ORLEANS – A surfer named Jim, no last name, who says “everyone knows me as ‘Kook.’ ” stared east from Nauset Beach and began speaking like George Costanza. “The North Atlantic is a fickle temptress. Some days she looks at you and smiles, other times she takes you away.”
Bad day for surfing. Jim, AKA “Kook” of Orleans, and Matt Farrell of Brewster, both surfers, decide these are not surfing conditions.
And that, said Kook, 43, was why he and his friend, Matt Farrell, 45, of Brewster were not surfing on this day of enormous waves and churn.
See also… Natural Art – slideshow of the storm from Coast Guard Beach
See also… 30-second storm video from Coast Guard Beach
“There’s too much water moving around,” said Kook, of Orleans, who teaches surfing in the summer and the rest of year works as The Tree Guy. ”There’s sand churning around in there. That’s why the water is discolored like that.”
Farrell described the water as “like a washing machine on spin cycle.”
Neither expressed any interest in surfing in the bubbly water. “I’m pretty confident I could swim out there a little bit if I had to,” said Kook. “But no one is going out there unless they have a real reason to.”
Not Today… Jim, AKA “Kook” of Orleans, and Matt Farrell of Brewster, both surfers, decide this is not good surfing.
And Farrell said, “If somebody paddled out right now, within five minutes they’d be two miles down the beach.”
At that point, explained Kook, the surfer, wearing a $200 wetsuit and holding a $1,000 surfboard, might have to make a decision. “Even if you had the best wetsuit in the world, you’d still have to walk back a couple of miles. It might be so cold that you’d think about just leaving your surfboard there to get back faster.”
And though they knew they wouldn’t be surfing, they still visited Nauset Beach on this wild weather day. “We wanted to make sure the ocean was still here,” explained Kook. “And now we have something to talk about at the bar later.”
— Brian Tarcy
What a Kook! Daaa dunt chaaaa…. love this story…. what bar?