Firsts

Today, I rode my first wave. Awesome feeling. I'm not a big surfer (obviously) but I had occasionally gone into the ocean with such delusions and failed miserably. Surfing is much more fun now that I can actually do it.

What sort of things have you worked at and finally conquered? What was the feeling like? For me, the other big first -- other than "the big first" -- was being able to run a game of pool without letting the other guy have a turn. For a moment, I felt entirely unbeatable.

Aside from prom night or the back seat of your parents car, what are some of your firsts, i.e., the personal goals you finally achieved?

 

First novel.

Now if there could only be a first publishing.

 

The first time I spent one minute I'll never get back reading this thread.

 

Fortunately, there are some cavemen who were around for dooley's first post. So they have that going for them.

Not sure who'd be around to witness Dooley's first bitchy rant about a thread he didn't have to read, though.

 

I've gone a whole month without buying a DVD for the first time since I bought a DVD player. Does that count? Part of the whole budgeting thing and all.

 

Um, Tex, how would a thread entitled "firsts" be a signal not to read it? And it was mostly tongue in cheek. Chill.

 

Didn't Johnny Utah say this exact same thing to a rankled Gary Busey?

 

I'm pretty chill, pal. But I wonder what you were hoping for out of this thread.

Anyway, my first: put a byline in the Boston Herald. That's about as good as I've got right now.

 

Then Utah got him two.

 

Then came the famous chase scene. Who could forget Patrick Swayze turning a gas pump into a flame thrower and living to tell about it rob more banks so he could surf during the worst hurricane to hit the coast of Australia on record.

They just don't make movies like that anymore.

 

The year after that movie came out, I was at a party where they were debating the accuracy and believability of it.

Fortunately, I was on my fourth or fifth mixed drink, so I was immune to their bullshit.

 

Last time I did that it off the break, against my wife and nobody we knew was around to witness it. I was so happy and so pissed at the same time.