kooks. what they need to know.
‘ I’m new at surfing and would like to know how one would define a kook?’
^ This email was from Fred.
back at you fred;
Only a kook asks Fred, and that’s just for starters.
A kook, Fred, is someone who doesn’t know whether it’s going off or gone off, or a high tide from an ebb tide or a left from a right. A thruster from a twinnie, a roundhouse from a re-entry.
A kook Fred, doesn’t know a reef from a rockwall, a pitch from a slab. A pig dog from a bush pig.
Backdoor from front door.
Fred, a kook is someone who cannot differentiate between a rip and an undertow, a flogging and a beating, a lull and a set, Kirra and Snapper, a nor-easter and a sou-wester. A blue bottle and a dead marine.
A kook Fred, is someone who thinks that the back seat in a car bound from West Ryde to Double Island overnight is The Premium Ride; a kook, Fred, is wholly incapable of pissing cleanly out of a window of a car doing over 45 KPH down Hunter Street on a Friday night.
A kook Fred, doesn’t even know that Hunter Street is in Newcastle, and he wouldn’t know a Cowrie Hole from a pothole. Kooks don’t do gnarly Fred, nobody does anymore, dude (that too)
Kooks carry a spare leg rope Fred, kooks wax their board the night before they plan to go surfing. They wear waterproof watches. The first thing a kook does when he gets out the back is look around for someone to talk to. Kooks sit on their boards and face the beach, they clean their board-bags.
Kooks get OUT of the car to fart Fred.
You know that frangipani decal your wife likes? – the one she stuck onto the rear window of your SUV – that’s a Kook Indicator Fred – so watch where you park mate.
A kook, Fred, cannot roll a tight number and cannot hold a triple toke,
A kook Fred, loses a lot of smoke.
The joint goes past the kook Fred.
A kook doesn’t know an onshore from an offshore Fred, a westerly from an easterly, a low pressure from a high.
Kooks, Fred, cannot read barometers, or hydrometers, or clouds. A kook Fred thinks that a synoptic chart is a discount deal on an eye test.
Chicks don’t dig kooks Fred.
Highway Police will always have you on their radar Fred.
Every car you will ever buy Fred will give up six hours distant from where you want to be with a cooked head, Fred,
and always at night,
and in the rain
– in winter.
If there is a country pub with a hundred people drinking and only one wanting a blue, he’s waiting on you Fred.
David Jones does not kit out surfers Fred, and Mambo is not a wearable garment known to the Children of The Sea. (that’s all of us fred)
A surf school (google) = kook (Fred)
Kooks fold their towels Fred, and kooks walk around in wetsuits, all day. Kooks carry combs, they wear sandals and straw hats. They know what a price / earnings ratio is, they have taken defensive positions with their share portfolio.
Only kooks surf Manly on weekends Fred. Kooks meet at a Macdonalds Fred because they don’t know where to buy a good meat pie.
Kooks spend thousands of working hours on surfing forums, kooks are clerks Fred, and they live and work in cubefarms.
Kooks pack lunch Fred, they have little eskies and they eat a lot of fruit. They ring their wives to tell them about the (gnarly) surf.
You’ve heard the saying have you Fred? ‘ Once a man, twice a boy, ‘ – well that applies to kooks Fred – the older the competent surfer gets the longer his board becomes and the more sedate his manoeuvres. So much so that at his latter stages he becomes indistinguishable from the classic kook – and I lived in Avalon for 20 years, they abound there Fred.
petebowes.com 
And here I was, smug and knowing, nodding along to each line. “Fucken stick it to ’em, PB.”
But what’s this? Straw hats?
I have a straw hat! Not one of those mincey fedora numbers either. My hat is a bona fide wide brim fucker, frayed on the edges and it can be crushed flat in a board bag then punched back into shape any number of times.
Surely I’m not….? At least, not yet…
we will consider your application stu, and be in touch in the fullness of time
I played a drinking game where I pulled from my Ol’ Potrero Rye each time checked off one of the Kook categories mentioned here.
Needlesh to shay, I am durunkkkkk.
Cheershhh!
That in itself is a contradiction youngbrew – kooks don’t get pissed, they fall asleep in their girlfriend’s car – She, meanwhile, is still inside with the party
Now here’s the rub.. never rolled a number, never help a toke, always passed it on. They don’t surf anymore.
I still do…er… sort of.
Kook: the simple definition,the world over is…….any stranger who surfs worse than you. All this other crap you all talk about just complicates things.
Haha that’s JB in the background behind the tourist! That dude is a semi legend! Where did you get this picture?
No semi-legend ever teaches kooks daks, just in case you thought I’d never get back to you … I hope he’s got his shit better together these days