Kid duty for me as Liz was going to a movie with a friend later. I had one of those days at work where I didn’t stretch for some lame reason, but I gabbed my board pretty much right away and went to it. Seeing as how it was rush hour there was a lot of people driving by the house which messed up my tempo a bit, but kinda let me rest too. Kickflips took a few tries. That’s not cool. After a good 20 minutes of sucking things started working out and I tried some tricks I hadn’t since the knee bruise. Treflip, double flip, nollie treflip, b/s flip, halfcab flips. I did most of them, but not in lines like I was trying. I tried one line one way of halfcab flip, treflip then heelflip. I had the most trouble with the heelflip. Ugh. The other way I was trying front shove, double flip, nollie treflip, but never got the double flip until Bernie showed up to drop off some footage and I snapped one in front of him to remind him who’s boss. Blah, I’m joking of course, but he was hyped. That’s the first double flip I’ve landed not wearing the IPath Stash shoe.

Had such a fun time after dinner playing Beatles Rock Band, then was supposed to have a chill little cello performance from India that went south. She freaked out and two hours later, lots of crying, me putting on a comedy act and lots of patience I was free for a few minutes. I was pretty beat and opted out for a quick Rampy session. I had watched a few more parts from the new Habitat video (Silas slays!) and was more motivated than I thought. For a few minutes anyways. I had wanted to try blunt to pivot and after some decent runs I started trying it. I never got a decent one. All were to 50 50 and I touched the wall on all of them. Oh well.

On the way to meet Fuzz, Carleigh and I were talking about street skating vs park skating. We agreed that park skating is awesome, but I had to say the best park sessions are not as rewarding as the best street sessions. It’s awesome because this ended up being one of those totally awesome street sessions.Carleigh and I picked up Fuzz in Broomfield, jolted to Community to sell boards, then to 303 to sell boards. After that we parked kind of near Civic park and rolled out with no expectations. First spot was a 4 stair drop over a rail. Carleigh went first and put it down in a few tries. Fuzz made it look easy. I took several tries to commit, but landed it when I did. Rad. Nothing like testing out the ol’ knee right away.Some pushes later we were at a fun little ollie spot. Ollie over a curb, land in a metal grate that is somehow super smooth, ollie out. And some nearby ledges with gaps and lights on them to get your mini-Huf on. We were here for awhile and it was a blast. Fuzz’s tricks: sw front 180 into the grate and back 180 out, front 180 in sw front 180 out, ollie in to manual ollie out (so sick!) and ollied about 10 of the little gaps/lights on the bench. Carleigh got wallies and ollies in followed by ollies out and got the one of the little ledge gaps. I got a couple of the little ledge gaps and a light, kickflip in and front 180 out. Man the front 180 was bad. I landed so straight legged.Lots of pushing around. We hit a crazy white ledge into a parking garage for a bit. Fuzz put down some solid front 50s and a first try sketchy front tail fakie. I got a little front 50 followed by attempted hill bomb, but I bailed out as it was sandy and I’m pretty sure I would have died had I done the whole thing. We ended up at the 4 flat 4 building. Fuzz did a first try front 180 off a big drop. I rode off it. Security came and Carleigh only got once chance at the 4 flat 4 which she almost did. That’s ollie 4, ollie 4. Not ollie 8.More cruising the city and we hit a banked window sill to wallride a bit. Fuzz got first try front wallride, I took a few tries, then added another horrible front 180 out to the mix. Apparently my front 180s need work. Next up Carleigh laughed at Fuzz and I for taking multiple tries to boardslide a little painted ledge and did it first try. She even slid at least 3 inches of it. Ha, just joking Carls. Fuzz and I finally slid it and we bailed out through a crack ridden ollie that smelled of bum piss and started back towards the car.On the way there was a fun looking hill bomb in a parking garage. Fuzz and I went at it. Fuzz did a ollie over a sidewalk section, quick manual then into the hill. He was hauling ass and bailed out. I went into it slow with a little gap to manny, but managed to stick with it until the gate. So fun! A few red curbs and ollies later we were in another parking garage where I slammed super hard trying to manual down a little curb downhill pad. Since no one saw it I re-enacted for Fuzz and since Carleigh missed the re-enactment I re-re-enacted it and called it a night. Totally awesome night. Awesome crew, awesome spots, awesome awesome. Skateboarding is awesome. Today’s word of the day is awesome.

Another busy day at work.   I stopped by Meta after work to get the new Habitat video and then home to eat and do the Null 3q taxes.  The taxes went by quicker than I thought so I peeped a bit of the Habitat video before picking up Jake.  Wow.  Austin Gillete and Janoski had some amazing footage.  It was rainy and felt like the first skate day in the 40s.  But it ended up not feeling that cold and Dahr, Ray Ray, Scotty and Dan where there warming it up.  Those dudes are fun to skate with and super positive.  I was a little worried about how my knee, but it came through fine.  Everyone was skating hard.  Ray Ray was making back lips look really easy so about when they left I started trying them on the corner of a curb.  A few tries in I did a couple weird sideways mannies and felt like back lip was possible. A few more tries later I put one down with a little squeek sound from the slide.  So hyped!  I’ve wanted to try back lips forever!  Jake had done some really good front lips and got back bluntslides already before he got some on the back lip game too.  He got a little squeeker too and we were hyped.  Other things I was happy about.  No comply 270 back tail, crooks on the ledge almost every try, being able to ollie, first try no comply over the rock, having fun.  Jake and I played a game of SKATE.  He got me with treflip and frontside flip, but I won it with fakie flip, halfcab flip, heelflip and b/s flip (he double or nothing’d the fakie flip and bailed it).  At the end I tried a run for awhile of front tailslide, 360 flip, back smith a curb.  I got a few tailslides which is good for me, some of the worst 3 flips ever and possibly a back smith.  I’ll keep working on that one.  As we left I told myself I need to man up and ollie the median finally.  A few tries in I committed, came up a bit short and still somehow rode away from it.  Good enough.  So hyped to be able to skate for real again!

Hopped in the Meta van in hopes of shooting photos second angles for the upcoming Meta video.  The first spot seemed really fun.  Max was trying a back 180 the hard way over a rail into a bank that was super gnarly.  He didn’t get it.  Next up was a steep bank spot where I posed a tail stall, Brian did some frontside grinds, a cool 360 carve and made fun of Jack for waxing it.  Neil and Lazer had some good ollies too and Neil through in a sick no comply.  Then I filmed Jack try his ass off for a front tail back 180 out.  Next up was my favorite metal ledge in Denver.  After some food and watching I grabbed the skateboard and was super excited to find that I was able to somewhat comfortably ollie.  It’s on!  Ha.  I did a few basics on the ledge like front 50, front 5-0, front 50 180 while Max tried tricks like front lip to switch crooks 3 shove out.  Ridiculous.  Neil killed it with some back crooks shove and front lip shove.  Carleigh had some good front 50s.  Brian was saving his energy for a manny pad.  Jack was was listening to Rocky Mtn High in a smokey van.  After awhile of this I got in Carleigh’s car with TF and we went to kook infested skatepark.  I don’t know the name of this park, but it has the lamest people.  Lots of scooters, fly out kids, bikes, thugs, etc.  Anyways to say I was hyped as hell just to be able to skate was an understatement.  I boardslide the little rail, tried to copy Brian’s awesome tailslide transfer, did a couple little grinds and basically worked myself up so quickly that I was out of breath and felt like I was gonna pass out.  Guess I’m out of shape.  After all the shredding we did the TF staple and ate at Tres Margaritas.  Don’t get their fish salad.  It’s not good.

Knee was buggin.  Met up with Derek and Mikey to film them.  Before we met Mikey, Derek and I skated a jersey barrier spot for awhile.  I did a few warm up tricks like back slash, back rock, front rock, rock fakie.  Might be fun to go back and do more some time.  We went to a couple other ledge spots where I filmed lines and had to squat and push a lot which seemed to be good for the knee.

Jake and I went to the Louisville park on a crisp, but nice night. Bikers were in the snake run and after a few cruises around doing nothing I noticed Jake headed to the deep pool and we ended up skating that for awhile. Jake killed it as usual. Backside grinds around the corner, front rock, back rock (both decked), maybe even a front 5-0 in the shallow. Jake was surprised that I landed a back rock in the shallow and even offered a beer for landing it. Unfortunately I would lose it later on by not landing a front 50. Anyways I had a fun run going with a carve in the deep end followed by a f/s carve in the shallow and managed a scratch grind in the shallow at one point. We moved on to the street area where I had a lot of fun grinding around a corner and then not ollieing. Jake front 50’d the hubba in a few tries then worked on front 5-0 and put it down. So sick. I tried a few ollies here and there and my knee worked, but I can’t describe how bad it hurt. Ugh. Then I started trying front 50s on a qpipe for awhile and took so long to land it that it wasn’t fun.Then we went over to the hockey rink.  Jake did like an eight trick line with a bunch of 180s, fakie flip, kickflip and tried to end it with a treflip.  I cruised around and did a few no complies and they felt ok.  Ollieing still hurt and I settled in to kickflips.  Over and over I wanted to land them again.  It’s funny I’ve only been hurt for like a week but I feel like a bruise shouldn’t hold me back as bad as it has.  Especially after seeing how badly some of my friends fall and don’t complain.  But it hurt like hell and I just wanted to do 5 kickflips in a row.  It took awhile but I finally did.  The knee somewhat loosened up, but ended up stinging in pain the rest of the night.  Ugh.  It feels like I only have a few more days of using the knee as an excuse.  At least I hope so.  I only felt like I was in my 60s today.  That’s way better than the 80s I guess.To all my fans out there (yes I’m joking) I apologize for the depressing updates.  I get bummed out on injuries real quick.  It hurts like hell to ollie, but tranny really doesn’t.  I guess that’s why so many old skaters stop skating street.  Hopefully I’m not there yet.

Ugh. Ollie and I went to Southern Hills on a pretty nice night. I wasn’t expecting much and my left knee was still hurting pretty bad. Little did I know that since I haven’t been stretching like normal or skating like normal my whole body felt like a sack of potatoes. It was horrible. I seriously couldn’t ollie. Not the same for Ollie though. He was ripping. Full speed mongo push ollies down the two stair, nose grab flyouts out of the handicap ramp, silly-start-of-a-run flip the board and jump on it, smiles for days. John showed up for a bit. He kept it pretty mellow too, but the switch slappy noseslides are seriously the hotness. We had to be back before 9 for Ollie’s bedtime. I sat depressed with ice on my knee feeling at least 80 years old.

Almost took a sick day. Had such a nice and relaxing evening with the kids and Liz playing Wii Sports, reading the new Thrasher, eating, etc. But after icing my knee throughout the day it felt quite a bit better and I new I wanted to skate a bit. So I went out to Rampy with the rough idea I would try to land a back disaster seeing as how I’ve done a few at Zuni now. After some sucking it was decided that back d was not an option, but I started trying back tail stalls and quite a few tries later I did one of those back tails where you pivot into the tail. I don’t really like those, but it’s my first one and my knee was starting to hurt so I’ll take it! 49 more days.

Another long and busy day at work.  Followed by a quick happy hour with Liz and Mia then a quick dinner before heading to Crisis to sell some boards and ask Fuzz for stickers.  The goal was to hit Crisis then 303 then skate the Brighton park.  At Crisis Fuzz was into the idea and joined Carleigh, Jake and I.  We spent a bit at 303, but eventually arrived at a nearly vacant Brighton skatepark.  The ride to the park was a blast.  Everyone was in a good mood and we joked about Carleigh roofy’ing dudes.  I don’t think I even spelled Roofy right.  But don’t worry, it was a joke.  At least we think so.Jake started out in the big bowl and Fuzz and I followed.  Fuzz brought the speed hype and Jake brought the trick hype.  Those dudes can skate tranny good.  They both did front 5-0s, back 50s, etc.  Fuzz got a front tailslide all sick and Jake did front rock too.  I was hyped to carve the tile and get an axle stall.  I wanted more, but being dumb ol’ me I bailed a back 50 and the run out hurt my knee.  Doh.  This pretty much took me out for the rest of the night.  I did a few things, but definitely couldn’t ollie.  A few things I was kinda hyped to do though.  Manny from the flyout bank around the hubba, back 50 the quarter pipe into the mellow bank, roll in a bunch, not be too bummed.  Carleigh started out on the bump to bar and did a few noseslides.  She also did pop shove, kickflip and front 180 up the euro and kinda tried ollie grab flyouts.  Jake ripped went for broke on some of the ledges.  Got front 5-0 down the 3 and almost front 50’d the downhill hubba.  Fuzz was ripping.  I’m so stoked for him being so happy with Crisis and being so hyped on skating.  He did a bunch of back pivot to back disasters, a bunch of tricks on the side of the hubba, some sketchy manuals and was the first person in CO to skate in a jacket this year.  Near the end of the session I took a few photos since I had done enough damage to the knee for one day.  250 days of skating down.  50 more to go.  If I was smart I’d take a day off, but I’m seriously freaking about getting this far and not making 300.  I don’t want to have to try for 300 again next year ..Carleigh first try for the camera noseslide.Pretty much the worst photo of an ollie over the ledge into the bank. Sorry Fuzz.Jake didn’t land this, but he put the effort in and put four down getting really close. We gotta go back!