Duke of Terceira Tuesday Surf & Culture Report
In keeping with the food theme we've got the lovely Mafalda working the linguiça booth in the Porto open air market. She was selling all kinds of sausages and embalmed piggy meat. In the tray on the right of the counter is a variety of piggy snouts, ears and feet, covered with parsley to preserve their delicate flavor. The hanging linguiça and other desiccating meats (like the pigs head on the right,) are draped with bay laurel to keep off those pesky insects that like to hover about the renderings.
A beautiful June morning we had 20 miles visibility under clear skies, unmarred by the typical gloom we have this time of year. Actually, this worries us a little. Usual water temps at this time of year are typically in the mid to low 60's. Today's water temperature was 55.2° and the air was 59.3°. Most folks are still in long rubber and there's a bit of chill in the afternoon wind. It's usually a bit cloudier and softer this time of year, with the morning overcast and late afternoon clearing. You don't think we're going to have another cold summer do you??? Winds were calm at checkout and the sea surface was smooth to glassy. Low tide was at 8:15am +0.0' and high tide was at 3:18pm +4.2'. So the 46221 Buoy told us that we had a SSW swell out of 205° at 3.3' and that got our attention. Upon closer inspection we decided Topaz was the best choice. 2' to 3' and some nice little green walls. Birdie was leaving as we got in, so we just kinda sat there and picked off some nice little rights close to the jetty. But then the wind started to kick up a bit, so we paddled around the rocks to Sapphire where it was still nice and calm, naturally we imagined it would be a lot smaller. We were pleasantly surprised as we paddled in tight to discover that it was breaking in the middle of the jetty and there were some waist high sets with nice little corners and we'd better paddle back out...
Working people frequently ask retired people what they do to make their days interesting. Well, for example, the other day, Mary my wife and I
went into town and visited a shop. When we came out, there was a cop writing out a parking ticket.
We went up to him and I said, 'Come on, man, how about giving a senior citizen a break?' He ignored us and continued writing the ticket. I called him an "asshole" . He glared at me and started writing another ticket for having worn-out tires. So Mary called him a "shit head". He finished the second ticket and put it on the windshield with the first. Then he started writing more tickets. This went on for about 20 minutes. The more we abused him, the more tickets he wrote.
Just then our bus arrived, and we got on it and went home.
We try to have a little fun each day now that we're retired.
It's important at our age.
(Our thanks to Lawrence Moch for this brilliant solution to post-retirement bouts of ennui... Ed.)
Speaking of warding off creeping boredom, LoLa wanted us to remind you that there'll be a group convening at Samba this Friday around 6:30pm. Absolutely, no problem if you don't want to come, but we'll talk about you and you won't be there to defend yourself... The only thing that could be worse would be to have someone else defend you...
Finally, we have a couple of snaps from the "Grande Festa Do Bacalhau" in Santarém. What a people! They have a festival to celebrate codfish! LoLa's dish was the cod baked with cherries... Of course they left the pits in. That's where all the flavor is...
"When the surf breaks, we'll fix it..."
The Professor!!
