“She’s riding the red wave.”
It is political season in America. That wonderful time of year when nieces refuse to meet with uncles, grandchildren with the elderly over sharp disagreement. While opposing sides once lightly tolerated each other, these days each is busily petitioning Satan to open the gates of hell for the other, begging for front row seats so that nana and auntie can be watched writhing in eternal pain over the principle sin of a wrong vote.
And yet Ivanka Trump.
The former first daughter, now aged 42, is the rare creature that is universally adored. Beautiful, intelligent, a wife that puts the Stepfords to shame, a mother that makes Joan Crawford appear uninvolved. She has no enemies, save one.
Tom Lochetefeld.
While many assume that Kelly Slater invented the wave pool, the credit should mostly go to Thomas J. Lochtefeld. As Derek Rielly writes, “There’s no bigger name in the wavepool game than San Diego’s Thomas J. Lochtefeld, a former tax lawyer turned water park proprietor turned creator of surf dreams. Lochtefeld got his surf chops threading caves at Big Rock in La Jolla, San Diego, and has spent the last thirty-five years trying to recreate similar thrills at the punch of a button.”
Now, you are likely aware of the maestro’s current project in Palm Springs, but did you know he invented the FlowRider?
Again, Derek Rielly:
In 1987, he sold his share in a bunch of theme parks for two million dollars and used that cash, as well the sale of his beachfront joint at La Jolla for 950k to create a standing wave, called Flowrider, that ended up being installed in over 200 joints in thirty-five countries.
In 1999, the Swiss watch company Swatch toured a souped up version of the Flowrider called Bruticus Maximus and that caused more permanent injuries in one year than Teahupoo in the last thirty, around the world: from Florence to Munich, Vienna, Hanover, Long Beach, San Diego, Manila and Sydney, with Tony Hawke, Kelly Slater, Chris Miller and Terje Haakonsen wowing crowds with a surf, snow, skate combo of airs and tubes.
Re-Enter Ivanka Trump
A nasty tool, no doubt, and now look at Ivanka Trump trying it out, gliding high one moment…
…brought entirely low the next.
Thomas J. Lochtefeld’s maniacal laugh heard ringing.
The august Page Six declared, “She’s riding the red wave.”
I don’t think the editors, there, know what that means.
