The spring season is upon us, and if you are like me you are stoked to be getting some cold early season waves.This post is to let everyone know that I am in the process of finding new digs to shape in. If you are interested in getting a new board shaped for the coming season or some travel destination, get in touch with me and we can discuss what you are looking for in a board. Then as soon as I am setup the shaping will begin. The contact info is all on the contact page. 

Know!Show Booth, originally uploaded by Form<->Function.

Here is my setup for the Know!Show.

It was a good time, talking with lots of people, spreading the word about my boards, and getting feedback on them.Met some interesting folks, all working hard doing business and making their own way in the world and within the boarding culture.

Kudos on the Know!Show crew for setting up a great show that has been taking off since they started it last year, and my buddies over at Tiger Distribution for helping me set it all up.

Surgery, originally uploaded by Form<->Function.

My 15″ Titanium powerbook broke down a few weeks ago after more than 4 years without a hitch. After doing a bunch of research online; I narrowed the possible flaw down to a few things, and started with the cheapest piece, a PRAM battery off of E-bay.

Unfortunately, the surgery proved unsuccessful.After much hair pulling, gnashing of teeth and usage of other peoples computers, I went out and bought a new iMac. I can now get back to having fun and doing the business that I need to do.As usual, Apple makes a good nice looking machine and the new Leopard OS has got some nice features. If it gets the mileage that the laptop got, then it will be well worth it. {I guess I mean figurative mileage here :-)}

When I have some more money flowing I’ll keep tinkering on the laptop and see if it can’t be resucitated. At least now I am back up and online!

Looks like the system that dumped all that snow on us also contributed to making some crazy surf on the East Coast. I’m pretty sure it was cold out there waiting for those bombs to roll through. Brrrr…..

There’s a short story about it on Surfline, as well as the usual write up and pics on Ralph’s weekly ‘Pic’s of the Week’ column over at Cinnamon Rainbows’ site.

The wave pictured above is in Delaware.

Stevey in Costa, originally uploaded by Form<->Function.

The crew just came back from a trip to Costa, where they got a chance to enjoy the sun and waves. (Marc is due back shortly)

The above is a pic of Stevey catchin a wave on the Fish I made him. He has a bunch of pics of the crew riding waves here. These pics were taken by a girl in Costa, who works for a company called Matos Films.

Jesse has photos of the trip here. It looks like a beautiful country.

I’m stoked to see some of the boards that I have made for my friends getting some action, as well as my friends having a blast; but; I really need to save some pesos up so I can join them on the next trip.

Snow, originally uploaded by Form<->Function.

Our first major snowfall dropped down on us yesterday on the 3rd of December. We got somewhere in the neighborhood of 30cm of perfect powder snow.

Now we often get storms like this during the winter, but it has been quite a while since we have had anything like this happen so early. One of my neighbors; an old timer; said that he hasn’t seen anything like it since the seventies.

Wonder what the rest of the season will bring?

News story of a surfer who has proposed a new; and simple theory of everything. It is based on the E8 symmetry, a mathematical formula discovered in 1887 but only recently understood. (pic of the geometry of the E8 above)
I’ve read the news stories and some of the discussion on the interwebs and it’s very interesting. It also can; and I assume will be; tested when the new LHC (Large Hadron Collider) is completed sometime next year. That could verify that the 20 new particles that the theory proposes do, or do not exist. This would be a pretty big deal if it is verified and could theoretically lead to all kinds of things.

The full paper can be downloaded here. I’ll delve into when I have some free time this weekend and see how much of it I can make sense of.

And people say that surfers are just bums!!

templates, originally uploaded by Form<->Function.

I just finished off a couple of new templates this evening.

I made a spin template for the 9′6″ longboard. A spin template has a half side of the board on each of its sides, so you can make a long template out of a shorter piece of masonite and save some space on storing them as well. I think I’ll be converting a bunch of my existing templates to spin ones for those reasons as well as the fact that it will allow me to mix different curves from different templates to come up with new shapes.

The other one is a template for a 6′10″ Diamond tail, which I will be shortly using to try out a 5-fin Bonzer style board.

I’ll finish that one up in the next few weeks, as I am also on the lookout for a new shop space. I am looking to cut my costs a bit with a smaller space. If anyone knows of a decently priced space in the neighbourhood of 500 square feet let me know.

Tiny Tree, originally uploaded by Form<->Function.

Today is Blog Action Day where bloggers post on environmental issues; the idea being to get as many people talking about this as we can.

Mike over at the surfmtl blog had asked me some questions regarding his post on sustainable surfing, discussing the things that surfers can do to minimize their environmental impact.

As far as what the choices I have made are; as a surfboard maker; I have decided to use EPS foam and Epoxy resins so that the manufacture and use of my materials is less harmful than others and so that the finished boards I produce are more durable than the standard issue boards out there so that they will end up in landfill much later(and provide more fun to the user). As a surfer I always carpool to get to surf spots and the vehicles I choose to use tend to be fuel efficient ones. (If I don’t need an SUV, I don’t want one)

I also thought that I would post a link as well. The University of British Columbia has published a paper detailing the findings of 2 scientists as to how the health of Canadians is impacted by pollution.

It would seem that pollution is killing us off in greater numbers than some of the ‘hot’ issues that the government and media would have us focus on. It has always struck me as silly that our society has prioritised the support/protection of big business and jobs, even when those things are slowly poisoning us.
Doesn’t our health and prosperity mean more than some dollar/market figures?
Maybe we can all become more aware and make more responsible choices, and maybe get our government and business to care less about money, and we can become a little more …civilized. ……..maybe

I mean, it really is like the little tree in the photo, life is in a precarious balance clinging on above a precipice.

This weekend is the SacredCraft surfboard show in Del Mar California.

There will, of course, be tons of sweet boards and fins and things to peruse, but there will also be several talks on surfboard shaping and technology.

There is also going to be some talks about the industry, specifically there will be folks speaking out against the outsourcing of the sacred craft by many of the big industry players. It would be very interesting to see the debate between JP St. Pierre ,of Moonlight Glassing, or Jim Robertson of Lokbox fin system and reps from Lost, Channel Islands, Boardworks and 9Fish(who are all making boards overseas).