SUNDAY JOINT, 2-25-2024: TRIBUTE TO THE STARS

Hey All,

It is midwinter break for those of us living in the Seattle Public School District, so I took my eighth-grade son and his best pal to Leavenworth for a few days. Not the once-notorious Kansas state penitentiary—although allow me to direct your attention to Frank Grigware, the train-robber turned Leavenworth inmate turned locomotive-powered-gate-busting escapee, who fled to Canada where he became a family man and small-town mayor and died happily at age 91—but the family resort village in the Cascades, two hours northeast of Seattle. It was a great little getaway. We hit the lowkey but mindblowing Reptile Zoo in Monroe to see the two-headed turtle (named Pete and Repete; not as sad as I expected, their heads at least move independently which is more than we can say for the WSL braintrust), did some sledding, mini-golfed, and in general I got to step away from the computer and EOS for the first time since the 2.0 relaunch. Except I didn’t step far. In fact, as the boys nerd-stormed the hallways, lobby, and empty banquet rooms of the Icicle Village Resort, I stalked many of you on Facebook in order to make this 2023 EOS Fundraiser “Thank You” video, which I think you’ll enjoy—come for the happy faces, stay for the Earth, Wind & Fire jam—and if you don’t see yourself please forgive me, I could only fit about 25% of donors into the clip.

So . . . how did the fundraiser do? You might recall that in mid-December, with “raccoon eye circles and rictus smile and shaky over-caffeinated fingers” I sent out a follow-up EOS fundraiser-related Joint because the first week’s numbers were lagging, and while MacKenzie Scott didn’t send us any of that sweet fuck-you-Jeff-Bezos money, the rest of you stepped up and boosted the final tally to just over $72,000. That doesn’t put EOS on Easy Street. But it very much keeps us funded and moving forward in 2024.

“I don’t think that ever in my life have so many people been so directly responsible for my being so very, very glad.” Marlon Brando, picking up what I’m laying down!

Here is the full list of 2023 donors.

Special thanks to the Croul Family Foundation, for again awarding EOS a $25,000 grant. The Croul name will be familiar to surf history devotees, as Spencer Croul is a cofounder of Surfing Heritage and Culture Center and has for decades been doing the not-often-sexy job of gathering, cataloging, organizing, and presenting various and sundry artifacts from our sport’s past—historic surfboards, mostly, but also magazines, books, contest programs, posters, stickers, surfwear, the list goes on, and the work Spencer and SHACC have done is invaluable.

Thanks again, everybody, donors and subscribers and fellow travelers of every kind, and see you next week with a big fat bomber of a Joint.

Matt

[Except for the 1955 Oscars shot of Marlon Brando, Bette Davis, and Grace Kelly, all photos of today’s Joint are of 2023 donors—who I’m not identifying here because, like I said, I Facebook-stole most of the images and didn’t check with any of you guys before making this Joint. Trying to walk that line between paying tribute and being intrusive.]