooklyn or Saturdays Surf in Soho. This blog was about style, music, etc., but now I have a tumblr account: http://burningfromtheinside.tumblr.com for all that fun stuff. This blog is now solely about my surf lessons, which, yes, are still happening and are going to be more awesome than ever as the days roll forth. On April 1 I am moving from Brooklyn to the West Village. Thus I will be more centrally located in Manhattan, making meeting up pre-lesson a much easier affair. We will now meet at Saturdays Surf on Crosby and Grand, and head to the beach from there. Lessons are $200 a pop, which includes all equipment, ride to the beach and back into town. It's about a 3-5 hour affair, so you must definitely plan for that in your day. Weekends are definitely do-able, but you will find that if you can break away on a weekday morning you will be able to get the most out of the lesson, as there will be many less people to contend with in the surf. I will teach 2 people at a time maximum. I do not believe in group surfing lessons. It is too dangerous a sport for those kind of shenanigans. Remember that if you chose to take a cheap ($60) group lesson you will most likely not get any attention and the instructor is also likely to have minimal experience. I have over 20 years experience surfing and over 10 years teaching private lessons. Like a well fitting shirt, my lessons are tailored to each individual's level of comfort and experience, and you'll be able to take this experience to enhance all of your future surfing endeavors.

Post NY Surf Film Festival

Here's a shot of me hard at work judging for the 2010 NY Surf Film Festival. There were still waves from Hurricane Igor this day, but I had 30 films to get through, reading to complete, and a different blog to manage (for the course I TA at Parsons). The film I'm watching in this shot is called Stoked and Broke by Cyrus Sutton. It didn't win, but it is a damn fine surf film and I recommend it to anyone looking for great footage of shredders on alternative crafts (the kid Ryan Burch absolutely kills it) and which also has an entertaining and enlightening storyline. As you can see here, my wetties are drying on the fire escape. They got plenty of water time during Igor, which produced the shapliest surf I've gotten in quite some time. Managed to ride my fish, my shorty, and a borrowed 6'3" widow-maker (Grey Ghost Surfboards) in the space of four days. As for the surf film fest, it was a blast. I only went for Saturday's showing of the brilliant short titled Darkside of the Lens and the feature Fiberglass and Megapixels. Darkside of the Lens won top honors for best short. I'm calling it the Joy Division of surf films. Nuanced. Dark. Beautiful. Only slightly bothered that it was funded by an energy drink, but hey, if someone's gonna throw you cash to make a surf film, you better put that cash to good use. Fiberglass and Megapixels is a highly educational film about the pro photo scene on the North Shore. First "surf film" I've seen to ever turn the lens on the lens, which is highly refreshing. You get a fish eye view into the heavy photo crowding situations at Pipe and a pretty complex view on how surfing as an industry relies on the shots taken on the North Shore every winter. It's not my cup of tea, but it is very true to reality. And in case you are curious about the results of the NYSFF, well Dark Fall, a film about New Jersey surfers, took first place for best film and viewers choice. Not a big surprise there, being that it was the best East Coast surf film, and well the festival is on the East Coast. It was good, I'm not saying much else...... Patrick Trefz's Idiosyncracies won for Best Cinematography and Dane Reynold's epic, no-talking, weird shred show, Thrills Spills and Whatnot, won for best soundtrack. Best part of Dane's film? Drawing a heart around Kelly in the water and writing BFF. Oh and did I say there was no talking? So refreshing. Dane and I must share the opinion that listening to surfers talk (unless they're British or Irish) is a pain which must be registered on a certain level in Dante's Inferno. In the end I am stoked to have been a part of the NYSFF. Tyler Breuer and Mike Machemer really put on a great event. Open bar. What? And Mike was throwing down the best vinyl tracks I've heard outside of myself djing at random bars with no dance floors. I remember his set went Sweet Dreams (are made of this) --> Ceremony --> So In Love --> Love Will Tear Us Apart, etc. awesomeness. I wanted to start creepy dancing in the middle of the surf party, but no one else got it, so I just threw Mike a devil shaka. Last note of the post. See my loafers in the photo? My pal Asa turned me on to wearing loafers. They're Florsheims and they're soft as a baby's bottom. Best with slim pants, a button down shirt untucked, and a v-neck sweater. So Italian in all the right ways. TTFN.

Fall and all of its Glory

This might be the last photo for a while of me waiting for a train to take me back to Brooklyn. The car is fixed and in my possession. Perfect timing for hurricane season and you can bet that I'm psyched about the arrival this week of Hurricane Igor. It's looking like Igor will produce 3-4 days of swell to Earl's 1-2. Definitely a word of caution to all beginners. I have learned that when there are waves the East Coast is no joke. You can get hurt and tossed out here just as bad as anywhere. Well maybe not Teauhupoo or Hawaii....Also coming up is the NY Surf Film Festival, of which I am one of the judges. I hope those dvds arrive soon or I'll have nothing to judge! Not sure which films I'm aiming to check out in the theater, but I think I'll shoot for Saturday night's Dark Fall about New Jersey surfers and the season we are heading into right now. Regarding the hopes and desires listed in my last post I have decided to nix a return to pro surfing. Philosophy and especially aesthetics and an interest in fashion theory has just won me over for good it seems. Plus I am surfing enough and having a blast doing what I love. As for lessons, well, nobody seemed to bite this summer. Too expensive perhaps? Well folks a good teacher ain't cheap, so I'm sticking to my guns. I'll try to keep the car in action to the best of my ability because I understand that that really increases the value. I did have one pupil this summer, Rachel, and she was awesome. She went from barely being able to catch waves to making drops on her own. She also developed a nice slouchy style ala Thomas Campbell flicks, which is always nice to see. On the music front, another Rachel I know has invited me to dj 80's music with her at Iona's in Williamsburg every other Thursday. Last Thursday was a blast, with Killing Moon by Echo and the Bunnymen definitely taking the crowd's fancy. It always does. Kind of like Cuts You Up by Peter Murphy. Well that's a wrap for now. I'll try my darndest to update more often throughout the fall.

Summer Sands

Ah the dog days of summer are whizzing past like the speeding motorcycle in the Daniel Johnston song. I still do not have the car back, but the part has finally been sourced. I’ve been praying that it would be ready before the weekend of my 30^th birthday so that the girl and I could throw the longboard on the racks and head out to Montauk for a day or so. But unless he calls really soon, as in today sometime, it looks like we’re Brooklyn-bound for the 22^nd/23^rd. Overall this is fine with me. I have a tradition of surfing on my birthday, so maybe a day ride out on the LIRR to Long Beach or Montauk, fish under arm, will have to suffice. Other than these surf related musings, how about this summer? Has any other summer gone by quite as fast? I do not believe so. Between reading Proust, researching fashion history stuff for Hazel Clark over at Parsons, planning the new print version of Canon (the interdisciplinary student-run journal for the New School), waiting tables, teaching the occasional surf lesson, and/or just paddling around myself, the days have passed like sand through a sieve. Fortunately there seems to be an interminable yet finite amount of sand still to sift. I am looking forward to fall, to my last year in the MA program, to wearing a jacket more often, and to figuring out how to execute the multitude of crazy plans that I’ve stirred up in my brain over the past few weeks. These include a possible PhD in Comparative Literature, a top secret fashion line, and a perhaps a minor return to competitive surfing……..we’ll see.

Heaving Pits and Car Trouble

Yes I do take a while in between posts and I'm not sure that the situation will be ameliorated any time soon. On the left you have a brilliant picture taken by my pal, Wayne Kelly, on an absolutely firing day out Babylon way in April. It isn't the last day I scored overhead surf, but it's pretty darn close. This was a day that made me super happy to be living on the right coast. But then again my car was still in action. So this is an update for those of you who might have been directed here inquiring into surf lessons. The little 02 that could is currently in the shop for head gasket repair and may stay there for some time till the proper part is sourced. Lessons are still happening, they just don't include a ride. The new situation is that we meet at Boarders Surf Shop on 92nd St. in Rockaway. This location is accessible via the A train (transfer at Broad Channel for the S). I am working on getting the 9'6" down there and hiring a locker space, but until I do, students must rent boards from the friendly dudes at Boarders. They have a complete stock and I'll be there to help you get the proper length. Of course this is non-issue if you already have a board. I will update this again when my car is back on the road.

Fish out of Water

This corrugated photograph was taken with an iPhone under the subway tracks at the Marcy JMZ station. Riya was sitting on the hood of our car making sure we didn't get a ticket for parking in a 'no standing anytime' zone. We were on location for a shoot by German photographer Stephan Pielow who's putting out a coffee table book in 2011 about New York and people who do watery things here. He's associated with a publication called Mare, which deals solely with ocean related topics. For this shot Stefan didn't want to do 'surfer at the beach' because it's too obvious. Instead he wanted the whole urban surfer vibe. I think he achieved it nicely enough. I also had the 9'6" down there with me and almost mowed over a few Hassid and Orthodox types when turning it around to get the closeup shot. Whether this shoot makes the book will be up to Stefan and the publishers. It was a fun shoot anyhow. It felt so New York I could hardly believe it. One of those moments when you have to pinch yourself. I wore a quintessentially 'me' outfit: an oxford shirt, my twill gstars, brown oxfords no socks, co-op tie, and my vintage pierre cardin blazer that I scored at Static in the upper Haight about 4 years ago (Japanese do vintage right!). Sometimes I do go for a darker aesthetic but this shot needed lighter clothing or I would drown in the shadow. The board I'm carrying is my 5'9" Channel Islands Ksmall - no rocker, glass on fins - a real wizard of a board. It goes well in anything from 2ft mush to 5ft ramps. How did this happen anyhow? The kind folks at Mollusk Surf Shop NYC gave me a ring out of the blue and then linked me up with Stefan and his wife Tina. I got an email that read: "Wear a Joy Division tee and bring your hot rod." I wore the Joy Division tee for our first meeting, but that too was too dark for the location. All in all it was a good time. I was a bit stressing about the car in traffic as blue smoke had been wafting out of the hood accompanied by the lovely smell of burnt oil, which reminds me of a jetski or a rickety ski boat. We took the car in the day after. It's looking like head gasket repair. Yikes! Hope to have it back soon, but if not I'm doing surf lessons by train. Just hope I don't kill any innocent bystanders lugging that 9'6" down to Rockaway.

Thomas, Josh (x2), Felix, and I.

Lovely day for a post. Finished my last paper for the semester on Tuesday and scored epic waves the following day. Yesterday was spent making flyers for Ceremony NY II, cavorting around Soho, and reading a bit of Wilde. While in Soho I stopped by Saturdays and had a chat with the dapper Josh. We talked surf lessons and Keala Kennelly's gaping barrel on surfline.com and how it's just generally a great time to be a surfer (when was it not?). In the course of our conversation I really put my finger on what makes my surf lessons special and unique and have consequently updated this blog as a result. To the right you see what I've come up with, and to the left you see Felix, our 1975 bmw 2002, with my current quiver strapped to the roof. This is just before we took off cross country last June. The big red board with the yellow tail is the authentic surf craft on which I plan to teach a majority of my lessons. It was shaped by Dane Peterson for Thomas Campbell (who did the paint/artwork). Thomas gave the board to my friend, Josh (not the owner of Saturdays - this Josh is aka the graffiti name Amaze), who in turn gifted it to me. Needless to say, you'll be learning on a piece of surfing history. It's about 9'6" and floats and paddles amazingly. And I think I'll leave off now. Until next time, mine the spice!