I Blew Out My Flip-flop, Stepped on a Pop-Top

The last 10 days here in Playa Hermosa, Guanacaste, have been rainsoaked (way more than usual) with some big surf that has eroded the beach significantly (we don't have any surf normally, so big surf is pretty unusual). Tropical depression Irwin was parked off the Pacific coast of southern Mexico for a week or so and threw a whole crapload of angry ocean at us, as well as 3-5 inches of rain every day for the last week and a half.

This afternoon Carla, Laila and I went down to the beach in front of AquaSport to enjoy low tide and an ocean that was back to its normal calm - swim-able for Laila. I was pretty amazed at how the face of Playa Hermosa's beach had changed. The sand has been eroded down anywhere from 1 - 3 meters and had exposed sand bags, beach logs, trash, shells and even some bones that had been long buried under its beautiful sands for years. I've never seen so many shells on our beach. Carla say's she hasn't seen surf like we've had, or this many shells on the beach in over 10 years.

And I don't doubt her. Why? Remember Pull-tabs (a.k.a. pop-tops) on beer and soda cans? Well, they're back on the beach in Playa Hermosa. Pull-tabs tossed by litter bugs sucking down cold ones back in the 80's - and before - have been unearthed by Mother Nature and are now back on the beach in the light of day after being buried for more than 20 years! And they're all over the place.

I showed one that I found to Carla and asked her if she knew what it was. She had no clue. So I filled her in and she looked at me in quasi-disbelief (born 1977). I told her how we would collect these things and make chains out of them by putting the tab through the ring and bending it over. I told here how most ended up underfoot for someone to step on, and how society became so fed up with the ubiquitous pull-tab that a race for a better "no throw-away" solution for opening a beverage can was born - how someone came up with the stay-on-tab in direct response to the proliferation of pull-tabs discarded throughout every corner of the natural landscape - especially on beaches where bare footed beach combers were shredding their feet on aluminum pop tops (Blew out my flipflop! Stepped on a pop top!).

Nothing like a little nostagia here in Paradise!

Pura bierra!

P.S.: Beverage Can history. Pretty interesting. I had forgotten about press-button tops! But then, I'm a geezer! LOL!