This Week In Not Surfing

1. Is there a difference between “denying that something happened” and “pointing out that something didn’t happen”? On the face of it, perhaps not, but I’m wondering lately about the psychological study of a word’s shifting meaning. Someone must study it. Probably it’s a cultural study. Or an etymological, lexicographical study. Probably all of them together. The idea that a word, innocuous in its usage, would connote over time a different meaning altogether thanks to its repeated context. Whereby “denial” conjures or equates a state of trial, a state of something already within the flow of dubious examination, when in fact, denial might simply be the statement of fact before that jurisprudence ever feels the need to be engaged.
 “What’s the weather outside?”
“It’s sunny!”
“So, you are denying that it’s raining?”
Does the affirmation of one thing connote the denial of another? Can I simply tell someone they are denying something and make it seem like they are contradicting a fact? Something like that. Quizzical. I'm not worried about it.

 2. Yesterday. I surf. It is my first surf since the last time I surfed, a span of misspent time documented in more than a few of these Not Surfing posts. It is my first surf after the Maiko & Shigeru move to Santa Barbara, those two stoked Japanese board-lovers. They are always a happy sight on the beach. Good luck Maiko and Shigeru! Say hi to Rincon for me! To Bedwetter! To Hammond’s!

 3. It is also a day which feels like the first day of recovery. I can’t get the thought out of my head. I am in desperate need of recovery. Yesterday is the first day. The waves look high-tide junky, then shift to mid tide central peak fun, and I get tired and fall over needlessly, but also paddle into some fun speedy rights. Recovery.

 4. As Kevin says: Danny doesn’t do platitudes. I wonder if I live my life through platitudes? The radio podcast yesterday says to always welcome a surprise. I’ve always hated surprises. Or maybe that’s just people jumping out of dark doorways to surprise me. But one might as well let people be people.

 5. Watching one local professional soccer team lose to another local professional soccer team seven to zero. Our preferred local soccer team being the losing side it provides an opportunity to teach my son about being a sports fan. Loss is part and parcel to life. Death, life. Blah blah. Another radio podcast platitude: “The winner is the loser who evaluates defeat properly.” Blah.

 6. Preventative medicine is just medicine in sheep’s clothing.

 7. You know the chips are down when you keep finding money in your pockets.

 8. Fetwa boulders arvo peert.

9. And one more thought, along this line of thinking: the word terrific. Whose etymology is not, as widely held, being that of "the fear of a small potted tree." In this way, the word horrific being a generally assumed misambiguated marriage of horror and terrific, rather is a combination of harangue and terrific, and has been the product of mispronunciation for so long that the meaning has been lost. Except, of course on the East Coast of the United States where the proper pronunciation hints at the real lingual lineage of the mot. Oh, the harror.