Dating a musician is pretty cool because, in addition to the usual stuff you share when you're getting to know each other, you can learn interesting things about your lover from her song lyrics. You might even learn more than you want to know. But I guard against that by assuming that any depressing or angry song was inspired by a lesser guy from the past, while any song that is happy, romantic, or naughty is about me. Nevermind that most of the romantic songs were written before I knew her- I'm sure she was dreaming of the study windsurfing marine biologist she hoped to meet one day.
I like this particular song, "Eve Ocean", because it draws metaphorical relationships between the wild ocean and female emotions, because it sounds good, and because there might be a bad word in part of it but you have to guess what the word is. The only downside to the song is that to listen to it you have to watch this video of me windsurfing at Revere Beach.
I have a bad neighbor in the apartment directly above my mine. Like, a real bad neighbor. Like, a crashing around and yelling drunken death threats at 6 am (not to me, fortunately) bad neighbor. I transcribed some of what I could hear this morning...
"Aaah! Oooh! F*ck you Robert! I don't give a f*ck! I'll f*cking kill you right now! I WILL kill you! Don't think I won't. I'm ready to kill you. I know you chickenshit. Shut the F*CK up! F*CK you motherf*ucker! I swear to god!"
I called the cops and they said they would come over and that I could let them in the door. I was like, "My buzzer is broken, isn't there some way you can get in without me actually having to go out and let you in, and be outed as a snitch." And they were like, "No we'll just call you on your cell phone when we get there and you can let us in, but just make it look like you were getting up to check your mail or something." For better or worse, the cops never actually showed up and I went back to sleep for a while.
I was pretty upset when I woke up, though, so I went to police station in downtown Lynn and tried to make a report. On the way out the door of my apartment I happened to see the bad dude walking up the stairs of my building. I know it was the psycho threat-maker because he was muttering murderous things to himself like, "Let's do it, it's on now" in the exact same accent as his yelling. At the police station the cop behind the bulletproof glass of the front desk was nice enough, but he said there was really nothing I could do unless the bad dude made a threat against me. Is that true? I don't know because I'm not a lawyer or anything. Another thing the cop said was that I could talk to my property manager to see about getting the guy evicted, so I called my property manager, who in some way I don't quite understand is a different person than who I pay rent to.
The property manager said there were problem tenants in two units on the second floor, one of which is directly above mine. He said they were in the process of evicting one of the sets of problem tenants, but they were having trouble evicting the ones directly above me, which is where he said the nasty dude I saw on the stairs lives. The dude is an illegal from Cape Verde who they tried to deport but couldn't because Cape Verde wouldn't take him back. (Can't say I blame Cape Verde!) The property manager is also having a hard time evicting him because his girlfriend owns the unit. He said they got some kind of no contact order or something on the dude, but it backfired because he got a lawyer or something, and their current strategy is just to fine his girlfriend when he causes disturbances, until the fines pile up and they can get a lien on the unit to evict the pair. Sheesh. That might take a while, but the more I whine the more they can fine. I just need to whine sneakily so the nutcase won't retaliate against me.
One good thing that the property manager said was that the bad guy is nearly blind and usually stumbling drunk (perhaps accounting for some of the banging around I hear) so I should be able to easily escape if he comes after me.
It's really too bad because the apartment is right on the edge of a pretty nice neighborhood, the other neighbors are nice enough, I have it set up and decorated the way I want, and I just signed a one year lease with a chunky security deposit. But if I do notice any of the bad guy's ire directed at me personally I'll be out of the there in a flash.
This situation makes me think of a song I like by the band "Massive Attack"...
I may have mentioned at some point that my two-year marine biology research fellowship in Florida was ending and that I would be moving to Boston Massachusetts soon to start another research job. Well, if I failed to say it earlier, at least now you know. I no longer live in Florida.
Yep, 24 hours driving a 16' Penske truck with my minivan towed behind it, broken up by an overnight at my sister's house in Cary, NC and another at a La Quinta hotel in Stamford CT, and I arrived at the stoop of my new home: 42 W Baltimore Street, Lynn MA. The place is smaller than where I lived in Florida, and I had a heck of a time fitting in my fabulous windsurfing board rack. The neighbors probably thought I was nuts, sawing the excess length off the 2 x 4s of the rack in the middle of the shared hallway at 9pm, shirtless and stinky with sweat and with the zipper busted off my shorts from where I tried to support the corner of a dresser with my johnson while shlepping it out of the truck. Anyway, right now I'm sitting in the computer lab at Northeastern University's Marine Science Center in Nahant, decompressing after a busy day of just-moved-to-a-new-place type work tasks and errands. Ahh.
My last week in Florida was pretty fantastic in terms of windsurfing, with a couple days of big waves and decent onshore winds related to Hurricane Earl. On the very last watersports day both the wind and the waves were nice and there were actually 5 windsurfers at the Fort Pierce South Jetty. Woo hoo! I took a few pictures from that day, presented in the slideshow below. One of the windsurfers was John Campbell, aka "floridawavesailor", who is a real good rider. He does lots of backwinded moves, like, carving 360's.
The video below is from an earlier day in the week, when the waves were good but the wind was not quite strong enough for the shortboard and 6.8 msq sail I was using. The session was saved by the "gorge effect"; the fact that the current and the wind were going in opposite directions in Fort Pierce inlet, which increased the apparent wind speed and the steepness of the waves enough to get planing and have a good time. The song in the video is one my friend Emily Westermeier sings. I think it's good but she's not so sure, so if you like it leave a nice comment or something.
I have some video from a windier session, too, that I'll edit up later if I have more time.
PS- Got my first session in Massachusetts after work today. It was a kiteboarding session in up and down SW winds at "Dog Beach" in Nahant. Pretty fun, and the air and water were warm enough that I could get away with a shorty wetsuit. Don't expect those mild conditions will last, though!
Frank Black, from the late '80s band "The Pixies", is so the man. I figured it would be appropriate to have his singing in this video where I'm riding my black windsurfing board, the Exocet Warp SL 71. The sail I'm using is an Aerotech Phantom 6.8, which I like a lot because it's equally comfortable on this slalom board and on my Freestyle-Wave board. The launch site is Old Fort Park on the Indian River Lagoon in Fort Pierce, Florida and the wind is out of the southeast in the low to mid teens.
If you don't blink, you can occasionally spot another windsurfer in the video. That's my buddy Brandon, riding his Kona ONE longboard with a 9.65 msq Sailworks NX race sail that he was able to rig for the first time that day since he just got a formula boom. The mast he used was an aluminum 460 jacked up on two extensions. I couldn't believe it worked, but it totally did! Way to go, dude.
The underwater part at the end of the video shows the seagrass ecosystem that I've been studying here in Florida. You can see that the blades of seagrass are covered by tufts of brownish algal fuzz. Those are "epiphytes" (plants that grow on top of other plants). When there is an excess of nutrients in the water (like from fertilizer or sewage in runoff), and there aren't enough grazing invertebrates to remove the epiphytes, they can smother the seagrass. Most of the seagrass beds in the Indian River Lagoon are holding up OK, but they are definitely under a lot of stress from the murky conditions and overgrown epiphytes, so their future is a bit uncertain. I wrote a more detailed post on seagrass a while ago. You can read it here.
My friend Emily Westermeier is a talented pop singer / songwriter / keyboardist with a lot of range in her voice and musical style. She and her buddy Steve Fogel are a home-brewed recording group called "Biscuits and Gravy", based out of Vero Beach, Florida. At the moment they're completely unsigned and unknown, but that could change quickly because their music is good and Emily is hot. I'm doing my part to help out by posting their first video "Bounce Me" here on my blog. As you might guess by the title, it is a sassy number, bouncing along the fine line between PG13 and NC17.
The other Biscuits and Gravy songs all sound different, but share the common theme of sassiness. You can listen to them on the band's website, here.
If you're a big-time recording executive and you want to sign B&G for a multi-million-dollar contract, you can contact Emily through the website. Or if you just want to get them to play at your local coffee shop, bar, or bar mitzvah.
In my last video post I mentioned my intent to do some kite-mounted camera work using the less wide-angle resolution setting on my GoPro HD camera. Thursday I did just that, filming a powered-up west wind session in Fort Pierce Inlet. The resolution and field of view were definitely improved over the way I was doing it before, but I still had some issues with camera shakiness, fogging up, and a piece of string flapping in front of the lense. Oh well, I'm learning.
The video shows one nice, long jump and one zoomed-in jump where I turn the board upside down in mid air, but mostly it shows puny jumps, mediocre transitions, and crash landings. I'm wearing both a life vest and a helmet, which should please my parents. I set the video to a techno anthem; "Watch Out" by Ferry Corsten. I know not everyone likes techno, but I think it's a cool song with a lot of energy. Also, it's pretty cool that the artist is named after a boat. I think he's European.
A week ago I wasn't sure whether or not I liked bluegrass music. I'm still not sure, to tell the truth, but I do know I had a good time over the weekend at the Magnolia Music Festival in Live Oak, Florida.
It took place at a huge campground in the woods around the Suwannee River, and it was well-attended by hippie-flavored rednecks, hippie-flavored yuppies, and hippie-flavored hippies. In addition to the music, there was lots of neat art and culture on display and for sale.
One of the headlining bands was a group called "Donna the Buffalo". At first I thought people were saying "Dawn of the Buffalo". This tapestry thing reminded me of that.
Besides the music and art and socializing, I got my nature and watersports fix at the actual Suwannee River, where there was an awesome sandy beach on one side and a cliff with a rope swing on the other side. It was high enough to be scary, but not high enough for me not to do it.
Catapulting Aaron and I both have articles published in the latest issue of windsurfing magazine. (This is clear evidence that editorial standards have plummeted - lol!) An artist for the mag painted a funny picture to go with my article, which I think is cool. If you don't already get the magazine, I recommend you check it out.
On a totally unrelated note, I have a song severely stuck in my head right now. At least it's a good song by a Seattle-based band called Fleet Foxes. I embedded the youtube music video below. Maybe it will get stuck in y'all's heads, too.
I'm a marine biology professor at Florida Gulf Coast University. My professional page is here, my personal blog is here, and my no-longer-maintained science blog is here.
