Monday, March 31, 2008

Why I am a Wuss, Reason 1/8675

Since I live in California, it seems like there are several things I should do: eat healthy, drink fine wines and beers, make all sentences sound like questions, and surf.

Scratch that last one.

On Saturday I visited a friend in Bolinas, the small hippie town just north of the city, where she grew up. We walked down the beach, and I said I had seen a sign posted that there have been shark attacks around there in water less than six feet deep.

Tina said, Yes.
I said, Really?
Tina said, Um, yes.
Me: Holy crap.
Tina: People get arms bitten off all the time here.

When you are a kid, adults tell you that shark attacks are rare. This is true, for the average person - but if you are a surfer around San Francisco, apparently, you have to deal with the fact that you might get nommed by a gigantic fish. A great white, no less! Although maybe surfers comfort themselves with the thought that if they are going to get ate, at least it will be by the T. Rex of the sea.

No, that's stupid. I still can't imagine floating on a seal-shaped piece fiberglass, legs and arms dangling down, with a major great white breeding ground just a few miles out in the Pacific.

Then yesterday I went for a bike ride across the bridge with Umbro. We wound up in Sausalito, which is just precious. We ate sandwiches and drank wine on the waterfront, then wound up in a shop that had mini everything: small charms, tiny bottles (which we are going to fill with booze for our Alice in Wonderland party!), and leetle plastic animals, including great white sharks. Those things look terrifying - a half inch of plastic designed to take tiny bites out of your nipples, or to swim up your nose and munch on your brains.

Like the time I had nightmares about a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup commercial, I think the fact that I got freaked out by a shark toy is a sign that I should not surf. Or breed.

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