Stunning place. Had a really chill weekend.

Ireland ‘among most vulnerable’ to peak oil
HERE’S a conundrum: restarting global economic growth will, by definition, push up energy costs. Rising energy costs will in turn choke off that economic recovery, leading to a fall in energy prices. Try to restart growth again, and the brick wall of energy costs magically reappears. Repeat ad infinitum.It is hard to overstate the extent to which our daily lives are subsidised by cheap, plentiful oil. Every 24 hours, Ireland burns around 200,000 barrels. That’s the daily equivalent of the muscle power of 2.4 million men, each working for a full year.

Our entire way of life depends on abundant, inexpensive oil. This era is now drawing to a close. Five years ago, the Hirsch report published by the US department of energy concluded that the world has “never faced a problem” as difficult as peak oil, adding that: “without massive mitigation more than a decade before the fact, the problem will be pervasive and will not be temporary”. Oil peaking will be, it warned, “abrupt and revolutionary”.

The advent of peak oil is, by definition, the end of decades of relentless economic growth, since this dramatic phase in human history has been entirely predicated on ready access to vast amounts of cheap energy.

The advent of peak oil is, by definition, the end of decades of relentless economic growth, since this dramatic phase in human history has been entirely predicated on ready access to vast amounts of cheap energy.

Saw this recently and thought it was pretty cool. Some really nice camera work, stunning spots and of course amazing surfing. Some of it is a little staged (or recreated as he says) but it’s well worth watching. Had me itching to travel by the end of it.

Quick weekend trip over to the UK.

Random flashback to the Summer. Normal.

This skinny local dude was standing barefoot grinning, with nothing but board shorts and his short surfboard on the edge of Puerto viejo thumbing a lift. Since we were heading down to go surf we stopped to cram him and his board into the trunk of our tiny 4×4 car for the 10minute drive along the potholed dirt track to Coccles. He was a friendly fellow, and we got chatting as we drove. I had broken my board the day before and when we arrived he ended up helping me replace one of the two fins I lost (they only had one). He then taped up a ding in the board with electric tape before using a lighter to melt the plastic tape a bit to seal it, after which it was almost as good as new. We gave him a lift and he helped me fix my board. sweet. He told me he ‘Normally‘ surfs  at least 5 hours every day and he had done his whole life….

…later….some guy from Oregon is in the room next to us with his girfriend and since we shared a balcony we get to chatting. “What do you think of Puerto Viejo?” we ask him. “Well, I don’t know what you guys normally eat, but we normally eat hamburgers” he replied, “and the hamburgers here have ham on them. Like actual slices of ham on top of the burger”. He was a big man, sitting there sweating without his shirt on and he didn’t look impressed.

Normal is a fairly abstract concept.

Just got back from the Motocross of Nations in Italy. There was some brilliant racing between Reed and Cairoli and there were some massive crashes in the final. Knackered right now after the weekend and a 5 hour drive, but here are a few photos I shot with my little Panasonic DMC-T27 point and shoot. More later.

Musquin owned all on the first day on his KTM and took the MX2 overall for the weekend.

Reed and Cairoli were swapping the lead back and forth but the Italian Cairoli came out on top at his home race to the cheers of the Italian crowd

There was a massive double step-up on the track. Not many people were doing the double to start with.

Cairoli was. Laying it flat.

Spot the rider. That’s a seriously big jump!

Jake Weimer

Tommy Searle above the crowds. There were 70 000 people there apparently on the Sunday.

Last weekend I went back and visited the MotoX club in Kent where I used to race as a kid. The racing was pretty fierce with some of the most exciting battling I have watched for years. Some funny characters down there too.

Had to hop over to the UK for a few days for work and managed catch up with my sister Cla one evening and some other peeps which was nice as we don’t see each other much.
The weather was well hot in the Uk for this time of year.
More photos later.

My sister Cla and her friends Sarah and Sarah

this dude busted me taking his photo I think, although camera was in the same spot as the shot above.. Got a brilliant zoom on it..

home alone, missing the wifey!

Mash has been one of my favo(u)rite shops in London for about 20 years..

San Clemente is a really nice small surf town about an hour south of L.A. We stopped for breakfast.

The waves looked perfect

Just outside of Oceanside we saw these fools. American History X is bleak as hell.

So many empty stores along Melrose.

I was considering getting a snowboard jacket at the Burton store, but it was over 100 degrees so after trying one on I was overheating so bad I had to bounce. Not sure why they dont crank up the AC to make it cold so people can try on all of the winter gear.