Still Skateboarding

Hosoi wins X Games 16 Skate Park Legends

2010-08-04T14:39:00.003-04:00

Ok, I kept my eyes glued to the TV during X-Games 16 so I could catch all the skateboarding that they aired and had to put up with all the BMX and motocross...don't get me wrong, I enjoy watching the other sports, but I hate when they keep telling you that skatepark or skateboard street is coming up and really it's been hours since they starting telling you that skateboarding was coming up next...so annoying! So anyway, I don't think they actually aired the Skate Park Legends compitition but I was stoked to hear that my idol growing up won back to back this year! Yep, Christian Hosoi took the gold again! Now I'm going to go on a quest to find the footage!

Tommy Guerrero Feature at Color Magazine

2010-05-11T11:53:00.004-04:00

Remember watching Tommy Guerrero skate down the streets of San Francisco in Future Primitive or listening to all his funny lines from Search For Animal Chin like "No way, he's got his own milk carton!" Well, then I bet you woke up this morning wondering what Tommy G has been up to lately, well I think we all know he is all about art and music and working behind the scenes over at Deluxe these days but here is a nice feature on him over at Color Magazine's website. Check it out HERE!

Chad Tim Tim's Brother Has A Blog

2010-03-22T11:22:00.003-04:00

I was very stoked about finding this out after DJ Tim Tim (Chad's Older Brother) posted a comment on one of my blogs. To me, this is like a celebrity's brother commenting on my site. These pro skateboarders are celebrities to us non Pro Skateboarders. I remember back in the 80s, the Bones Brigade were all celebrities to me...in some sense they were bigger than life. Also guys like Christian Hosoi were just huge. I actually got to meet and shake Christian Hosoi's hand a couple years ago in Virginia Beach. I have to admit, I was very nervous...I idolized this guy for years....I also met Mike Vallely at a small concert in 2005 and Andy MacDonald at my local skatepark around the same time. I felt nervous and excited meeting all these guys that I used to watch on an almost daily basis trying to learn to skate like them, my idols.

So be sure to check out My Brother Is A Pro Skateboarder...I bet his blog will prove to be a very interesting look at what it's like to be the big brother of a pro skateboarder who also skateboards himself.

Hosoi, Cab, and Eddie Posing for the Cam

2010-03-22T10:52:00.000-04:00

These are some big time legends of skateboarding here...we have Christian Hosoi (my childhood favorite), Steve Caballero, and Eddie Reategui (one of those hardcore Alva dudes! :)) Hosoi has been thriving since he was let out of jail quite a few years ago and became a Christian....it suits his name very well, don't ya think? :) Steve Caballero never stopped shredding - the man is amazing! Eddie Reategui has kept a foot in skateboarding since his hey days. Hosoi and Eddie were both in the 80s movie "Thrashin'" as part of the skateboard gang "The Daggers".

Refocusing Blog

2009-11-20T11:37:00.005-05:00

Ok, since I am now going to attempt to operate two skateboarding blogs, I need to try and keep some sort of structure. So, what I am going to do with Still Skateboarding is make it about older guys and girls who are still shreddin! With No Comply News, that blog will just be about everything and anything skateboarding. Of course both blogs will have reviews of different products and services as usual to help pay the bills. :)

Got My First Domain Name!

2009-11-20T10:55:00.004-05:00

www.stillskateboarding.com is all mine!!!

Okay, this is scary for me....I don't know why, but it is for some reason. I've finally purchased my own domain name. I figured I made enough money blogging now that I can spend the money on a domain name from the blogging and this should now open some more opportunities to make money since some places would not accept my application because my domain name had blogspot.com at the end of it...how annoying!

I feel like I should have purchased a domain name for my other blog http://nocomplynews.blogspot.com, but that page is actually ranked by google as a PR2 and I didn't want to lose that because with a pagerank of 0, you hardly get any opportunities to make money blogging. So that is the reason I decided to purchase a domain name for my unranked blog and I'll just have to work on it's pagerank now....wish me luck! :)

Michael Jackson skateboarding

2009-08-19T16:42:00.005-04:00

I don't know the story behind this photo, but the man was talented with his feet! :) Plus, he had that song and album "Off the Wall"....hmmmm, ya know, the Vans slogan....The King of Pop may have had more ties to skateboarding than I realized! :) That board looks like the first one I ever stepped on as a kid. One of my first memories skateboarding was on one of those skinny plastic boards from the 70s and I was riding on one knee down my sidewalk, I hit a crack and did a nice face plant lip slide....I remember being just a bloody mess running to my mom crying....I was horified seeing my lips all bloody. I'm sure my mom was too, I wonder if she remembers that.

Need HELP with your Rental Property?

2009-08-18T21:03:00.004-04:00

Since I am a 35 year old skater, some of my readers are most likely older skaters like myself who have homes and mortgages and sometimes rental properties. Well I have friends who have told me what a nightmare and hassle it can be to maintain there own property that they are renting out especially when its location is far away.

Real Property Management manages over 20,000 units nationwide, so you know this is a company that handles the job. Also, RMP Midwest joins the National Association of Residential Property Managers to ensure the highest standards in property management services. This is excellent because one thing you don’t want to worry about is the quality of work that your Property Management Company is doing when you are hundreds or thousands of miles away from your property.

If this company wasn’t impressive enough, Freddie Mac has just signed an exclusive agreement with Real Property Management to manage the new REO Rental Initiative. They were featured in the Bizjournal of Cincinnati and Columbus and received the “Franchise of the Year Honorable Mention” award! What more can you ask from a Property Management company?

Tony Hawk Skates with the Zulu

2009-08-18T20:55:00.004-04:00

Straight out of being a comentator at X Games 15, Tony Hawk flew to South Africa on the outskirts of Durban and discovered a skatepark in believe it or not, a Zulu village! "No Way! He's got his own milk carton!" :) LOL. Hawk is a member of the Laureus World Sports Academy and was on hand for the launch of a partnership with Indigo Youth Movement, as part of a larger project to help young people in rural communities develop life skills and confidence through skateboarding. Ya gotta love that man! :)

Web Hosting Geeks

2009-08-18T14:22:00.004-04:00

I think all of us who have our own blogs at some point start toying with the idea of having you own domain and possibly switching from a free service to a pay web hosting provider. The next step is what we all have trouble with. What company should I use? I know I am at a loss. About the only company I can think of off the top of my head is GoDaddy.com because of those commercials they run on TV. Even then, I know nothing about them, if they are any good or even affordable. This is where Web Hosting Geeks comes in to help. They provide you with information as well as reviews of each Web Hosting Service. They rank all the different Web Hosting providers and well as list their features. The ranking is based on the best price-value ratio. Host reliability, uptime, key features, bonus features, customer support, past and current user feedbacks, user-friendliness and hosting awards have been taken into account as well.

In addition to helpful tools for picking your web hosting service, Web Hosting Geeks provides resources such as a Web Hosting Guide as well as articles on How To Make Money with web hosting. Web Hosting Geeks also has a blog on their site that has entries on useful information such as SEO/SEM, e-commerce, security issues as well as web hosting news. If you have more advanced needs, you may want to consider dedicated server hosting geared for a more resource-intensive ecommerce web site or sites that requires extra security. So if you are looking to move your skateboarding blog up in the world and get your own web hosting service and domain name, be sure to visit Web Hosting Geeks first to get all the information you need to make an informed choice.

Dave Chappelle Skateboards?

2009-08-18T14:18:00.005-04:00

That is awesome. I would have never thought he skateboarded! What's even cooler is that he is there skateboarding with his kids. Now Momma needs one too! :)

Copier Guy Requirement: Must wear Musk

2009-08-18T09:53:00.004-04:00

A coworker and I were having a good laugh today after another visit from our copier guy. You see, for some reason, no matter who the repair guy is who is sent to fix our copier, it never fails that they wear way to much cologne! It really must be a requirement for the job. I really am not exaggerating either, you can smell him once he enters the building. Ok, so maybe it’s not entirely that he wears way to much cologne, it could be the fact that we have a no scent policy in my workplace, unfortunately sometimes this policy backfires for those who don’t even wear deorderant…. Yuck!

Since my workplace prohibits it, I rarely wear any scent other than deoderant. When I do wear cologne, I prefer scents like Calvin Klein’s Escape or Drakkar. As far as scents of perfumes, I tend to enjoy the fruity sweet scents of perfume. I’m not a big fan of the flowery scents. I have loved vanilla perfumes that my wife has worn on occasion.

If you are looking for cologne or perfume, be sure to check out Scent They carry a large collection of mens cologne and womens perfume, both discount and popular fragrances at great prices.

Goodbye Earl, Welcome back Jason Lee?

2009-08-13T15:58:00.009-04:00

I guess Jason Lee can shave off his mustache now :( Man, I loved that show and "The Office". I wished they could have saved the show...c'mon people, this is quality entertainment here. Oh well....Farewell. Maybe we'll see more of Jason Lee on the skateboardin' front now with Stereo Skateboards. Or maybe another Jay and Silent Bob Film? Jason Lee has got some talent my friends.

Article below is from http://www.thrfeed.com

Official: 'Earl' finishes list, not going to TBS
Despite attempts to continue NBC's "My Name Is Earl" on cable, seems the studio and TBS were unable to reach an agreement. The show is now officially gone. Here's the post-mortem statement from 20th TV:

"Greg Garcia's brilliant 'My Name is Earl' kept America laughing for the past four seasons and certainly deserved to continue for many more."

"While we had hoped to find a way to produce additional episodes for TBS, in the final analysis we simply could not make the economics work without seriously undermining the artistic integrity of the series."

"As none of us, Greg included, want the show to go out on anything but a high note, we regret that we must put to rest any speculation that Earl will continue. We are grateful to everyone at TBS for their enthusiasm for the series and wish to offer our heartfelt thanks to the cast and crew of My Name is Earl for their incredible work."

Bye Randy, Catalina, Earl, Joy and Darnell

Bye Crabman and Mr. Turtle! Ha! :)

New York's Skate Legend Andy Kessler R.I.P.

2009-08-13T15:34:00.002-04:00

Andy Kessler was a pioneer during New York City's 1970s skateboarding scene and a designer of skate parks who was admired by boarders on both coasts. He died Monday from a Heart Attack brought upon by an allergic reaction to a Wasp sting. He was 48. To learn more about Andy Kessler, watch the following video below...

Skate Shoe Memories: Converse Cons, Vision Street Wear

2009-08-13T10:51:00.009-04:00

I can't believe it, the Converse Cons that I used to wear back in the late 80s have been revamped for the Converse Skateboarding line! How cool is that. The Gold and Black is the new one incase you couldn't tell. They also brought back the Weapon but I don't think that is in the skateboarding lineup. I don't have pics of the other skateboarding shoes they have released because I mainly wanted to show a comparison of the same model from back in the day to now. I'm so happy that the skate companies have started in recent years to bring back the high top....man, when I first started skateboarding, all I would wear was high tops, it just made sense with the ankle protection and stability it brought. Yep, the rolled up jeans and the converse high tops, of course then I moved on to a pair of suede Vision Street Wear High Tops, with the "Ollie Pad" :) Ah yes, there they are down below! Totally Rad! :) Hmm, they still look awesome, wonder if they still make 'em...gonna go check now! :)

Skateboard Legends...I feel sooooo old.

2009-08-12T16:37:00.006-04:00

Man, how did we get so old? I'm so grateful that skateboarding is as big as it is today. I remember thinking I would never quit skating as a kid, but then I did right before I set off for college and I didn't look back really until 12 years later. I do remember throughout the years though when I would see an object that looked skateable, I would envision myself skating it. I think that is something that becomes ingrained in you when you really get into skateboarding and then it never leaves, you see objects in society different than others. EVERYTHING becomes skateable! As you drive down the road, in the back of your mind, you are saying "Oh, that would be fun to skate!" It's really cool to be still watching these guys skate and compete and now instead of just watching a little skate vid that nobody else in the world outside of skateboarding views. We see them compete on the X Games in front of the world...I don't know, some people don't like the media attention on skateboarding, but I like it because it means as I flip through the channels on the TV, I might come across some skateboarding and I love that! :)

Skate Tunes

2009-08-09T02:24:00.005-04:00

I have put a playlist of music I liked skating to back in the day on here. It's a nice collection of old school punk and some newer stuff...project playlist doesn't have everything I'd like to have on here, but I did what I could...check it out and enjoy some punk tunes. I'd love to get the Bones Brigade Tunes album on here...good stuff! :)

So Close to Hitting the Skatepark once again...

2009-08-09T02:12:00.009-04:00

Well, it's been a year and 4 months since I had a car and at the end of last month, I got a car!!!! Yes, I'm so stoked about it and so grateful for the generous friends of the family that donated it to us. You see, my engine threw a rod and at the time, we just could not afford to replace the car and so I traveled mainly by bus, sometimes by bike and sometime by foot. Also a week before my engine blew, I had broken my foot which made life even more insane...I was in 3 different casts for a total of 13 weeks and then was in physical therapy for awhile so I could get rid of my limp! So, things are starting to get back to normal and though I haven't taken my new car to the skatepark, I do have my deck, skate tool and shoes in the trunk and one of these days when I get some time, I shall skate! I have to be honest though, I'm a little scared of injuring myself again because last time really hurt my family financially so I'm a little paranoid about that. I keep thinking I need to shed the 40 lbs I've put on first....baby steps! :)

Hosoi grabs Gold at X Games 15!

2009-08-04T15:06:00.006-04:00

Hosoi

At the Skatepark Legends Final this past Sunday, 10 of the most influential people in skateboarding convened for a showdown of many years of crafted talent. When I look at the list of people, I feel like I must be dreamin'! Just look at this list of legends...

1. Christian Hosoi
2. Chris Miller
3. Lance Mountain
4. Steve Cabellero and Tony Magnusson (Tied)

Other competitors were big names from the 80s...
Lester Kasai, Steve Alba, Duane Peters, Steve Steadham and Pat Ngoho

I'm still scouring the web for the video footage of this so if anyone knows where to find it, please comment with the link! :) Now they need a "Legends of Street" competition! Wouldn't it be awesome to have like Natas Kaupas, Matt Hensley, Mark Gonzalez, Mike Vallely, Johnny Kop, Ron Allen, Tom Knox, Eric Dressen, and whoever else I didn't think of. Now that would be fun to watch too! Here are some more pics from the event that I could find.

Lester Kasai

Lance Mountain

Steve Alba

X Games 15 SuperPark

2009-08-04T14:37:00.007-04:00

Well, X Games 15 is over and somehow all I saw was a little of the big air contest, a little of the big air rail contest and MotoX contest where you are trying to jump the highest. I have got alot to catch up on as far as the skateboarding...I mean, that's all I really care about. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love watching the rest of it too and would if I could. I was trying to find video of the contest I was most looking forward too and that is the Skateboard Park Legends. I have still only found some pics and results but no video except an early practice video. The picture above of the skateboard park is insane! It is so monsterous compared to anything I have skated. It would definitely take me awhile of rolling along the bottom before working up my nerves to try even to get up the walls high enough to grind I think. Given the chance to skate this, I definitely would and I would definitely pad up.

Another Old Skaters Blog

2009-07-27T17:41:00.004-04:00

Sweetness, I just found another Old Skaters Blog! I get a little jealous of alot of these blogs, because I haven't been able to skate as much as they do and I don't ever get any footage, but that's okay. I get enjoyment from the other sites and reading about there adventures and fun. Maybe I'll get out there one of these days with a camera and try to get some more pictures of me skating. Until then, I'll just enjoy other peoples pics of them skateing! HA! Check out this blog guys, it rocks!

Stoked on Hosoi

2009-07-27T17:32:00.005-04:00

Wow, I was browsing the Skateboard Mag website and stumbled upon this advertisement....The board is what caught my eye. I'll have to make sure I check out this interview in the September issue. I was fortunate enough to catch Hosoi while he was in Virginia Beach promoting his movie a couple years ago.

Want a 71 Camaro SS for Free?

2009-07-24T16:50:00.003-04:00

This is just too funny to not share....Free, Disassembled and cut up! Wow, I guess it's already to drive home if you have a flatbed! :) Uhh, does it have an engine? How about cupholders? LOL! :)

Link to real listing.

Old News: Skateboarder Skates Interstate 405 in SoCal

2009-07-24T01:56:00.007-04:00

How did I miss this story of last year....I was browsing a cool site called Skatepunk. You all probably have already checked it out since it was the site of the week on SkateDaily.net Well I don't remember hearing about this, but this dude is nuts! :) I can't believe traffic kept there distance from him though! That is impressive! Be sure to check out the video of it below. Oh, BTW, this was on Go Skateboarding Day of 2008.

Licensed to Ill: Beastie Boys Cancel Tour, Push Back Album Due to Tumor

2009-07-21T09:12:00.003-04:00

The Beastie Boys are canceling their tour and postponing their album after Adam “MCA” Yauch was diagnosed with cancer last week, according to the announcement video they posted on their site. That includes their performance at All Points West, a publicist just confirmed to us, meaning that the festival is currently without a first-day headliner. In true Beastie fashion Yauch apologized to fans, ending with a straightforward “So that’s what’s up.”

Oh man, I can't believe that Adam has cancer. I don't like this getting older bit guys. Everyone starts dying and getting diseases...it sucks. I'm glad he sounds optimistic and I hope these doctors get this tumor removed and Adam is able to overcome this setback and continue to make the awesome music he does with the Beastie Boys. You know, I am a huge fan of older rap groups like Run-DMC, Public Enemy and the Beastie Boys...if I had to pick my favorites, those are them, but if I had to pick a group that has been around and together for decades still making awesome records...it has to be the Beastie Boys. I mean, hell, they still play tracks from the "License to Ill" album today on the alternative stations and rap stations. Beastie Boys, you guys rock! Get well soon Adam! :)

Skateboarder: Ray Barbee

2009-07-17T12:25:00.005-04:00

Ray Barbee had a big impact in my skateboarding back in the late 80s. After initially seeing his video part in Powell-Peralta's Public Domain with Steve Saiz and Chet Thomas "The Rubber Boys". It changed my skating forever. From then on, I was in love with the "No Comply". It became my main trick that I did everywhere besides the ollie. I would study Ray Barbee's video part and try to learn his lines which seems so effortless. I still love watching him skate...he also makes music now. I can only dream of being able to land all his No Comply variations! :) Check out some of his footage below...his public domain footage I watched over and over back in the day...or course that was the only footage I had...my parents had purchased the Public Domain video for me for Christmas and it was the only video from back in the 80s that I actually owned and not copied. :) Oh, and man, I remember taping the audio from the Public Domain part to tape because I loved the music so much...I then played the tape outside on my boombox while we skated either a launch ramp or the rail that I had in my front yard made with 2x4s and plastic coping! :) Ah yes, the Good Ole' Days! :) By the way, the music from Ray Barbee's public domain part is "Weakness" by McRad...yeah and you can believe I've got it on my iPod. :)

Public Domain "Rubber Boys" - 1988

Public Domain "Mini Ramp Sesh" - 1998

Ban This - 1989

Propoganda - 1990

This is my Element - 2007

Unfortunately I can't find a clip of Ray Barbee In the Firm's "Can't stop the Firm"...but I did find some of what looks like homemade footage, but mabye it is an older Firm video from 1992? Not sure. Worth a watch though.

Angelina Jolie supports skateboarding!?!?

2009-07-15T09:17:00.008-04:00

....and uhh, the right to bear arms? :) Okay, so this is obviously a fake, although whoever Photoshoped this did an excellent job. There is also a good one of Tom Cruise on a board. I don't know how I stumbled upon this site Freakingnews.com but I did and apparently this site had a contest for photoshopping a skateboard picture. Well, I couldn't resist sharing this odd collection...Check out the other pictures here.

OMG! I'm a Middle Aged Skateboarder!

2009-07-13T10:22:00.017-04:00

I found this awesome article on the San Francisco Chronicle's website...www.sfgate.com. The article is by Mark Simborg and really captures what skateboarding is for me as a 35 year old. I too have experienced skateboarding in the 70s,80s,90s and today. Funny, because when I started back up again in 2004 when I hadn't really skateboarded since 1991, I thought I was the only one, so I went scouring the web for other older skaters like myself to really help myself get over the awkwardness I felt by going to the skatepark as this 30 year old with a wife, 2 kids and a mortgage trying to skate with the 14 year olds...this voice in the back of my head kept telling me I was "crazy" and that I was too old for this childish activity. But I could not resist, I craved that feeling again, the feel of the board beneath my feet, the feel or an ollie or landing a trick and rolling away...it just feels so good and comfortable and all is right with the world when I am on my board....it's hard to explain....maybe it's just a return to a time in life where you didn't have to worry about bills or keeping a roof over your head or putting food in your belly. A time of less stress....it certainly is addicting and I found can be dangerous if this escape is used so often that you really have escaped the reality of adult life and responsibilities. So be careful that you balance skateboarding in your adult life with everything else otherwise this de-stressing activity of your youth could end up causing more stress. So check out the article below, it is awesome and will make you want to grab your board and go skate....heck, it makes me wish I still had my old Hosoi Hammerhead deck from the 80s. Dear Santa, please send Hosoi Hammerhead Reissue this Christmas! :) Ha! Oh, by the way, if you read my last post about the Screaming Hand Skateboard Flashdrive....my Mom and Dad read the post and decided to purchase it for me! Thanks Mom and Dad! You are the Best! :)

Shredding Again
In which we chronicle midlife skateboarders and their return, to be schooled by 6-year-oldsArticle from www.sfgate.com by Mark Simborg

On a brilliantly clear Sunday morning in June, an SUV pulls into the nearly empty lot of the Pacifica Skatepark. The ocean crashes a mere 300 yards away, across Hwy. 1, close enough to hear its rumble, and taste the salty air. By Pacifica standards it is a good surf day: warm, sunny, waves 3 or 4 feet high and not yet blown into a crumbly mess. Surfers dot the water like an army of seals. They jockey for position, waiting for the perfect crest to float their way. Back at the skate park, Bob Gardali steps out of his SUV. He goes to the back, opens it, unzips a large black duffle full of skate decks, some with wheels, some without - all tanks by today's standards: big, 30-inch-long, 8-inch-wide boards with flat noses. He grabs some pads, and then, smiling, rests himself on the bumper and begins to untie his shoes. He is 41 and he is about to score the best waves of the day - crowd-free, wetsuit-free, no bone-chilling water or sharks or heavy equipment. The Bay Area, after all, is now full of perfect waves. All you need are some wheels.

Gardali is a member of skateboarding's newest legion: men in their 30s, 40s or even 50s, married or unmarried, with or without kids, from every type of professional background, who grew up in skateboarding's early days and now find themselves, besides aging fast, in hog heaven: a time, unimaginable in the '70s or '80s, when new, government-sponsored valleys of carveable cement transitions topped with slick metal coping open every week. What else to do but take it up again?

"In the '70s it was always skating in the street or the driveways," said Gardali, a lieutenant commander in the Coast Guard. "Now with all the new parks, that's the reason why I've kept it up. At my age I have no desire to skate driveways or fight with cars in the street."

Gardali grew up skating in San Mateo but quit around 1980. "Life," he said, when asked why he stopped. "I was in high school, playing other sports, girls." A few years ago Gardali saw the movie "Lords of Dogtown," which portrays the "Z-Boys" - a group of Venice, Calif., teens who revolutionized skateboarding by taking it to the drained pools of the 1975 drought, essentially inventing modern-day skating - and decided his skating days weren't over yet. "That final scene, when they're in the Dogbowl? I thought: 'I can do that!' I dug out my old original '78 Dogtown skateboard and went to a park."

Gardali typifies today's older skateboarder: started when he was young, dropped it in his teens or early 20s, started back up again recently thanks to the plethora of skate parks. His equipment is old school - original or reissued decks from the '70s or '80s and trucks by Tracker or Independent. His terrain of choice? The skate park, of course, where the fast freedom of "Dogtown" carving is so readily attained.

"(The parks) keep getting better, with Pacifica and Sacramento being far better than anything in the '80s that I ever rode," said San Francisco resident Michael Wehner, 50. Wehner skates a reissued 1980s Powell with skull and crossbones graphics but actually started skating long before the original version of his reissued board came out. "In my generation the boards didn't even have graphics," he said.

Wehner said he returned to skateboarding about seven years ago when a friend invited him to skate a local park. "It was pretty crazy. I've had to teach myself things over again."

All over the Bay Area older skaters like Gardali and Wehner are pouring back into the scene, creating a strange demographic loop in the parks. "That whole middle ground is definitely missing, the twenty-something skaters," said Ross resident David Schaeffer, 31. "It's either us or the little guys."

A breezy Saturday morning found Schaeffer standing atop the sprawling San Rafael skate park, surveying the activity from a picnic bench area. "I wish I were good enough to ride even half of it," he said. "I come here and just get schooled by 6-year-olds."

Schaeffer skateboarded as a kid but stopped in high school. "I started snowboarding when I was 14 and got completely addicted and thought it was silly to slam onto concrete when I could fall on the snow," he said. Earlier this year, Schaeffer discovered a skate park only minutes from his office in the East Bay (he is product manager of Outerwear at North Face) and with a co-worker decided to hit it up as a lunchtime tension reliever. Now, skating parks has become a weekly activity. "I'm not leaning on any skateboarding skills because I really don't have any," he said. "I'm leaning on snowboarding skills." Schaeffer's wife doesn't exactly approve. "She thinks it's silly, but then she thinks a lot of the stuff I do is silly."

The midlife-crisis angle is not lost on today's older skateboarders, or their wives. Said Gardali: "When my wife finally accepted me skateboarding, she said, 'Skating's a lot less expensive than a twenty-something blonde.' "

"We spend a couple hundred on boards instead of Ferraris and extramarital affairs," added Gardali's friend, Kieth Plymate, 45, who regularly skates the Pacifica park with Gardali.

But outside of midlife angst, what would inspire a person in their 30s, 40s or 50s to pick up a skateboard? To understand this it would help to look at the rough history from which the sport has emerged. Rewinding 20 years from Gardali's inspiration, the Z-Boys, we arrive at the first skateboarders: 1950s California surfers looking for the same sensation on pavement for their surfing downtime. Nobody knows who did it first, but at some point a wooden plank was mounted onto roller skate wheels, and presto - the first skateboard.

The popularity of skateboarding surged in the early '60s, with manufacturers building decks shaped like surfboards and SkateBoarder magazine publishing its first issues, but in 1965 "safety experts" came down on the sport, urging shops to stop selling skateboards and parents not to allow their children to skate. Skateboarding died almost overnight.

Then came urethane, an oil-based composite that provides a satiny ride compared with clay, and by the early '70s skateboard manufacturers were back in business, mounting their decks on these translucent wheels that didn't jam stop at every pebble and also gripped the pavement, allowing for high stability and serious carving potential. At the same time the Z-Boys (Z for Zephyr, the name of their surf and skate team, which itself came from the name of a local shop, Jeff Ho Surfboards and Zephyr Productions) were just beginning to take their wild, low-riding surf style to the pavement. The drought of 1975 led to empty pools and, thanks to the Z-Boys, the birth of the "vert," or vertical, skateboarding era. The first skate parks appeared in the late '70s and were largely private endeavors. Derby Skatepark in Santa Cruz - a long, snaky ditch caked with graffiti - is one of the few remaining parks from that era, as most were shut down in the early '80s thanks to orbital insurance premiums and landowners cashing in on escalated real estate values.

While skateboarding originated in Southern California, it was Northern California that would come to be known as the sport's mecca. In the '80s, San Francisco was home to some of the most unwittingly delicious urban skateboarding terrain on the planet (it still is, though some of these spots have since been skate-proofed): the stage and steps of the Embarcadero's Justin Herman Plaza, Hunters Point Dish, the embankments of Fort Miley, the steps and ledges of Pier 7, the steps at Hubba Hideout, the wide, mellow-sloping avenues of the Sunset - if you made it to San Francisco as a skateboarder, you had made it to the promised land.

San Francisco was also home to one of the country's largest skateboarding subcultures, and this subculture would produce some of the decade's finest skaters. The beginning of a 1985 skateboarding documentary, "Future Primitive," shows San Francisco's Tommy Guerrero carving, ollying and sliding his way down an avenue in the Sunset District to the chords of a bluesy skateboarding ode: "Well I'm a Future Primitive, and I skate to live."

The film was the second of a series produced by Z-Boy-turned-entrepreneur Stacy Peralta and his partner George Powell (creators of the powerhouse skateboarding brand Powell Peralta), featuring a group of skaters known as the Bones Brigade. Another member of the Brigade was San Jose's Tony Caballero (Cab), whose backyard ramp in the '80s attained an almost iconic status among Bay Area skaters. "Dude - I heard he skated Cab's ramp," was a common refrain.

Nothing else quite captures the tumultuous ride skateboarding took through the last two decades of the 20th century as well as the history of Bones Brigade member Tony Hawk. In 1983 Hawk was a 14-year-old skateboarding phenom, a vert-ramp specialist who was the first to pull off any number of tricks, including the 720 (two spins in the air; in 1999 he would also be the first to land a 900). By 1986 his name was synonymous with high-flying skateboard mastery. But in the late '80s the skateboarding industry crashed again, and this crash was followed by a major shift in the sport - from vert to street. Suddenly, Hawk's specialty was out, and street skating was in. Hawk suffered financially and went through a divorce. Succor arrived in 1995 when the X-Games thrust vert-skating back into the spotlight. Media attention continued to refuel the sport's popularity, and by 1998 skateboarding had begun to move into a place most skaters never thought (or maybe even hoped) it would: the mainstream. Hawk is now, quite literally, a multimillion-dollar industry unto himself, and skateboarding is being considered for the 2012 Olympics.

Something else happened in the late '90s: California passed AB1296, which declared skateboarding in a public skate park a "hazardous recreational activity" if the skateboarder is 14 or older. While it didn't completely let skate parks off the hook liability-wise, AB1296, renewed in 2003 as SB996, significantly reduced cities' insurance exposures and set the stage for an unprecedented period of skate park construction. Today there are nearly 100 in Northern California alone, most of them built over the past five years.

Fairfax resident Robert LeCussan, 33, lived the end of the first skate park era and the beginning of the second. "Basically, the only park available at the time was closed," he said. "It was a park built by some kids on the second floor of an abandoned building in South San Jose. That was the only fun place to skate." At 18 LeCussan stopped skateboarding seriously, but started up again when the indoor Milpitas park opened in 2001 (now closed). He now skates the San Rafael park every weekend.

On a Saturday evening in June, LeCussan, a transpersonal psychologist, kick-turned around the edges of the San Rafael park, steering clear of the raucous group of tweens attacking one of the park's centerpieces: a four-way ramp surrounded by banks. As a kid, LeCussan sprained his ankle attempting an ollie when his front foot slid off the nose of his board. It's why he now skates a "popsicle stick," the upturned nose of which makes this practically impossible, and also why he wears full pads: for the wrists, knees, elbows and, of course, the head.

"As long as I'm padded up, I'm still willing to get back into it," he said.

Gardali is also no stranger to injuries, though his have come in Phase 2. In December 2005 he cracked two ribs trying to drop in at the Pacifica skate park (for the record, he returned in March 2006 and did it). He has also cracked two helmets since his triumphant return to skateboarding. If it wasn't for today's pads, Gardali said, he might not have gone back to the sport. "The pads are so good that you don't feel anything."

For Schaeffer, skateboarding is nothing short of petrifying. "It's concrete, not snow - there are consequences," he said. For this reason Schaeffer is perfectly happy leaving the tricks to the younger guys and focusing instead on carving. "I just want to get that juice, that feeling, from skateboarding, the same feeling I get from snowboarding."

Schaeffer's sentiment is illustrative of the other gap: the gap in endeavor. Where new-schoolers tend to focus on tricks, old-schoolers are more intent on surfing the transitions, reaching that high carve that will give them the feeling of plunging down the face of a wave or arching a turn in 3 feet of powder. With such dissimilarity one might expect friction between the groups, but the dynamic is one of mutual respect.

"I'm learning so much from kids who aren't even 10 years old," Schaeffer said.

From the kids' perspective, the old-schoolers are a welcomed addition to the parks.

"They rock!" said Colin Dallara, 11, from Lagunitas. "They remind me of the Z-Boys; they're really good at axle stalls."

"They can go really high on bowls and they're practically touching the top but they're not," added Dallara's friend Nicholas Tribble, 10, from Petaluma. "They look like they're flying."

"And they have big wheels," contributed Alex Hartford, also 10 and from Petaluma.

"Bend your knees!" Hartford and his friends called to Schaeffer as he tried to negotiate one of the San Rafael park's quirkier features: a down-sloping series of bumps followed by a steep embankment.

"You can go down and roll over the bumps and then ollie off the lip," Tribble told Schaeffer a little later, as they waited their turn. "I can't ollie," Schaeffer replied matter-of-factly.

"Is that an old-school board?" Dallara asked, pointing to Schaeffer's deck. To any old schooler the board's unique hammerhead shape would have made it a dead giveaway as a Christian Hosoi. In the '80s Hosoi rivaled - even bettered, by some estimates - Tony Hawk's aerial wizardry, but his life would take an even more dramatic fall than Hawk's when vert skating lost its popularity in the early '90s. A 2006 film, "Rising Son: The Legend of Christian Hosoi," documents Hosoi's plunge into bankruptcy and crime, and subsequent resurrection through Christianity.

"Yes it is," Schaeffer replied.

"Awesome! Can I try it?"

"Yes you can."

"Hosoi used to bust fat airs on that board," Schaeffer muttered as Dallara kick-turned around, commenting on the board's smoothness.

In fact, Hosoi still busts fat airs on that board. In 2004, within weeks of release from a five-year prison sentence for drug trafficking, he got back on his deck and returned to high-flying vertiginous grace. Last year Hosoi signed a deal with Vans for a shoe featuring the same Rising Sun graphic found on his debut pro model skateboard, released with Sims Skateboards when he was just 16.

Perhaps LeCussan said it best: "There's something about skating that's a unique feeling - something about taking a fall and getting back up that's like nothing else in life. It makes the little troubles you have in real life a little easier to deal with."

-- Video: For more skateboard action, check out SFGate.com/magazine. To see an excerpt from "Future Primitive," go to sfgate.com/ZBEB

-- Video: For more skateboard action, check out SFGate.com/magazine. To see an excerpt from "Future Primitive," go to sfgate.com/ZBEB

Mark Simborg is a San Francisco freelance writer. He is still searching for Animal Chin.

This article appeared on page P - 12 of the San Francisco Chronicle

Skateboard USB Flash Drive

2009-06-30T16:16:00.000-04:00

Okay, you don't know how excited I am to have found this....I NEED THIS! I feel like a kid in a candy shop! You can buy it here at TigerDirect. I mean, it's not JUST a skateboard flash drive...for any of you who skated in the 80s, you know this is the Jim Phillips screaming hand graphic! I have this graphic on a t-shirt from the 80s, it is so worn out because it was my favorite and one of the few skateshirts I have from back then "because I was a shmuk who let this weasel borrow some of my skateshirts back then to never return them and then move!!! GURR!!" -but no I'm not bitter...not at all! :) LOL!

Tony Hawk skates at White House for Father’s Day

2009-06-30T09:50:00.000-04:00

I know this news is old, but I had meant to comment on this when I heard about it...With permission from White House Officials, Tony Hawk does what any skateboarder would be thinking while walking down a hall in the white house....he skateboards down it! Sweet! Hawk, 41, skated in the grand foyer and the nearby Old Executive Office Building and yes, of course he had permission...I cannot believe after Hawk twittered the photo, so many people were commenting how offensive it was to do such an act, that is was disrespectful.....C'Mon people, he got permission and he rolled down a hallway. It's not like he was trying to damage Whitehouse property. Hawk joined other dads, athletes and celebrities at a Father’s Day forum hosted by President Obama, including NBA players Dwyane Wade of the Miami Heat and Etan Thomas of the Washington Wizards. Hawk has done so many things that I didn't think I would see him do when I watched him in skate videos when he was a skinny teenager in the 80s. I certainly didn't think he would be at celebrity status and I didn't think skateboarding would be where it is today with huge competitions like the X Games, The Dew Tour, The Maloof Cup and all the skateboarding parks around the world...along with June 21, Go Skateboarding Day! We have our own day...it's just too awesome. Hard to imagine that back in 1991, skateboarding was almost non existent for a little while.

Pro Skateboarder Jereme Rogers Retires?

2009-06-18T12:23:00.000-04:00

I've got to say, when I first saw this posted on SkateDaily, I was stunned and confused. I mean, okay, so he wants to focus on music now, fine. But a big announcement that you are "Officially Retiring from Skateboarding" along with a retirement party? What the hell? Who does that in skateboarding? It just seems like he is saying that he is not going to skateboard anymore, whereas skaters like Tony Hawk announced way back that he was retiring from Competitive skateboarding. So he still skates, just doesn't compete...now that makes sense for a skateboarder....do we ever really want to quit skateboarding.....I don't think so unless you really don't have that passion for it and you just did it because you had a gift for it. Maybe that is what it's about for him, maybe he just had a gift but not a love for skateboarding that I think most of us who have stuck with it for so long, have. I mean, look at Jason Lee, star of "My Name Is Earl". Did he ever announce his retirement from skateboarding? I don't think so...if so I missed it. We all know he still skates and makes appearances in videos every once in awhile and we also know he is an actor. I just don't get why Jereme Rogers announced his retirement, why not just go about your business focusing more on you music and less on skateboarding...but still skateboard? Whatever...I just thought it was weird...

Happy Belated Birthday Mark Gonzales

2009-06-02T17:14:00.000-04:00

Mark Gonzales turned 40 yesterday...oh man, how time flies! I think back to the first video I saw Mark Gonzales in, it didn't really do him justice as it was a competition...as you all know, he has some amazing footage in many skate films, but check out the first footage I ever saw of him...I had checked this video out at the local skate shop in Bellevue, Nebraska where I lived...it was actually a Bike Shop called "Earl's Bikes", if I remember correctly. Earl was a cool guy, he was always willing to help all the kids get the skateboard gear they wanted and he was the only shop I knew of in town in the 80s that sold quality skate stuff. It was a pretty sketchy place however, located between two oil stacks in a old metal warehouse down a gravel road with no other shops around. Thinking back on it now, I bet his rent was cheap! :) Anyways, I think I borrowed a friends VCR and connected it to my Dad's and recorded a copy of this video....the old way of pirating...man it took so much effort back then! :)

Check out the clip....man, I miss launch ramps! :) Well, without further adoo, Sticker Head, Mark Gonzales! :)

Remember Airwalks?

2009-05-13T12:00:00.000-04:00

I do mean the shoes and not the trick. I was passing by Payless Shoe Store one day and I saw on their window a banner for Airwalk Shoes. If you were skating in the late 80's, you probably had a pair of Airwalk skate shoes at some point. Remember the big velcro shoelace cover? Well, I went to Payless Shoes website and scrolled through the airwalk selection. I wasn't impressed. I don't understand why one of the first companies to make shoes just for skateboarding has gotten away from that. They are cheap and I feel like i must get a pair for nostalsia purposes. The one I have pictured up top is the closest I could find to that logo they used to have on all there shoes back in the late 80s. The picture below is an Airwalk Reissue of their "Prototype" shoe in the late 80s....wow, I remember those! I always wanted a pair of those but remember them costing too much.

1982 Skateboarding Flashback

2009-02-23T09:32:00.000-05:00

Take a trip down memory lane...actually for me, 1982 skateboarding is before I really started skateboarding. I was 8 years old and the most skateboarding I probably did was on this really skinny plastic skateboard...it was modeled after the early skinny wooden skateboards...and sometime in the lates 80s, I figured out I was able to pop some crazy high ollies on this board and well, these boards were not designed for that and it snapped in half. I wish now that I would have treated that deck with more respect so i could still have that piece of skateboarding history. Flip through all of 1982's Thrasher issues online for free at Thrasher Magazine's website.

Skate the Pipeline

2009-02-17T10:53:00.000-05:00

I never had the opportunity to skate those huge Pipes I used to see in all those skate videos of the 70s, 80s and 90s. I always thought it would be fun to do so, should I ever come across one in my travels, but until then I'll just sit at my cubicle and dream and visit sites like www.desertpipes.com that showcase these crazy huge monstrosities. It's a cool site that tells the history of these pipes which I had no idea why those things were sitting out in the desert until now. Can you imagine climbing down a 200ft hole and then walking a couple miles through smaller pipes to get to the big one and you are way way underground, carrying lanterns so you can see...all just to skate a pipe! Pretty sketchy but it sounds like they had fun on these adventures.

Alphainventions

2009-02-16T12:24:00.000-05:00

I am very impressed with this website. I actually stumbled upon a website called fiddlewiddle.com which one day got me over 1,000 hits. Although it stopped working for some reason the last couple days I've tried it. So I saw that the traffic being referred by Alphainventions.com and so I visited that site and found out that it does the same thing that fiddlewiddle does. I'm not really sure, but I think fiddlewiddle is a work in process by the guy behind alphainventions. Anyhow, I highly recommend visiting alphainventions.com and adding your blog to their rotating list and you will instantly get more traffic and exposure as well as the chance to discover some interesting new blogs for yourself as they rotate through. The creator of this website is just plain brilliant! What a great idea! Check it out yourself!

Insane Skate Footy

2009-02-16T10:50:00.000-05:00

I'm not trying to be a video blog, but my last couple post have been just that. I stumbled across a cool skate blog today called http://www.cheeseburgersupreme.com/. On this blog, there was a post titled "Damn Asians" and it was this sick youtube video of Gou Miyagi's video part in a skate video called "Overground Broadcasting" pulling off some jaw dropping grind combos. I was highly impressed...check it out for yourself...

Natas Kaupas in Wheels of Fire

2009-02-12T15:45:00.000-05:00

Hey look everybody, it's the Pickpocket Man! What can I say, this video part is part of me, of my skateboarding life. The music is ingrained into my brain forever. I remember watching this video part over and over and learning every move Natas made. He seems like the kind of goofball guy you'd love to go skate with...in fact he reminded me of one of my skateboarding buddies back then. If you haven't already, watch and learn...this is skateboarding with style...If you've already seen it, well, kick back and relive the memories and then go out and do some wallies if you still can! :)

PS. Here is the song info for those of you interested...

Eight Dayz (Claus Grabke's band) - Pick Pocket Man Band

Eight Dayz - Leave Me All Alone

Kahuna Big Stick

2009-02-09T10:14:00.000-05:00

Now this thing looks like 100% Pure cruisin' fun! :) I've only ridden a longboard a couple times and do not own one myself, but I love the soft wheels on longboards and just the smoothness of the ride and I from watching this footage, I can see how the stick probably helps you lean into turns more and you don't have to take your feet off to push because it's like a paddle. I've been seeing ads for it pop up on skateboard sites since November I think and I just saw a couple pictures pop up on a newsite showing Matthew McConaughey riding with one. You can get these bad boys at http://kahunacreations.com/.

ABC Nightline Pool Skating Coverage

2009-01-29T12:32:00.000-05:00

Did anyone see ABC's Nightline coverage last night of the foreclosures in Fresno, California? The news piece was called "Riding the Foreclosure Wave" and featured some local pool skaters. I am always shocked when news stories feature skateboarding even though it is a more popular sport nowadays. They somehow ended it with saying that pool skating is what led to things like the megaramp and then they show the clip of Jake Brown's bone breaking, spine tingling slam of all slams. The news loves to show that clip.

http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=6746457

Watch Skate Videos Online

2009-01-26T10:50:00.000-05:00

I just stumbled upon this site today while searching the web to see if there was a new Black Label video out. There doesn't seem to be from my findings, but I did discover this awesome site! At first glance it makes me feel like a kid in a candy store! All these skate videos streaming from one place?!?! No WAY! That is just too cool! Anyways, I just clicked on Powell Peralta videos and they have all the classics on here...SWEET! I may have to watch some Future Primitive at work today! :) Check it out holmes!

http://www.skatevideosonline.net/

Black Label's Back in Black

2009-01-26T10:34:00.000-05:00

I was just thinking about this video for some reason this morning. I used to hop on the treadmill everyday for 30 minutes and I would pop in the DVD player a skate video to make the time go by faster. I haven't been on the treadmill regularly since 2006, and this video was one of the last ones I was watching all the time. If you have not seen it, you should, it is some raw hardcore skating...Black Label videos usually are. A scene that sticks out is Matt Mumford falling in a pool splitting his head open and he is wearing a "Jason-Friday the 13th mask" and carrying a machete... Crazy bastard! Hmmmm.......I wonder if Black Label has a new video out...

Obama Skateboards

2009-01-21T10:31:00.000-05:00

This just may be the coolest president we have ever had. I can't tell you how excited I am to have Barack Obama as our president and I know alot of people share in my excitement. He inspires me and restores my hope and pride in our country. He also is very marketable. Have you seen all the merchandise you can purchase with his face on it?!? I mean, WOW. I don't remember any past presidents that were this cool. I mean, Obama t-shirts are as cool as Bob Marley t-shirts. It's insane, but you know what, I would buy a t-shirt, in fact I want one. I thought Bill Clinton was a pretty cool president, but he has nothing on Obama. I never thought to myself, hey, I want a Bill Clinton T-shirt or hey, let me search for skateboard decks with Bill Clinton on them. But for some reason, I am extrememly proud to display Obama pictures on my desktop, on t-shirts and I did a search this morning for "Obama Skateboards" and came up with a bunch of cool shit! The picture above is a sampling of decks from Zazzle.com. This is not the only company selling Obama skateboards, just do a google search and you'll find a slew of other decks that have really cool and artistic graphics of Obama on them.

Also, Satori has put out a skateboard wheel with Obama on them. What's next, will Independent Trucks issue a limited Obama truck? :) I shouldn't laugh, it may already be out! :) Oh and I have to say, the last time I stopped into a 7-11, I was blown away by all the commemerative Obama stuff...trading cards, coins, you name it...the man is our president and a pop icon/rock star! :)

Cheap Skateboards

2009-01-06T17:55:00.000-05:00

As a child skateboarding, I didn't have much money to spend on skateboards so I usually bought them used from friends who bought new decks. I have also made my own skateboard when naked decks were big. Now, blank decks are probably the cheapest skateboards you will find. I did alot of searching on the web and in local stores for cheap affordable skateboards that were also good quality. After all my searching and testing, I found the best place to get them is on ebay from http://stores.ebay.com/Slam-N-City-Skateboards

Yes, it is an ebay store but you can't beat their prices and the decks are good in my opinion. They don't have too much concave or too little concave, it is just right and very comfortable. I'm trying to remember what exactly I paid for these decks, but it came out in the end to be about $14 a deck including the grip tape. That is without trucks and wheels and bearings, but those parts usually last me for at least 2 decks, then my trucks and wheels start to wear down. I purchased my decks in packages of 5 for like $58 dollars or something including grip and then I think it was like $12 for shipping...so $70 total for 5 decks with griptape...so yes $14 freaking dollars a deck...that is a whole lot cheaper than $55-65 dollars for a pro deck! And let me tell you, it is so cool to recieve 5 decks in the mail with grip. I think you might be able to save even more money if you bye a 10 deck package. Anyhow, I have actually sold some of my decks for a small profit to local kids who needed a board. Sometime the younger kids don't want to have to wait until Mom and Dad can take them to the store so they get desperate and buy decks from anyone as long as they are decent and these are. So, I highly recommend SlamNCity Skateboards on ebay...the decks that I bought from them had the Litezpeed logo on them. The SlamNCity website is down right now, but said they will be back up after January 7, 2009. So check them out then!

Another blank deck that I got off ebay was from TGM skateboards. These were high quality decks but I could not stand how steep and long the nose was on these blank decks. I hated it and ended up giving this deck away. I purchased a complete skateboard from these guys for like $30 or something...it had everything and was ready to ride. In fact I am riding the Core trucks that this board came with on my current deck. I'd say if you like steep long noses, give these blanks a try..I would recomment you check these guys out because they do sell pro decks too for cheap and they have some other really good deals.

Beware of deals that are way too cheap and don't give a good picture angle on the decks. I can't remember the name of the seller, but it was from ebay and the decks were crazy cheap like $7 a deck or something and they turned out to be a flat piece of really thick plywood with like glitter griptape...it wasn't even tape, just like somebody put glue on the deck and then sprinkled some sand on it! HA! :) Straight up firewood man! So be careful when you are trying to get the cheapest skateboard ever because sometimes you do get what you pay for! :)

PS. I tried buying a butt load of blank wheels from SlamNcity once and I don't recommend them...they smelled bad and really slowed me down even with good bearings, the wheels just made you go sooooo slow! I let some friends try them to see if it was just me, but it wasn't...they just plain sucked. So, unless they have changed who they get these blank wheels from, stay away from them.

Skaters Anonymous?

2008-12-27T00:43:00.000-05:00

Hi, my name is Kraston and I'm a skataholic. Have you ever felt like you've got a problem? I know when I was around 13 years old after skating a couple years that I was an addict. I lived, breathed, ate, slept skateboarding. It was always and I mean always on my mind. I remember Rodney Mullen in a skate video....probably Public Domain where he talks about education and your mind and how skateboarding helped him focus so he wouldn't go crazy. After seeing that, I thought, yeah, that's right...skateboarding is good for you, good for school and my grades will get better because I skateboard. Wrong! I never did my homework, I just wanted to skate and when I was in school, I looked at skate mags, played with my finger board and dreamed about skateboarding once the bell rang. It totally consumed me and I never could imagine quitting...well, at some point in the early 90s, alot of my skater friends quit skating as much and looking back now, it was a slow time in skateboarding history. I wanted to hang out with girls more and drive and skateboarding just faded a little for me...I didn't have time for it anymore. So 12 years later, I get the spark again and I start skating again at 30 years old. Guess what happens? The addict in me comes out again, only now I am a responsible 30 year old adult with a wife of 7 years, a mortgage and 2 young children. Well, I didn't think I would be so consumed with it at first, I just knew I wanted to skate again...there were free parks I could skate at now that were not around when I was in my teens and all sorts of fun opportunities, plus I got on my board and I could still do all my old tricks and now I've even learned new ones. When I first started up again, I was nervous, embarrassed because I was the only old guy I saw at the park. Once I got over that, I just wanted to skate all the time, so my skate on my 30 min lunch break got to be much much more and soon I was skateboarding when I shouldn't be and lying to my wife and sneaking off somewhere to skate on trips to the grocery store even. I would get upset at myself if I didn't skate every single day, I was obsessed with getting better and learning and landing more flip tricks....it was crazy. It was just like when I was a kid, except now I was suppose to be more mature about things like this, but no, it took over...a song comes to mind...ST...."beware, he's possessed to skate!" Yep, that was me. You know, sometimes you can get too much of a good thing. I didn't want my wife and kids to be part of my skateboarding obsession. I wanted to go by myself to the skatepark....don't get me wrong, I wanted my kids to learn how to skateboard, but they were way to young and I was being selfish, not wanting to have to parent while doing my "stress relief" activity, ya know. Well, I've learned now that I had the wrong attitude. I now have gotten myself into a sticky situation with my family and with my finances and my obsession with having fun on my wooden toy played a part in hurting both my family and my finances. Since breaking my foot and causing a huge financial blow to my family, I have learned that skateboarding in your 30s with a wife and kids needs to done in moderation and you should get your family involved in your hobbies, not keep them hidden to yourself...make a day out of your skateboarding adventures or at least invite your wife and kids to come watch...don't exclude them from your passions in life. I did that and I screwed up. My wife supported my skateboarding and now she doesn't want me to have anything to do with it. I still love skateboarding and always will. I long to get back on my board and to the skatepark to feel the grind on my trucks against the concrete and do some noseslides on my favorite ledge and to knock out some no comply's. I will get to the park ones of these days as I am very rusty now since I haven't skated since March other than a few see if I can still ollie sessions! :) ha! I will do it right this time, I will not blow off other responsibilities to my family or work in order to go skate and I will not be obsessed about it. I will make attempts at involving my family in skateboarding with me and not exclude them like I have in the past. Any of you have a similar experience with being obsessed with skateboarding?

Pool Skating

2008-12-22T17:17:00.000-05:00

So, I didn't skate my first Pool until I was 32 years old. I can't believe my friends and I never found one as kids to skate in Nebraska, but it just never happened. So, I'm 34 years old now and haven't skated another pool since. I was fully padded, helmet, wrist guards, elbow pads, knee pads....I know, pretty lame, but I am the father of 2 young children and I wasn't about to skate my first pool and kill myself. I have to admit, I don't wear my pads very often so it feels very restrictive but I had fun, I felt like a kid...just so stoked that I was going to skate my first pool. I just pumped and kick turned front side and back side as high as I could several times, but I never made it to the top...I'm sure I could over time and getting over the fear of it all. I do hope to skate it again, however I've not been back since that day because I had heard the owner of the property filled it up with something because kids were spray painting profanity...stupid kids...I mean, this guy was fine with us skating it, but the profanity pissed him off...oh well... It's wierd, It's like this guy lives on the property of an old public recreation center that closed down. His house is way in the back and there is a baseball field that has been overgrown with weeds, a gymnaseum with busted up floors and this pool in the woods that is coverered under a little shelter that is all worn out. Check out the video below, I found it on youtube...I don't know any of these people but this is the same pool...funny to see the footage of all the frogs because I had heard it was nicknamed "Froggy Bottom"

Nash Nightmare 1986

2008-12-19T00:36:00.000-05:00

That is the model of my first fish shaped skateboard. My very first skateboard was a hand me down from my brother....it was from the 70s and was a red plastic skinny thing but I remember the wheels were oh so soft which made the ride real nice...the thing was tiny though and your feet hung over the edges alot. I rode that all the time as a kid and that was the first skateboard I had ever sat and then stood on. I broke that board after learning how to ollie and thinking it would be fun to try and ollie on that old tiny flat plastic skateboard and it was alot of fun at first. I was snapping huge ollies on this thing and well, I landed once not over the trucks and that was the end of that skateboards life, sad to say. So one day in the 80s when skateboarding was the latest fad and everyone was doing it, I went to the store and asked my parents to buy me a skateboard. The one I picked out was a green Nash Nightmare. I thought it was sooo cool at the time, it had this picture of Jason from Friday the 13th and creepy hands and other scary images for the graphic and I thought the cut on the griptape pattern was cool. Looking back on it now, I remember the grip tape wasn't even grip tape, it was like little pieces of black colored sand held onto the wood with glue. The deck was flat and the wheels were like plastic and the bearings made it hard to pick up any speed. I have in the past looked for pictures of the Nash Nightmare online with no luck, so I decided to see if anyone is trying to sell one on ebay and there is!!! I'm so excited just to see it again....I had just the picture in my head to go on and now I finally get to see it again! If I had the cash I would buy this board but I just can't afford to purchase
anything right now. This board was a total piece of crap, but it was my piece of crap, so that makes it special! :) ha! My fond memory from this board and I think the last time I rode it before getting a new deck was when I rode down my hill at full speed which wasn't very fast on the board because of the crappy bearings. One of my wheels hit a rock and my board came to a dead stop while I did not. I hadn't gotten used to falling correctly by tucking and rolling. So I put my hand down to catch me and fractured my wrist and had a nasty cut on my elbow. I didn't go to the hospital until the next day. The night of my injury I realized that I probably broke something becuase it hurt to lift my fork at dinner. :) So, thanks Nash Nightmare for my first broken bone! :) Since I've started skateing again in 2004, I have fractured my other wrist slipping out on a ledge and I have broken my foot (a jones fracture) by landing primo after just ollieing up onto my nose on a ledge and as I was doing a shuv-it out, I landed wierd. It wasn't even a hard landing, but it broke. Sucks becuase I was purposely "taking it easy". Oh well!
13 weeks in a cast....that sucked!

Butt Pads? I'm speechless.

2008-12-17T15:07:00.000-05:00

So, I just finished purchasing a Christmas gift for my wife on Overstock.com and so it seems to me this store has everything, so I figured I'd do a search for skateboards and see what kind of deals and brands of skateboard decks and hardware they are selling. Once I saw this thing, my jaw dropped to the floor. Part of me is saying OMG, really, are you kidding me, a butt pad for skateboarding---how lame can you get? The other part thought, hmmm, you can hide it under your clothes, nobody would know and your butt and hips would be nicely padded....nahhhh!! That's just crazy...or is it? I can hear the conversation at the skatepark now, gee Kraston, you look like you've gotten a little chunky in the hips and buttocks area. Yeah, must be the holidays! ha! :) Little do they know, I've got my Hilbilly Buttpad on! :) Hilarious! I just realized it appears to only come in small and extra small....okay, so maybe this is intended for little ones...hmmm, great idea for my kids to wear year round---I'm often saying to my wife, we should make them wear helmets all the time! :)

Quicksilver's All 80s All Day Street Sesh!

2008-12-17T10:24:00.000-05:00

Ok, so I've been reading when I've got the time about Quicksilver's "All 80s All Day" shindig and have seen some of the vert footage, but I hadn't stumbled upon any of the street footage and was wondering if it was just strickly vert that they were doing. So, I used my high tech searching skills and pulled up youtube and searched for "All 80s All Day street" and low and behold in my wildest dreams....I found the Street Session that went down at the Quicksilver All 80s event and it rocks your mothers socks!

I mean, I love 80s vert and all because I grew up skateboarding in mid to late 80s and when you watched skate videos, you watched alot of vert and vert is awesome....the only problem is where I lived in Omaha, Nebraska, the nearest skatepark was a couple hours away and so you had to have an adult willing to drive you and then you had to pay to get in. I remember doing this once with a friend and saw it as my one opportunity to skate vert. I was scared shitless and I owned no pads at all and the skatepark we went to didn't even require me to wear any! I remember distincly standing up at the top of that vert ramp with my naked deck that I had jigsawed into a Hosoi Hammerhead shape along with custom artwork and griptape and a nice polyurethane coating! :) I was trembling...I had never dropped in on vert before and nobody was at this skatepark when we were there to even encourage me but my friend Aaron who had never done it either. I tried to envision myself on top of the quarterpipe at my friend Tom Sullivan's house and kept telling myself to lean forward more because it was vert....I remember as I was dropping the nose of my skateboard down onto the ramp....asking God to please not let me die! :) It all happened so fast, all four wheels were on the ramp vertical and then the next thing I know I'm at the bottom of the ramp standing on my board and I hadn't fallin yet! Awesome I thought to myself and then as quick as that happened I was faced with the other side of the ramp and I was haulin ass real fast....I remember thinking, oh shit, what do I do now, I didn't think that I would actually be standing still going up the other side! :) LOL! So, I bailed, fell backwards on my ass and shot my board up the otherside, then covering my head as my board went straight up into the air and crashed hard back onto the flat.

So, that was my vert experience and my only vert experience to date unless you count my first pool session 3 years ago, but that is another story on it's own. So, back in Nebraska I grew up worshipping vert skaters like everyone else but I skated street, ledges, stairs, curbs, parking blocks, launch ramps, homemade rails and once a miniramp. That is not to say I didn't also worship street gods like Natas Kaupas, Tommy Guerrerro, Mark Gonzales, Ron Allen and others...Vert was just where it was at back then.

Ok, I just have to say when I watched this video, I was very impressed with how much the production of the whole thing was so believably 80s. I mean, if you were not watching closely, you would think it was authentically 80s footage....it's that good! :) Enjoy if you haven't already! :) Be sure to watch until the end to see the results...you'll be surprised that a dagger won the contest!

Transworld Skate Vids Rock

2008-12-16T17:31:00.000-05:00

I always find it refreshing to kick back and watch the latest Transworld Skate Vid. I was just checking out a preview of "Let's Do This" which is probably already out, but I have not seen it yet with my whole being injured, losing my car and not skating since March.

But the preview got me thinking about skate videos and how you can watch so much footage now online and the amateur stuff is getting pretty sophisticated now with computers and cool software to edit digital video which must make it much more challenging for professionals now to put out material that is worth buying. Of course, I think most skaters download there skate vids anyhow, so there is money lost there too. But I just have to give thanks to Transworld for putting out videos that incorporate good cinematography and kick ass skateboarding all into a visually stimulating end product.

Skate Like A Girl

2008-12-15T11:32:00.000-05:00

This morning I got an email from my Mom and Dad in Bellevue, Nebraska (My childhood hometown). They told me how it was -2 degrees outside. Burr! That is freakin' cold compares to the 70 degrees it is today in Williamsburg, VA. We don't really go below 20 degrees here and seem to mainly hover around 50-60 degree weather in the winter. So I started to get nostalgic about Nebraska and skateboarding and was thinking about the spots I used to go to on a regular basis for skateboarding as a kid. I was mainly thinking about this ditch we used to skate in Capehart housing (housing for the military but not on the base itself) This ditch intertwined down the middle of the backyards of these homes and it was a small ditch but not tiny...it probably had about 7 foot of flat and 4 foot of incline on both sides and it was not straight...it curved around and reminded me alot of Wallows in Animal Chin, but smaller. I maybe remembering this ditch larger, but I can't find for the life a me a picture or any video footage on Youtube or anything...so annoying in a day and age where you find virtually anything on the internet. Anyways, I remember having some fun sessions at that ditch...if any Nebraska skaters stumble upon my blog and know the ditch I'm talking about, post a comment! Thanks! So in my quest for youtube footage or pics of the ditch I used to skate, I found this website "Skate Like A Girl" and the redo of the Powell skull above is a sticker they are making. I enjoyed browsing this blog and enjoyed the pics and blog entries...check it out if you have some time. I love finding new to me skate sites and am always impressed with women skaters especially when I see them at my local park...they are such a minority and I welcome them!

Skateboarding Bulldogs get Float in Rose Parade

2008-12-11T12:09:00.000-05:00

I remember the first time I saw a dog skateboarding. I was sitting at my parents house in chilly Nebraska in 1988 on Christmas Day. I got the Bones Brigade "Public Domain" video on VHS for Christmas and couldn't wait to watch it! I popped it in and there is a segment with Lance Mountain where a bulldog chases him down and steals his skateboard from him and starts pushing away...hilarious! :) Well, today's most famous skateboarding Bulldogs that I know of are Meaty from Rob and Big and Tyson and Tillman who are featured in commercials, TV shows, talk shows, etc.

Well, apparently Tyson and Tillman are sponsored by the Natural Balance premium pet food line founded by celebrity Dick Van Patten. Natural Balance will have a float in the Rose Parade featuring a track that Tyson and Tillman will skate on while the float comes by. The float features a vibrant 15-foot-long sculpted skateboard and a 16-foot tall floral bulldog. Unbelievable! :) I can't wait to see this. I found some practice footage of them on YouTube. They seem to have a problem with going around the track, instead they go back and forth but they have time to practice some more! :) ha!

John Lucero Curb Session

2008-12-08T13:18:00.000-05:00

Watching this sadly reminded me of myself. It is just us old skaters that find so much enjoyment from a curb session? I mean, really that is all I need...I just get so much enjoyment from just skating a curb or parking block....I guess it is because growing up, that is where most of my skateboard sessions were held and if we weren't skating that, we either skated a ditch or the old launch ramp! :)

No Comply never dies!

2008-12-08T10:58:00.000-05:00

The No Comply was invented by pro skater Neil Blender in the 80s.

I first recall learning this trick after watching Powell Peralta's Public Domain Video back in 1987. I first learned a 180 no comply, then a forward no comply, then I learned my one of my absolute favorite tricks to do and it always confuses little kids. A 180 no comply where you land on your back wheels and then pivot back forward again, a 180 no comply pivot perhaps? I learned it from this video though where Ray Barbee, whom I consider the master of no comply's, does a great job executing it and I can't really recall a video clip of anyone else doing it.

I have seen newer videos of people doing no comply 180s to pivot all the way around on their back truck 360. There are so many variations of the no comply that can be done and for some reason I just find this trick to be so much fun, I love it! Oh man, I absolutely can't forget to talk about the No Comply off parking blocks...I love this trick. I do it no handed and a grab variation. If you've never tried it, you must learn it and you will be sure to impress your friends. I also love doing no comply's to tail, both 180 and 270. I do those on curbs and ledges...again, so much fun and not very hard! :) I think I saw the 270 variation first in one of the Santa Cruz videos from the 80s. Yes, you gotta love YouTube!!! I just found Tom Knox's clip from the 1989 Santa Cruz video "Speed Freaks" This is the skateboarding I grew up with and some of the last tricks I was working on back in high school.

Here is a nice Tony Hawk Trick Tip with Mike V that shows a couple different variations on the No Comply...I think it is just missing the grab and the parking block no comply. Mike V had a nice part in Public Domain as well where he shows off his No Comply skills and that is where I really perfected the parking block no comply. Both of these video clips are below...check them out and then hit the streets trying out these fun old school tricks! :) I'm glad to see new skate vids with the new pro's and am's doing no comply variations like no comply 180s down a set of stairs...awesome!

Fingerboarding just got kicked up a notch!

2008-12-04T14:35:00.000-05:00

If you are a 30 something skateboarder, then you probably remember making your own fingerboard skateboard by glueing sheets of thin cardboard together and cutting out your skateboard shape and then fastening wheels from a hotwheels car and some real grip tape on top in some fancy design like we all did our grip tape back in the day. Nowadays kids don't bother making there own, forget being creative! :) Just go to your toystore and get a Techdeck with your favorite logo or skater's graphic on it. Well, I have to admit, I have one and the little realistic trucks on them are quite impressive and what's even more impressive is the video of people on the TechDeck Trick Tips website doing the same tricks you do on a real board with there freakin' fingers! I've tried doing these tricks and let me just say, HUH?

Well, now that you are caught up with fingerboard evolution, this next stage is brought to us by the folks at Illusion Labs. It is called Touchgrind and is made for the iphone. It is touted as the first real multi-touch skateboard game ever created. Apparently Touchgrind has 12 unloackable boards that has different abilities, incredible 3D grahics and you can even jam to your own music with a custom soundtrack. Insane and all for $4.99 from iTunes! Too bad the iphone isn't closer to $4.99! :) Check out the insane demo video for this below!!!

The Real Free Credit Report....really :)

2008-12-03T12:19:00.000-05:00

I was just browsing some other people's blogs this morning and stumbled upon an entry where somebody got tricked into signing up at FreeCreditReport.com....I know you are singing the song right now, aren't ya....."shoulda gone to freecreditreport.com, I coulda seen this coming at me like an atom bomb.."

Yeah, you know you love it! :) Well, they aren't the real free one...if you sign up there, you are signing up for some trial...you do get access to your credit report and you can save it as a PDF, because hell, I fell for it too and that is why I am telling whoever reads this...don't go there unless you want to have to remember to cancel your trial membership. Instead, go to

https://www.annualcreditreport.com

That is the site where you can get your REAL free credit report.....and it's jingle free! :)

Political Radness...NOT

2008-12-01T16:50:00.000-05:00

Apparently, it was just a rumor that Obama's Treasury Secretary was a skater..thanks to Skatedaily.net for clarifying this. Sorry, I guess the dream of a white house skatepark will have to be put on hold...

Footlocker owns CCS now?

2008-11-25T16:29:00.000-05:00

Apparently this is old news, but Footlocker has bought out CCS, the online/catalog skateboard store. What is the world coming to? Before it was Wrangler bought out Vans....now that was just wrong in my mind, but they have done a good job keeping these very different parts of the companies separate from what I've seen. I have not witnessed the Van's store carrying Wranglers, nor have I seen Van's with the Wrangler logo on them...thank God! I guess Footlocker wanted something more than just selling skateboard shoes in there stores. They wanted a piece of the skateboard market. I think CCS is a pretty successful store, I know I enjoy looking at there catalogues, although I rarely have any money to buy anything from them and there website is pretty kickass and appears to have improved since the last time I visited. I envision the Footlocker guys riding around the stores on skateboards now, or worse, they try to help skateboarders and say the wrong terms for tricks, like you should try these DC shoes, they really help with your jump tricks and your rail glides. LOL! :P

Obama's Treasury Secretary a Skateboarder?!?!

2008-11-24T11:16:00.000-05:00

Yeah, you read that right! Sweet! Although I'm sure there are many skateboarders in many professions that would shock people, but they don't advertise it and so we don't know... I just think it is pretty awesome to know that part of the presidents administration is a fellow skateboarder, so you know he could be sitting at the whitehouse daydreamin of skatin' sometimes. :) ha! Ok, maybe that wouldn't be such of good thing, but hey, he is an insider, a skateboarder close to the president....I'm thinking he could be like "Psst, hey Mr. President, I was thinking, we should really approve some legislation to take down all of these "No Skateboarding" signs. It's just our youth trying to get some exercise, for God's sake!" Ok, I know, skateboarding can be destructive and I can agree with some places, that skateboarding should not be allowed. I work at a library and there are some pretty marble ledges for people to sit around a fountain and the surface around the marble is brick. Now, as a skateboarder myself, when I first saw those ledges, the skateboarder in me was salivating! I was envisioning all the tricks I could do on those ledges or attempt on those ledges! :) But I also saw the bricks as a deterrent, I hate skateboarding on bricks and now that I've been spoiled with skateboard parks and the smooth surfaces they have that I'm a bit of a surface snob now, no crappy bumpy parking lot pavement for me hommies! I only glide on the smooth crete! Well, skateboarders have skated these ledges and have been kicked out before from what I've heard from the librarians I work with. Unfortunately, the pretty marble is no longer pretty where skateboarding has happened and you can see the wax that was applied and the damage from noseslides and grinds. So, I think some places "although inviting" should not be skated on. I know, all you teenagers are like "whatev, we're skating it"....I was the same way, but this is what happens when you become a grown-up. You start realizing things cost money and if you pay respect to things and people, you will get respect back.

Here is a link to the article if you are interested in reading more about him....

Tim Geithner article in the Huffington Post

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Skatedaily.net Rocks!

2008-11-21T15:56:00.000-05:00

I've been checking out Skatedaily.net since I started back up skateboarding again 4 years ago and it had only been up for a couple months I think. At the time I was scouring the web for skateboarding sites and this one immediately went into my favorites and now is always in my link list in the browser. It's always got current skateboarding news as well as reviews of skate vids, shoes and what not. Also the pic of the day is always something to look forward to and the SD Top 3 entertaining. On occasion I submit news I find on the web about skateboarding and sometimes it gets posted up on Skatedaily.net. Just a great simple site about skateboarding that keeps up all connected. I'm a fan and if you are not yet, surf on over to Skatedaily.net and check it out!

P90x kicked my butt!

2008-11-21T15:03:00.000-05:00

So, I've been watching those infomercials for the P90X workout for a long time now. So much that I have acquired the 12 videos and manuals for free so I could follow the program. I've got a lot going on in my life lately that frankly is more important than working out, but at the same time, I realize that being out of shape is hurting me on a daily basis. In relation to skateboarding, I believe I broke my foot so easily because I was 30 lbs heavier than when I started back up again and I think that amount of weight was just too much pressure coming down on my foot at a bad angle. Anyhow, I tried the 1st video for P90x a couple nights ago and man, I am still so sore everywhere. I guess that is what happens when you are out of shape and try a hardcore exercise program like P90X. It's an hour for each video. I don't know if I will be able to squeeze this kind of time into my schedule, but I do know I am very interested in trying the next video, we'll see...

Too Old To Skate?

2008-11-20T12:42:00.000-05:00

I can't remember the last time I have been on my board...not a good thing. Oh wait, actually I do remember now...hmmm since I don't know who might stumble upon this, lets just imagine myself rolling around inside somewhere on some hard wood floor just desperate to be on my board and then suppose the floor was a bit dusty/dirty and well, I may have slipped out and fallen on my ass. ha! :)

Ok, here is a little background. I skate for 7 years during my youth (ages 13 to 19)...well, it was probably more like 12-19 but it's hard to say when I was really committed to the sport. I loved skateboarding, I lived it 24-7, I would dream skateboarding and when I woke up, I wanted to skate before school and then once I was at school, I would be dreaming of learning new tricks and would play with my homemade finger board (none of those fancy techdecks you can buy now). No way, this was 2 or 3 ply cardboard with real grip tape on top, I don't remember what we used for the trucks, but the wheels from hotwheels cars made great skate wheels! :) So, I think skateboarding faded out of my life sometime during my senior year of high school where cars and girls seem to take the place of my little wooden toy. It was 1992 and skateboarding itself was dying out too. I remember all my friends that skated were no longer obsessed either. The one thing I used to say I could never imagine quitting, I did. I never got rid of my board though, I kept it in the trunk of my car...it was a Black Label John Lucero. It was the last board I had bought off a friend who was quitting skateboarding, probably to just hang out with his girl...we were all so lame that we couldn't seem to juggle skateboarding and girls and friends who didn't skate. Oh well. So, I went off to college in Arkansas and my skateboard came with me, although I truthfully only remember riding it to the barber shop once and some really crappy road. Many years and many colleges and cities later....I'm 30 years old in Williamsburg, VA with my beautiful wife Suzanne and our 2 year old son, Jake. I had just lost 55 lbs and seemed to be doing some sould searching and for some reason I had this urge to go skateboarding...I had heard we had a park in town that was free and I was going to do it. Of course I was nervous being old and having not really skated in 12 years. I tried some ollies in the driveway and was still able to do that and then I attempted a kickflip and was able to land a couple kickflips on my old school deck...so I knew from there on that I still could skate. I was so embarrassed about skateboarding though, so I hid it from everyone until a month later, I ollied up onto a ledge at the local skatepark...the ledge had just been painted over becuase it had graffitti on it and next thing I know, I land on the ledge, my board slips out and I land on my wrist and break it. I lied to everyone including my doctor saying I slipped off a ledge at the gasstation. I cannot believe how embarrassed I was....well, eventually I came clean with everyone and told them the truth...that I had taken up skateboarding again. Everyone seemed to be okay with it and some even thought it was cool. Of course there were also the ones who thought I was way to old to be skateboarding and thought I should be out playing golf. My response, golf if f*cking boring. Well, I've never played except for Mini Golf, which I love!

Well, I skated alot from 2004-2006, 2007 and 2008 have been a little dry as I've had some family troubles and plus I broke my foot and was in a cast for 13 weeks! That sucked! So far I have broken my right wrist when I was 13, my left wrist when I was 30 and my left foot when I was 33. The broken foot really hurt myself and my family buy not allowing me to work my second job that I needed to pay all the bills. So, currently I haven't really been skateboarding since I broke my foot...I think I need to invest in some supplemental insurance like Aflack!! But I do miss skateboarding and can't wait to hit the skatepark once again, but right now, I've got some other things to take care of before I can hop back on my board.

My first blog post, sort of...

2008-11-19T10:16:00.000-05:00

Ah, my first post, actually it isn't my first, I've deleted my first in trying to figure out what I want my blog to be about. I want it to be about things I love, the stuff in life that I am passionate about or strive to be more passionate about. I am new to blogging but in my browsing of other blogs, I have found things about them like layout and crisp photos and content that I will strive to attain in my own blog. I do have experience designing a family website with my wife and I think we did a damn good job on....we stopped working on it at some point and stopped paying for the advertisement free version, but when we did work on it, it looked nice and was easy to navigate. So, if you just found my blog, I'll be discussing things like my family, skateboarding, music, computers, food, exercise, my teams (The Lakers and The Cornhuskers) and other random topics. :)