Independent As Truck

Shot some footage for my video part last week. To be honest I don't think it will make it into the final cut. I did end up throwing down a layback triple frontside rock on a small curb in front of Rodney's house, but I didn't land it. What I did land: frontside 180 ollie up the curb to ride off the curb followed by a 180 boneless one. I think it might be good enough to make it into the credits.
I want to get off track for a few and write a little bit about INDEPENDENT trucks. No, this is not an advertisement. Sure, everybody seems to say, "Indy's are the best, of course!" Do they really know why they're saying that? It took me fifteen or so years of skating before I even tried them. I rode Trackers and then Ventures before finally settling on Thunders as my truck of choice. I swore by the Thunders for years. I still feel that they are the second best out there as far as overall performance is concerned, but they have signature models and colorways now, and that just doesn't turn me on. It's okay if you want some colored trucks, but I don't need some dude's name on them. Is the truck any different with the signature on it? It would be one thing if Kenny Reed's signature Thunder truck had flags from every country he had ever visited attached to them, and then every time you backside five-o'd a ledge you could feel comfort in the fact that you were giving peace a chance and bringing people from all walks of life together.
Like I said in an earlier post I spent some time stone cold shredding the streets with one, Larry Burns. He rode Indys. I remember him telling me, "I never even thought about riding anything else." So I bought a pair, and I haven't looked back. There's just something about them. They turn on a dime. They grind real good.

I have broken a couple kingpins while riding the Indys. One time I ollied a curb and the truck fell off mid ollie. I chalk this up to a truck that encourages you to shred harder and thrash more than you normally would. So yeah you might break a kingpin here and there but overall you can feel comfortable knowing you are traversing the streetscape with a superior truck that none other can equal.

Sponsored!

Twenty two years of skating has finally paid off. I just picked up my first sponsor. No, it's not a sunglasses company and no it's not chewing gum. It's none other than Trailer Trash Skateboards! This is the real deal, run by two kids out of an actual trailer park right here in PA.
You can imagine how stoked I was when I heard I was officially on the team. The team manager gave me the news at a BBQ this past weekend. I was so excited I hit the streets yesterday to work on some moves, despite the humidity. I donned my sun blocking golfers hat and felt pretty good from the get go.
I'm not sure what the kids are looking for from a professional skateboarder these days, but I sure hope it's ollies up curbs and the occasional shove-it. If that's the case then turn me pro!

Fakie bigspin to pulled pork

We had some beautiful weather on Saturday. I woke up my wife with the request that she film me performing a demo for the people at the Clarks Park Farmer's Mart. I grabbed my board, we grabbed Josh and hit the hills for some cafe. I was in the coffee shop for a long time. Under normal circumstances this would drive me crazy, on the brink of telling all these thirty something liberals, with a hell of a lot of rules to take their lazy attitude about the sugar/cream station and shove it up their collective ass. Collective.


I finally got some iced brews and out of the door I flew. My wife kept asking me if I wanted to get some footage, "You like that parking lot up the street, right?"
"Yeah... it's okay."

At that moment, Josh grabbed our dog and jumped on my board, waving a long branch in front of the dog's face like a dangling carrot. I couldn't top this trick and Josh isn't even a skateboarder. Well... maybe that day he was. I was originally there to do a skate demo for the farmer's market crowd. Only problem was, it wasn't Saturday, it was Sunday. We had been tripping the entire time. I haven't done a demo since the old Sam's Place demo of 02' . Next week maybe.

This morning I took a cruise to the FU WAH for some chips and such. I ollied up the curb, I rode off, I rode up another curb sans ollie. Then I did the uh, fakie big spin. I'm pretty sure people were doing the fakie bigspin before they were doing the big spin. Aside from the freestylers, Ron Chatman and Matt Hensley come to mind. I just wanted to drop those names. An intellectual and a heavy hitter. A comedic teacher and an idol. Weird shit. I never saw so many skaters with the same outfit at once. Matt Hensley influenced an army of lemmings, myself included. Cut off army shorts, buzzed head, high tops cut to low tops. You know, it was sick style.

Actually, I think his shorts were hemmed. I have some sick footage of this barbecue I attended this evening. I ate a superb pulled pork and slaw sandwich, and some excellent grilled asparagus. Sorry, no photos.

Bitter Pill Transfer

I wanted to skate so bad today. The sky was full of beauty, the breeze was breezy. I would have loved nothing more than to blow off work and ollie up and down many curbs.

Skateboard magazines consistently have these lame intros like, "Just skate. Skate for the fun of it. Blow off work and just skate. Skateboarding comes from the soul. " Easy for you to say. At the end of a hard days work it can be pretty tough to say, "Okay, time to shred."
Even worse is when the editor's note starts talking about skateboarding like it's some kind of holy lifesaver. Yeah, we get it. It's awesome, everyone who's been doing it since they were ten and has stuck with it thinks its awesome. Those Transworld videos, and countless others that followed the same structure, are so god awful annoying with the voice overs. "It's just skating." so many dudes seem to say. "Pure." "Just skating, man." Yeah, we got that after you and your teamates said it a hundred times. "There's nothing else like it." Okay.

At the same time, that's exactly how I feel about it. If someone were to ask me, "Why is skateboarding so important to you?" I would end up saying the same shit.
"I don't know man, it's like.. my best friend."

Tonight I fired up some steaks on the grill. while I was at it I grilled some romaine lettuce for a caesar salad. Grilled Caesar! It was awesome. Just grilled lettuce, bro. Just pure eating. Shredding.

switch stance acid drop

What's up with all this overuse of the word "random"? Has anyone noticed this? "it was totally random" this, and "in a random gesture" that. Enough of this trendy word. At the same time I think the word AWESOME will remain just that forever and evs.

I wanted to write about the famous yet forgotten RAT CURBS of Penns Landing, but that will have to wait until I get my facts straight. In the same breath I have to mention the Sundial which would be a sidebar in the RAT CURB article. I got a chance to skate the sundial before it was laid waste by... Penns Lands maintenance crew? In any case, it was a great spot to do a rock fakie or fakie rock. The RATCURBS was one of my favorite spots of all time. I miss it every time I ride by. Sigh.

I used to session it with longtime bro, Larry Burns. He liked to skate really dangerous spots. We would set up camp at this sidewalk bump on University Ave and the whole time Larry would be skating in the street right where Lancaster Ave curves into 38th street. Cars turning full speed into the right hand turn while Larry is trying to switch heel into the emergency room. It got me thinking about skating in the warehouses of northern philadelphia and all the dusty floors and pipes sticking out of walls and plenty of random stuff to bash your head into.

Today I managed to ollie into the future and fakie ollie into the past, if only for a short moment.

long manual off a short pad

Awesome stuff happened on the way after the ATM. Leaving the A-Plus gas station after getting cash I recognized the curb cut. It's one of those sidewalk sections that goes to flat in order to accommodate wheel chairs. It had 3 inch high transitions on either side to make for one super miniature mini ramp. I dropped in and went frontside on the first wall. Carved the fuck out of it. Came back in and hit the second wall with a rock to fakie. I was surprised I/we didn't rock to fakie into oblivion.
I'm thinking aBOUT DOING A DEMO TOMORROW morning in front of the coffee shop. I also want to learn how to play the piano. I do not want to learn how to ride a track bike or grow dreadlocks, but I'm pretty into meditation lately. Meditate on this marinate: A man's vertical leap decreases one inch for every three years after age twenty. That explains why I can no longer ollie 30 gallon trash cans. In other news I am perfecting the ollie to six pack to cup of coffee to go to bed jittery to fakie to wake up and eat nachos and/opr hoagie to revert back to the bed for extended nap. Sweet trick if you ask me.
Check out my one man demo happening tomorrow(or maybe not) at the cafe on the corner of 43rd and Baltimore. I promise plenty of switch stance magic while you read about the war in Iraq, and how to make a knit fanny pack.

Used to be into sandwiches, not sure what's going on with my life right now

Found this clip today:
http://www.bobshirt.com/NSNG/PatBrennen.html

Remember watching this part fresh out of a hard days work at the local high school. Get home, eat a snack, watch a video, go skate. Even though this was nearly the Powell dethroned days, I enjoyed a couple parts in this video. Chris Senn, Adam McNatt. What happened to McNatt? He was at the top of the heap at one time. It's funny that they still use the shaky "in out" cam on this one. It's like they paid for the technology when they made Propaganda and wanted to get their money's worth. "Can we at least get a couple nauseating shots with the shaky cam?"

This was right around the time when slick bottom decks were prime time. I believe Santa Cruz was the first to brand the idea and my skatebro, Branden, had the Tom Knox version. I eventually got an Alien Workshop Dyrdek slick. It was before pros had a new graphic every month, so I had the slick bottom version and the wood deck with the same graphic albeit a different shape. I would go on to have many a slick bottomed deck. Some worked better than others. The Mark Gonzales mac 'n cheese deck for example, was just a cheap laminate. Great graphics though. I loved the frag out of that one. Branden had the G&S Shannon May slick with the model graphics. I had an ATM Gonz slick that would bend when you stepped on it. Weird time for skateboarding.

RIP Pat Brennen. (360 late shuv)