I’m sitting here at gate C33 in the Houston airport, which interestingly enough has been renamed the George Bush Intercontinental Airport. We’re talking George Bush version 1.0; you know, the guy who only lasted 4 years in office back in the early 90’s. I can’t imagine anyone in their right mind would name anything after George Dubya Bush. Ok, maybe a garbage transfer station, ouch! The reason I’m in travel limbo at the moment is I’m on my way to Orlando to take in Surf Expo. For those of you not in the know, Surf Expo is the annual trade show for all things wake, kite, wind, surf and skate.

They've encased good ole George in Carbonite, just like Han Solo

In years past the SBC crew has rolled in a pretty big posse with the editors from SBC Kiteboard and Windsport in tow along with a pretty pimped out booth. This year we decided to kick those guys to the curb cause they’re not cool enough to hang with the wake crew (kidding, Pete and John, you guys are the dopes). So this year it’s only going to be yours truly and SBC super-salesman Jamie “Jimmer” Reekie. We’re going to be keeping a low profile around the show; more of a covert ops mission if you will, but still going to be living large at every buffet in the Orlando Conference Centre/International Drive area.

Surf Expo is the time of year when all the manufacturers roll out all of their new product, but most of that stuff has been leaked out on the Internet for a month, so I’m going to bring you the straight dirt. You know the really important stuff like which rider is the most hung-over, who’s career is totally washed up, the wakeskater with the weakest handshake, the number of high-fives I manage to accrue throughout the show, which wakeboarder wants to beat up another wakeboarder for stealing their girlfriend and Andrew Adkison’s yearly dominance of ping pong, sorry TABLE TENNIS.

Besides a busy daytime schedule, the nighttime activities look to be even more entertaining. There’s something big going on every night of the show. Thursday night starts off with the annual WBM Wake Awards. It’s basically the gala night of the entire wakeboarding industry with every pro rider in attendance. Once again a lot of hype seems to floating around the Wakeboard Trick of the Year category. After Danny Harf managed to keep his 1260 under wraps last year, everyone gunning for the title this year is using cloaking technology to keep their trick top secret. Rumor has it that Aaron Rathy stomped a triple grab 1440 wake to wake, so I’m pretty sure he’s a lock.* There’s also the Parks Bonifay documentary and the Nike 6.0 films making their world premieres; busy times, indeed.

My flights just been called so I can finally get the hell out of Texas, thank God. Check in everyday for more updates. And if you’re a big a nerd as I am, I’ll be doing the Twitter updates throughout the whole show.

* This fact may or may not be 100% true and/or false: only time will tell