Go to Your Happy Place

I love being a California kid. Granted, the waters pictured are the pristine currents of Malibu, and not the seedy shores of Venice where, as a child, I whiled away many an afternoon, sun-browned and bored off my gourd asking "Please can we go home now?"

In the summer, when Venice and the former People's Republic of Santa Monica were overrun with tourists, I would stare at those plump, ruddy Midwesterners, and sun-shaded, be-visored Japanese tour groups and wonder why in the world people would want to spend their summer vacations here.

People from other places think that summer is the best time to go to the beach. And, sure, it ain't bad. But every California kid knows that the best, Best, BEST time to go to the beach is a hot day in September. The tourists have all gone home, the sun is hot, the breeze is cool, and the water is ice cold.

On a hot day in September, you can have the beach all to yourself. The view for which rich folks pay millions (over and over again--those houses tend to wash away) can be yours for the price of the gas it takes to get there.

Those ugly toes in the picture are mine. And so, for a few hours, was that lovely stretch of beach.

I wonder what the weather will be like this weekend?