Have Boogie Board will...

I wanted a boogie board. My first stop was my local Target. It’s a little high end for your garden variety shaped styrofoam toys, but it usually has a good selection of cheap seasonal goods and its not Wal-Mart. It was also not cheap. They had plenty of boogie boards, but these were for pro-boogie boarders and proto-surfers! I wasn’t looking to join the tour. I figured there was a Professional-Boogie Board conference in town and they had stocked up for that in case they got a hankering for a little off season lake boogie boarding, because what they had one hand were not meant for the non-serious once or twice a summer, amateur boogie boarders like me. These were for pro’s. I got discouraged and left.

In my memory, boogie boards were just shaped styrofoam, really just tarted up kick boards - also, in my memory, cheap tarted up kick boards. It turns out my memory is faulty or they last time I priced them I was at a going out of business boogie board sale or that in the land locked island nation of Dallas, Texas the market for them was a little less active then it is closer to the actual ocean.

The next time I was down near the beach I went to a Wal-Mart and went straight for the seasonal crap isle - fully expecting to find a nice, cheap styrofoam board. They didn’t have any nice, cheap shaped styrofoam boards! They had plenty of pricey shaped styrofoam boards! All they had were big, heavy, non-cheap, professional grade shaped styrofoam boards and they wanted big dollars for them! Even at freaking Wal-Mart! I was way out of my league and I hadn’t even signed up to play yet.

This was not looking good for me., but maybe I was looking too close to the water, and the people here were all long time boogie boarders and had all ready gone past the cheap shaped styrofoam board stage and needed these professional grade boards. I went to the kiddie swim toy isle, thinking that perhaps this was where they kept the cheap amateur grade boogie boards. No, not even there. These kids hadn’t used cheap armature grade boogie boards when they had surfed out of the womb.

I was not going to be denied. It was fall, I had all winter to find the elusive cheap boogie board of my memory.


The winter ended and the seasonal isles of my Poverty Barn finally were cleared of plastic Santas, paper-mache hearts and aluminum shamrocks - and were full of red, white and blue plastic margarita sets, el cheapo- guaranteed to shred in the first wind red, white and blue beach umbrellas and made in China red, white and blue flip flops. And, finally, cheap, non - read, white and blue, non-professional grade BOOGIE BOARDS!!!

And the crowd went wild!

I got my very own boogie board! It even comes with a very professional strap so that the board does not boogie with out me! And even more important, it matches my swim burka. I am good to go.

But.

How does one boogie board now that one has a boogie board? I mean, it’s really not like the tarted up kick boards of my youth. Time has marched on, things have changed... So, I went online. There aren’t many sites dedicated to boogie board education, proclivity for Boogie boarding is apparently something that is carried in the genes like eye color or model train lust. You are either born to boogie or you are not. Finally, I found
Boogie boarding do’s and don’ts . My hero.

Bottom line? Among many other Hot To suggestions, he says that, pretty much, it helps if you look good while boarding, and secondly, if the locals barely register the coming wave, you should get ready to boogie, if the locals are excited about a coming wave you should boogie to safety. I can do that.