It's late Sunday night and we got a little today

Ruth and I went to the Farmers Market today, then to Whole Foods and lastly we hit Ralph's. While I was checking out at Ralph's Klaus called and said he was at the beach and where was "everybody." I said we were shopping and should be home in about 20 minutes.

By the time we got home Klaus was at the house and we had a beer. We checked out the wind but there wasn't much to talk about. The time was about 3 o'clock. Then Juliano came over and said he was going down to the beach. I went with Juliano and Klaus went home.

Once at the beach I noticed that Tiki day was in full bloom on the Granada ramp. It looked like it was a lot of fun.

We noticed the only person doing any good on the water was Peter from SD. He was on his big Best and his big directional board. Juliano started pumping and I just watched. Yawn.

Juliano grabbed his big Naish board, as Jorge and Bobby checked out the wind, and Pilar stood by to launch Jorge's kite. Our friend, the lifeguard at the Claremont ramp, Mitch, is constantly watching out for us. Thanks so much Mitch, we appreciate it.

Juliano got out with no problem. He was powered up and I think he was on his 13. What a good wind dummy, now it's time to pump....

My Sherpa's for the day pumped my kite as I took pictures and put out my lines. It was Michael's wife and brother. Thank you so much.

The time stamp on the pictures above was about 4:30. You can see from this graph that the wind jumped up about 10 mph about that time. The wind was really good for a while. I was on Dan's surfboard and had to de-power my F-One 13 when I was in the center of the channel.

A little after 6 the wind died and kites started falling from the sky. Michael and I made it in just in time. Actually what was funny is when I was kiting in the mid-channel a kite appeared over my head. I thought "Who's that?" As the kiter passed me from the back I noticed it was Michael. He was doing very well on his twin tip. I was on the surfboard practicing my turns. At this point, for me it's easy to go toe side in either direction, although I can't seem to hold the toe side stance very long. One time when I transitioned from starboard to port I actually made my foot switch. I was very excited.

Monday, August 24th.

A lot of kiters came to Belmont when they saw the wind building.

As you can see from the graph, at 4 o'clock things were looking pretty good.

Ruth and I had just arrived back at the house from Costco and I was excited because I saw a few kites out on the water. Then then wind died. Not long after that, Dan, Rijk, and Klaus drove up to the house, hoping to kite. Not today guys, the wind just died.

So Dan grabbed his 13 from the garage and installed his new strut. Then it was time to fix a few holes.

Klaus in the mean time had gotten real brave and took Chica from the tree and put her on his shoulder. Here he is trying to get her to whistle. We tried to warn him. At one point Ruth said "She's a mean bitch and I can put her back in the tree."

After returning from her swim in the bay, Ruth asked Rijk to get her "two fingers" of wine. Here every one is helping her measure two fingers. It seamed a little more to me but she didn't complain.

Just then Chica decided to bite Klaus on the bottom lip. Oh that hurts. Klaus has sworn off of talking to our bird and is going to stick to driving his new VW Passat, CC.

Dan and Rijk pose for me here. At least they got something done. I just took pictures and drank beer.

The next day, Tuesday, was about the same. A little wind for a little while. I got to the beach late because I went up to Hollywood to prep for a job on Thursday. Once I got home I grabbed my camera and was shooting all kinds of cool shots. I was really proud pf them. At one point I looked at my camera and it said "No Memory Card." Crap there went all those great shots.

So we all came over to the house to pick up where we left off yesterday.


Naturally Klaus had to put Chica on his shoulder again. Yesterday was just a fluke.

Sure Klaus seems like he's shy of Chica but he loved to give her things to eat.

And drink.....no problem!!!

When I took this shot I think Klaus was thinking, "I wonder what Chica is doing?"

It may be hard to see unless you double click on the picture, but Klaus got bit again. I think this time he's going to leave Chica on the tree branch and not put her on his shoulder anymore. But, there's always tomorrow. Let's see what happens.

P.S. Our windsurfing buddy Danny Valo had mentioned on the beach yesterday that a bear come down from the mountains and decided to cool off by going in his pool.

Check this out. I definitely would be using the long lens on my camera as to not piss off the bear. Danny said eventually the bear went back to its home in the mountains. Man I don't know what I would do? "Shoo shoo, go away you big bad brown bear, and don't come back." "Done!!"