Zed said..
The poley sounds like a bit of a douche, but then so do you for wanting to "meet up" with him. Sailing close to her and yelling abuse is perhaps out of order, but you don't know the circumstances. You're naturally going to take your gf's side in this and assume she did nothing wrong, but maybe she did. Maybe she's completely unaware of what she did wrong. I was windsurfing up at Lano in pretty strong conditions came flying in and went to gybe then just caught sight of some Euro chick who came flying back into the beach at some obscure angle and almost collided with me. I jumped off and narrowly avoided being collected at 35km/hr+ - that would have been trashed gear + hospital. She was completely oblivious to what she'd done and was merrily waving to her boyfriend on the beach and I let loose with a few expletives, primarily because I had just shat myself and also because of her careless attitude. I don't give a @h!t if someone drops in on me or gets too close, but I do care about having my board/sail/legs broken. Fast forward an hour and I'm on the beach de-rigging and I can see her and her b/f plus mates glaring at me and so I wander over, apologise for my outburst, but then explain what she did. She was completely unaware, apologised and all was good. So perhaps your g/f unwittingly did something that almost injured the poley?
Irrespectively she sounds like a strong, independent woman, this isn't the 1950s, she doesn't need you to fight her battles for her. If she's going to windsurf, surf, kite etc you both need to expect that if she fücks up, people are entitled to give her a spray, especially if someones health is threatened. If neither of you can cope with this, then she should take up netball or some other girly sport. I will reiterate sailing close to her and risking a collision is not cool, but if I were her, I'd assume I'd made a mistake and get over it.
As I said before she is going up and down the same path pretty much, so a very predictable for everyone route. No upwind or downwind jerks. I think the perception of crossing others' ways is that you guys go harder upwind and shoot further downwind than us in most situations. Maybe this contributes to some misunderstanding?
With regards to kiting vs. netball. Kiting does not require a lot of muscles really, it is more technical. So if my gf was less feminine I agree she should have probably joined the netball team
I believe in equal rights. So women can join kiting, wind surfing or whatever. We are a modern developed country. However, this does not mean that we expect them to work on their guns, take boxing lessons, and yell at those blokes who intimidate them, pick a fight etc.
We can still appreciate they are physically weaker while otherwise equal. My opinion anyway.
PS. I asked Laurie to delete this thread as (and I am not talking about your comment at all) has more entertainment value for some at this stage and I don't have time to go back and comment on everything. Thanks again for some good advise and comments despite the grumpy start. All the other trolls and bad ass mofos who's only intention was to stirr me up, go f$ck youself.
Enjoy everyone.
Finally, I strongly believe that inappropriate response, if going to far, will most likely trigger some less than polite response. We are humans and while I believe staying calm and chillax is a better response I may not always be able to do so. But what I am doing, and will continue to do is to apply a friendly body language and smile, wave etc to those who do the same. Unfortunately some bring their frustration into the sport and this is the cause of it all.
Think the problem is some think that being friendly in general is a weakness. I leave it at that. Cheers.
shux, thanks dude! 
