Score one for Root.

As I have said previously, a good weekend should start on Friday at the beach. I felt obliged to confirm my credo. With the prospect of family showing up for my mom's 60th birthday weekend, I sensed it necessary to bounce out of work after a late lunch, and meet up with my sister Jennifer at Torrey Pines S.B. for a Root rematch. As luck would have it, Friday, August 17th was a gorgeous day here in San Diego. With all the crucial supplies for an extended beach outing: beer... cold beer and maybe a beach chair, umbrella, music, towels, & spf 30, we headed down to the beach at about 1 pm with plenty of time to soak up some afternoon sun. In our haste to get to the sand, food/snacks were forgotten... oops. I did have a few small packs of Nabisco trail mix in my beach tote reserved for emergencies, courtesy of Mike W. from our Baggo @ the beach day a few weeks before. In the right state of mind, they're delicious, but generally... not so good. The last time I played root happened to be after an epic day of Baggo, and seemed overwhelmingly inadequate as a recreational staple. A huge let down. I had actually gone online earlier in the week, and ordered my own Baggo kit, but because I wasn't willing to part with an extra 20$, I was still waiting on UPS to "bring home the Baggo". With Root as the only available option, with significant apprehension, it was going to have to do. To be at the beach was so nice and after base camp had been established, a couple of beers had been consumed, & before we got down to the business end of our mission, we both took advantage of the 70 + degrees ocean water for a refreshing dip. Taking advantage of all the beach has to offer on a day like that makes San Diego well worth the price of admission. Now, in the right state of mind, we were ready to compete. Since my last Root post on LCBS, I had found a site that clarified the scoring system of Root. This was key. Previous attempts at remembering the finer points of Root, had been desperate stabs at piecing together LA roadtrip memories clouded by purple haze. The first game got off to a rocky start. Figuring out the right tossing distance takes a little troubleshooting. Jenn was distracted by a work situation, & I had a spontaneous distraction of my own. I will elaborate...

A couple of month's ago, my 9'0" G&S gem of a board got ripped from my mom's garage. I got a new board, and for the most part... I'm over it. I have to say though, when around my mom's neck of the woods, I do find my wandering eye focus in on every ~ 9 ft. ish longboard I see. Is that it?... no. It's a curse. I know it's long gone, but some part of me thinks I'll see some jerkoff walking to Torrey Pines with my board under his arm. Which brings us to the present distraction. I am facing north on the beach, lining up my toss of the root, when some "jerkoff" covered in tattoos appears past the trestle at tower 7 carrying a ~ 9 ft. ish longboard under his arm. The difference this time? From about 80 yards away, I could see the hallmark G&S logo on an all white canvas, with a single large blue fin. Disclosure: I am about 3 - 4 beers deep. I really thought that this was my board. The windmills of my mind were whirling, playing out all sorts of weird scenarios that didn't end well. All of a sudden my root ability went to hell, and it was obvious to Jenn something besides the game was commanding my attention. I hadn't at this point revealed to Jenn why I was distracted. I really didn't know what I was going to do, and wasn't 100% sure it was my board. Was I going to walk over and say "Hey bro nice board, where did ya get it?", and then cold cock him? You could cut the tension with a... well, with a surfboard it was so thick. Tattoo boy fiddled with the board for it seemed an eternity, waxing it or something which obscured the view, allowing even more time for me to stew. When he finally picked it up to head for the surf, I was able to see the top of the deck. It had a pretty healthy coating of wax, but... It had 2 long, thin, barely visible pinstripes on either side of the stringer. My "baby" was a clear canvas, void of any extra top or bottom deck graphics. And, as my head began to clear as the windmills slowed down, I remembered that my single fin was yellow, not blue. I had given my blue skeg to Ted to use on his longboard. At this realization, it was like the Red Sea had parted in front of me. For about 10 minutes, I had might as well of been blindfolded tossing the root and ball. Helen Keller could have given me a run for my money. At this point, I disclosed to Jenn what was causing my obvious diversion. We laughed. And decided, another swim in the ocean was needed to clear our heads before we could even attempt resuming our match.
After chilling out a bit, the next games were good. We both seemed to have a radar for the stick w/ the root & the root w/ the ball. Jenn scored the most possible points in one turn without being a game winner: leaner with the root, ball through the root, ball hits the stick, 5 pts. very well done (pictured left). Root this time was much better, and honestly, gave Baggo some real competition. Getting out early that day was huge, and got the weekend off on the right note. Another good day at the beach with Jenn Jenn. Something tells me this will have to be a more regular occasion. Good times, LCBS.

Post script: The photos were not staged!