skate journal: weird denver manny pad mission then late night beer fueled broomfield session (Sept 28, 2013)

Null day! First in awhile. Carleigh, Jack, Max, Blaine and I met Chad at this new manny pad spot in Denver. It’s still under construction and will soon have a handrail around it we’re certain. But on this day the only obstacle was human crap on the far side right where you’d want to land/ollie. It sucked. Jack found a car floor mat we put over most of it to at least by us some comfort. Jack and Max were pulling some moves quick. Carleigh and I were doing accidental wallies up. Chad was struggling for reasons unknown to him. I was trying nose mannies at one point, slammed and looked up to see if Jack was laughing at me, but he was nowhere to be found. Turned out he had rolled his ankle yet again wallieing off an orange cone. He’s been on a bad streak lately and it’s tough to see. He went Tommy Gunz though and kept skating. It was crazy. Unfortunately he got pretty bummed and ended up tweaking it again. Argh mang. I never ended up getting a nose manual, but got a few manuals. One of which was right after Jack got up from rolling his ankle and casually manualed it like it was nothing. I also got kickflip up back 180 off, kickflip up no comply 180 off, front 180 up f/s halfcab off, a few things that kept me from being too bummed. Carleigh was hucking nollie back 3s off (aka helipops aka Romars) and getting pretty close in my book. Blaine killed it filming. Max got a sick line and a funny clip where his board shot out into traffic and got run over. That spot gave off all kinds of weird vibes. Between the hipsters and homeless people walking by it was non-stop weirdness. The homeless guy ranting about the rebar being dangerous got old the after the fifth time he walked by.

Then we ended up at the Church of Scientology. There was a fun downhill alley with a few little bumps and a tall backside ledge for regular footers. Blaine was doing some rad lines with tricks into the hills. Halfcabs, back 180s, no comply 180’s etc. Carleigh too. Chad was trying front 180 nosegrind and got close. I was doing some nollies that felt taller then my normal nose scrapes then noseslides, but a car parked in the way. I ended up getting a couple fun feeling lines. Kickflip into a mini bump, noseslide the ledge, back 180 off a curb cut. Pop shove the little bump, noseslide to fakie, switch front 180 off the curb cut. I was hyped. At that point some obnoxious car pulled up and said we were on private property and asked us to leave. I didn’t actually hear it, but it sounded really annoying and I’m sure I would have been a smart ass. Pretty weird day. My legs felt pretty numb and arthritic.

We hung at Crisis again drinking some beers and watching skate videos. John showed up and after awhile called out the Broomfield park so we did it. It was only open for 30 more minutes. John, Fuzz and I played a game of O-L-D on the quartapotty. John is super good at tranny, but somehow was the first out. He can’t do front disasters? So funny. He can do pivots to fakie, but not a front D. Crazy! Fuzz did a sex change disaster which I’ve maybe done on a qp once like 10 years ago. Maybe longer. First one was close. We were playing loose rules and I was able to get it a few tries later. Pretty hyped actually. Then the lights shut off. There was a little light in the corner and John and I tried some switch noseslide variations. The John Brandow patent tricks. They are basically slappies, but man they are fun. Fun session. I haven’t skated with a few beers in me in a long long time and it was honestly pretty fun. Felt great to see my friends so much this weekend.