I’ve been reading Jamie Brisick’s, We Approach Our Martinis With Such High Expectations for the last few nights and like an album worth buying, it has grown on me.

Sex with an ex, fixations on Bridget Bardo, collages of sex ads, surfs on Tavarua, time spent in Paris, Brazil and the Pacific.

At the root of Martinis lies pleasure. More accurately, the pursuit of pleasure, as Brisick doesn’t gloss over the grit that enevitably pairs with the glide.

A used package, once containing two condoms, on which the message, “Multiple Choices” is written.

What else is a rider of waves to write about? We arguably understand the ups and downs that are inherit to the pursuit of pleasure more than most. The act of waveriding is so pleasurable we quit jobs for it, live like paupers in insanely expensive cities or like kings in isolated, impoverished areas. Finding few words to express the pleasure we feel riding waves, we wrap new language around the activity. Where language fails, we gesture wildly with our hands or better, show photos.

The cardboard bottom of a sixer, condensation from the cans have left watermark rings, over which the words, “Lust, Hiccups and Matter over Mind.” are written.

Somehow, Martinis is saturated in these aspects of the life of a waverider without featuring surfing in more than a few stories. It is apparent on every page though, that surfing is the catalyst, the reason this sketchbook like record of Brisick’s globe trotting excesses exists and why you are reading it.

You can purchase Martinis at your local independent bookstore or at Amazon.