LAIRD OF MAUI

Three important Hawai'ian phrases you must know:
Hello/Goodbye = "Aloha"
Thank you = "Mahalo"
What's up = "Shit, you see what Laird Hamilton did?"

In a world full of X-treme Mountain Dew-chugging goatee-sporting "dude"-spewing dilettantes, one man stands alone as the authentic extreme adventurer. Around here he makes Michael Jordan look like Gary Coleman.

Words cannot do justice, although if any white man can honestly say "I was raised a poor black child," it would be Laird Hamilton. There's books, there's films, there's anecdotes. He gets hurt a lot - says he stopped counting at 1,000 stitches.

Actually he reminds me of a routine Richard Prior did about Sugar Ray Robinson. Someone would be talking about his favorite boxer, and Prior would just say: "what about the time he fought Sugar Ray?" A question invariably met with sullen silence.

Hamilton's about the same. Some guy's talking about his favorite rad cool x-treme sportsman and you can say "yes, someday he might be the equal of Laird Hamilton. After he surfs the biggest wave ever ridden by a human."

[I'm waiting for the Imax movie - UttDC]