After my last couple horrible performances I decided to go out solo to campus and have fun darn it. I had taken a nice nap and was ready to go.  I was on call for work so had two phones in my pocket and wasn’t up for another Real premiere (the Denver one).  I started out in the area behind the student center that has the really good concrete that I played the game of SKATE with Fuzz and Connor. I can’t believe I had never noticed how smooth it is there before. It’s the best place on campus for flatground which is extra awesome because I like that area a ton already anyway. I had made up my mind that I would like the new shoes and it seemed to work. Warm up tricks were dropping first try until I realized I had landed a bunch first try. Then it was normal Glen, but that’s cool because I moved on to hammers. I wanted to try a long line. Front 50 a metal stair, ollie onto one of the ledges down the 5 stair, ollie off it, 360 flip on flat, ollie up the two, ollie down the two, ollie down the three, ollie up the three. It didn’t start good because the stupid metal curb was somehow ridiculously sticky and the easiest trick in the line took the longest. I did somehow get the whole line though. The 3 flip included a hand in the make and the ollie up the 3 at the end was a front 90 because I was so exhausted. I was hyped though. Then I moved over to the handicap ramp area with the ledges/rails. Last time I was there I freaked out because I couldn’t ollie onto the ledge. This time I could and then decided I should try to manual it. Pretty scary for me and I got really close a couple times. Not only do you have to manual the ledge, but it drops down a level, then drops again and you have to thread the needle through the rails. That would be fun to get sometime. I was happy to finally be skating hard after a few days of lackluster effort.

I started heading toward the hill ledges, but saw a somewhat tall ledge off the bikepath that I wanted to ollie onto. It was quick and after a pretty good slam I managed to do it. Pretty hyped on that. Next was the hill ledges for awhile. I did quite a few backside noseslides where I was trying to dropin a little further up the hill each time to go faster. I had a few bad front 50s on the top ledge. A few ok 50s on the curved ledge at the bottom. I started trying front tails on the top ledge. I got a couple that didn’t slide. Eh. I backed one up with a front 5-0 on the curved ledge. Neat.

On to the nearby parking lot where I had tried a line before and never got. No comply 180, fakie ollie up a curb, fakie flip, sw front 180 off the curb. I slammed on the fakie flip over and over because it was downhill and there was a crack that I kept landing in. A couple times I started the line off by ollieing off the nearby ledge with the death drop on one side. So scary. Anyways I finally landed the stupid fakie flip and went back to the student center for some more flippers. I got a few treflips, heelflips, f/s halfcab flips and did a f/s halfcab heel that would have only counted on defense in an over 50 game of SKATE, but it’s been awhile for that trick anyway so whatevs. I hucked a few Rick flips for good measure too. At the end I tried to do a little line of kickflip over a crack then nollie tre. I was going pretty fast for me and never got the nollie tre. Doh. I had fun though. I was so tired I didn’t even ollie the 4 stair on the way out. Had a blast.

A deep crew to Ft Collins on a windy and kinda cold sunday. We met at SOL. In my car were the kids; Jack, Max and Ollie. Bernie, Carleigh, Derek and Aaron were in another car and Neil was solo so he could bail out early. We hit up MRKT to sell some Null and because it’s a mandatory stop when you’re up there anyway. Next stop was the other mandatory stop – Northside. Ollie was with us so I stuck with him. He was pretty chill, but we had fun dorking around in the corner behind the handball court. He had some decent ollies to fakie on the bank and some body varials. I really didn’t do much of anything other then no comply pole jam. Max was shredding all over the place. Jack did pole jam late shove and pole jam body varial. Neil was sitting down. Carleigh did front 180 nosegrind to fakie on the ledge. Bernie and Derek were doing crazy manuals on the mj ledge. Fort Collins heads were murdering the park as they normally do.

The first spot was a 12 stair rail that Max ollied. He came close to kickflip too. It was nuts. I filmed his line like crap though. Such a bad feeling. Next we went to the kicker spot on campus so Jack could do the birth control, but it was too windy for that. I didn’t really skate there and Bernie started almost doing manual b/s flip so I filmed. I saw Ollie do a few fakie shoves on flat which I’ve never seen before. So stoked to see him skate everytime. Derek and Max ended up getting a couple awesome manual tricks. FYI I still hate these new shoes.

Saturday! And it’s nice out! Bernie, Sam and Sam’s son Evan showed up. Derek and his friend Nate met us. Carleigh met up with us. First spot was the long bench featured in Max’s retard clip. It’s been a few days since the session so it’s hard to remember it all. Carleigh was hungover and didn’t skate there. Derek almost did a back nosegrind across the entire thing. Bernie messed around then filmed Derek. Evan is a funny kid. Sam was kind of on dad patrol. Nate skated everything pretty good. The front 5-0 180 on the composite bench was sick. Bernie had done an effortless kickflip manual on a little manny pad nearby. So steezey. I was struggling to say the least. Couldn’t manual to save my life. Came close to boardsliding the whole ledge, but didn’t quite get it. Skated the two stair for a bit and did kickflip and front shove off. Yippee.

We moved on to the 3 flat 2. I posed a couple ollies, but didn’t get close. Nate ollied and front 180’d it. Derek landed on a few 360 shove its, but never rode away. Doh.

Next we went to the manny pad in the Louisville tech center where I struggled once again. I tried to do a line of manual then ollie a bench. Never got the ollie and credit carded myself with razor tail. Wonderful. Later on we had put a trashcan lid out instead of the bench. I got a line of manual, ollie the lid then out of nowhere pulled an ok frontside flip which apparently hyped up Bernie. Ha. I also ollied up the tall side and kickflipped off the curb. Nate kickflip and b/s flipped over the bench. Derek was struggling and sore and bailed after a few bad switch nose manny slams. Carleigh started skating and was hurting, but had a few manual attempts that could have gone the distance. Sam did his patented nose manny. Bernie took awhile to get going, but had some good stuff at the end. Kickflip manual the tall way. Kickflip up, kickflip off, kickflip over the trash can lid.

We left after this. Fuzz and Connor had wanted to skate so they were gonna head into Boulder after closing hours and skate. Fuzz had just setup new wheels and a board so I had to too. But I one upped him with the addition of some new shoes:

Some Vox Duece. They feel pretty cheap, but Vox is one of the few skater owned shoe companies left so I’m hyped to support them. Anyways, Fuzz and Carleigh grabbed some food while Connor and I skated the hill ledges. Well, Connor skated them, I flailed around like a 12 year old just learning to skate. Connor had some some sick moves like front lip to tail on the first ledge then front 5-0 on the curved one at the bottom. We moved into the slappy area as Fuzz and Carleigh joined us. We didn’t stay there too long and Carreigh left.

We went to the student center area. I was so tired. Fuzz manualled the 5 stair ledge first try and ollied onto another ledge pretty easily. And manualled around the two stair area. Connor firecrackered the two stair not knowing there was a three stair right after it. Pretty funny. Then we played a game of SKATE which might be the only time I felt decent about skating. I was not hyped on the new shoes. But the game was fun. Seeing as how Fuzz and I are seasoned vets of skating for over 20 years obviously we took out Connor pretty quick. He didn’t even land heelflip and the textbook varial heel was just luck. It was a super fun game though. I landed way more than I thought I would. Heeflip, fakie heelflip, treflip, fakie bigflip, f/s halfcab flip, most of my tricks. Fuzz got me in the end with a cab. How boring is that? A vert trick on flat. The board doesn’t even flip.

Next up we skated the ledge coming out of the parking garage for a bit. Fuzz and Conner back 50’d it all good. Connor may have even back 5-0d it. I just noseslid it. I think after that we pretty much just peeped the 14 knowing it would show up in the Real video (Chima switch front board). Fun night. I was beat and with the exception of the game of SKATE I skated like total crap. Not hyped on the new shoes.

Super nice friday evening. The kids were already over at friends houses for sleepovers. Well one thing led to another and lets just say Liz delayed my arrival at the skatepark. And when I did arrive I lacked much of any drive to do anything other then stand around and catch up with Brian since it’s been awhile since we’ve hung out. My first few minutes were spent slipping out on everything as it was so slippery and I haven’t skated parks much at all lately (a good thing!). Then Brian and I took a couple runs in the pro bowl. Terrifying. Brian got tiles and coping. I didn’t, but still had fun. Then we played on the rocks for a bit, kind of watched a fight, witnessed a really weird board giveaway scene and then I left. Skateparks are silly.

Went to Meta to sell some null goods and give product to nondeserving jerks (ha ha ha sorry Jack you know you are sooooo deserving) and then meet up with Carreigh and Fuzzual Adams to skate campus. Fuzz and Sam vented for awhile about shop life. Ok, a long while. Carleigh worked out some anger too. Geez, I think even I vented about maybe losing my job soon. We avoided the temptation of avoiding skating all together at the bar and went around the corner and under the bridge to work our aggression out via a super fun slappy session on the banked curb on the bikepath. Carreigh got her first ever slappy. I did my first slappy Helmstetters (back smith). Fuzz did some slappy blunts to Neil out. We also lined out some stuff from the bench area. Fuzz switch 180’d the bench to bikepath gap. I did a little boardslide to manual to tail drop. Near the end I was “working” on front blunts. In other words about 1/4 I would get into the slide and then just shoot out. Fuzz was trying switch bluntslides and called “five more tries” landing it on the 5th try. So rad. I ollied the “big two”, posed some kick back tails and then we headed up to the hill for a couple beers at our favorite intoxicated college student joint. Fun times. Fun crew (Oh wait, did Max’s crew patent that name?).

Still playing Mr Mom. India was at a friends, but Ollie had said he would go skateboarding with me once i was done pretending do work (at home). His friend Sam was over though and that kid was not in a good mood. He’s the youngest teenager ever. Anyways, after Ollie and I ate some nachos he bailed on wanting to skate and got upset with me for not wanting to play basketball. The compromise was to play basketball for awhile then I would skate flat in front of the house. You might think this is good parenting, but really I was just thinking it would be good for warming up my legs. It failed two fold though. First, Ollie was bummed once I left the basketball court. Second, I was one uncoordinated idiot. I had thought of treflips and how I didn’t do one for some reason when I skated flat for hours on Saturday. So I was like “I wonder how many I can do in a row?” The answer, never more than 1. Actually, I only landed one. I could not do a treflip to save my life. UGH. I tried a bunch of nollie treflips too. Everyone of them felt good, but I never rode away. Ugh, I’m approaching a year closer to 40 and feeling it.

Went out to Rampy after putting the kids to bed. Actually had a blast. Tricks didn’t take too long. I didn’t skate for too long, but did some front and back smiths and tried back smith revert. I did one, but I’m not sure if I was in a real smith. Probably not knowing me. I started getting tired quickly and called it when two ollies in a row did not leave the ground. I kinda miss forcing myself to skate everyday. Glad I went out there.

This whole Mr Mom thing is tougher than I thought. It’s one thing for a day or two. But a week deep I’m exhausted. Anways, on Saturday I got up early, got India going to some DI thing, collected Ollie’s friend, drove to the wrong school to see India’s performance, played basketball with other dad’s while waiting, ate pizza with several other parents then was responsible for Ollie and his buddy Sam. They used to like skateboarding, but now they just want to play legos, lego star wars on the wii or basketball. Ugh. And they don’t even want me along for the basketball part anymore. So I skated flatground in front of the house. I was kinda unmotivated and it was sunny and hot which I wasn’t used to so I downloaded some silly “skate dice” app to my phone (since I lost 1/4 of the read dice) and failed a bunch of tricks. I would try tricks I’ve never landed 10 times just for the heck of it. Tricks I’ve never done that I got close to were front 180 heel and nollie frontside flip. Tricks I did that I haven’t done in forever were halfcab heel, fakie treflip and frontside flip. The only new trick i did was nollie cab. And boy was it a bad one. After awhile Derek and Carleigh stopped by since Derek wanted a board. We did some more skate dice and then I beat Derek in SKATE. Sick! At that point it also became apparent that both my kids would be having sleepovers elsewhere. Awesome! Carleigh mentioned that Black Dots were playing Petes in Denver so I was down. I had to bring boards to Community on the way. So around 8:30 we started skating. First spot was a buddist temple or something that had a no runup 4 stair to brick landing. Normally not so bad, but warming up is hard for me. Carleigh did it in a few tries. I took a bit longer, but on the first commit I went down hard. So hard. I guess my board shot out, but I certainly wasn’t expecting it. Ouch. That threw me for a loop to say the least. We walked by Petes and saw John. He was hyped and wanted to show us a ledge he saw nearby:

John killed it pretty quick. Some long front 50s and front 50 front 180 into the bank. Carleigh killed the noseslides and then went noseslide shove bolts. I however was sucking. It took like 20 tries to land a front 50, but once I did things got better. Powerslides down the parking garage was a blast. The funnest thing I did was an ollie onto the ledge then ollie somewhat farther down into the bank. Soooo fun. Carleigh was almost landing 180 nosegrinds. I got a front 50 front 180 out and then we went to Petes and enjoyed the show.

Today was the first day of being Mr Mom for a week as Liz is in SF. So I’m coming home from work early to get the kids when they get out of school. The stars aligned and both kinds went to friends houses so I went skating for about 40 minutes. I went to ballparks where I was to meet Carleigh after awhile. My warming up was bad and lasted until about the time Carleigh showed up. She was a wreck again. Man, I hope things get better for her soon. I ended up having a decent time. Last time I was in the Springs with Null kids I did a noseslide at Harrison and for whatever reason hucked a bigspin out. It wasn’t close and didn’t resemble a bigspin, but it triggered a thought to try it again. Somehow I finally remembered. I actually got super close. Even kind of landed one where I came to a hault at 90 degrees. I know I skate like I’m 12, but surprisingly I’ve never really tried that trick before. I also got some front 50s, accidental front 5-0s and some mediocre flip tricks. I hope I land that trick sometime. Seems possible. Carleigh got some noseslides, but mostly looked out of it and bummed. Doh.

Skated flat for about 15 minutes in front of the house. It was pretty windy. I failed a bunch of nollie flips again, but managed a run of halfcab flip, heelflip then treflip. Ollie took the blurry photo above of a heelflip after coming out to tell me dinner was ready. What do you know? I rocket those too. Oh and I put a hole in my sock as I blew through the suede already and forgot to fix them. Afgh.