I am still not feeling 100%, but Brian invited me to the warehouse for a session with TF.   I was super nervous because I’m already too self conscious as it is and now I can’t even really skate.  I was super hyped to roll with friends though.  It was super crowded when we got there.  Doh.  I hung out with my injury partner in crime Carleigh and the every shy Jack in a corner that had a tiny bank for a pyramid that was under construction.  The ramp was super crowded.   Carleigh did some kickturns and little tailblocks.  She just got her cast off so she isn’t allowed to ollie yet.  Jack did all kinds of goofy tricks.  Kickflip pretzels, etc.  Neil came by and got me to do a flatground shove it.  It had no pop and I wasn’t even really moving, but it felt good.  I did some other little front rocks and stuff on the side of the pyramid.  I felt so awkward on a skateboard.  But we kept dorking around and I felt a little better as opposed to the red curbs session where I kept feeling worse.  So that’s cool.  Eventually I skated the main area a bit by dropping in on the bank to ledge, doing a kickturn and then a little boardslide on the ledge.  That was fun.  I had a couple bails though that felt so weird.  My ankles haven’t moved that way in a long time so it would hurt for a few minutes then feel looser and better.  This whole arthritis thing is so weird.  At the end Brian and I tried some flatground kickflips and got some back to back!  I got two in a row.  They were still mobbed and horrible, but man that felt good.  I also tried some front rocks on the bank to ledge.  It felt fun to try a somewhat real trick, but we had to go before I got it.  I felt like at the end I could kind of feel my skate feet.  I just wish my legs would have some pop in them.  I’m really rambling on here.  Skating hanging with TF felt great.  Bye for now.

The Think team is the most underrated team in skateboarding.

Jack sent me this one. Wow.

Gotta love clips with curbs in them.

Is the best.

I went to Red Curbs on a very cold day. I had an offer to go skate the 303 warehouse later on, but I wasn’t sure I could actually skate and I was on call for work. Turns out it was probably the right call as skating didn’t really work and I got called in for work. Skating was harder then I thought it would be. I did a boardslide on a curb quick and fell. It didn’t hurt, but it kind of set the tone. I couldn’t do much of anything. Ollieing up a curb was really, really hard. It’s a mixture of my muscles not being used and arthritis. My legs did everything slower than normal. It sucked. It didn’t hurt, but it didn’t feel right. It’s not like a normal injury where your nursing one part of your body. Both feet, ankles and knees felt weird. Really weird. I quickly realized that flip tricks weren’t going to happen. I wanted to do a kickflip though. I tried a run one way of front 180, sw front 180, slappy tailslide the curb then a kickflip attempt. Never got it. Going the other way I tried a slappy switch front nose, halfcab, then a kickflip. Nope. I did manage a horribly mobbed kickflip, but it was on it’s own. It made me happy to land a kickflip again and get out skating, but it was kind of more just depressing and I realized I have some more waiting to do before I can skate the way I want to. I take another injection of the arthritis drug tomorrow and I hope that it does it’s job.

This is seriously throw away footage? Wow, I hope a shop gets in this DVD.

Total destruction city skating and awesome music. So hyped punk/garage music is making a comeback.

SF hills!

Kind of boring spot, but it looks like it took all of 20 minutes to film. Any PJ footage is gold.

I think I’ll start skating again any day now. The biggest problem is my left foot is still really swollen and hurts. Argh. I am in kickflip withdrawal.

I’m on the come back! Been feeling way better this week. Not good enough to skate, but better. Been doing some exercises and trying get back in shape a little. Stretching again, all that. The arthritis is still there though. It’s really hard to describe what it feels like now. It doesn’t hurt so much anymore, but it makes everything feel slow and restricted. With that being said it was almost 60 degree outside and I couldn’t resist seeing how I felt skating. I didn’t think I’d be able to do tricks at all, but just wanted to push. Surprisingly pushing felt pretty good. I went pretty slow and felt it out, but man it felt good. I did a few manuals between tree shadows and they felt ok. Tried to ollie a bit, but that didn’t work. My leg reflexes are way too slow for that. I did a few slide around 180s where you just pivot off the front truck. Fun. Then I went inside before I did anything stupid. I’m not sure what would happen if I fell. My wrists still hurt pretty bad. I have no idea when I’ll be skating for real. I’m hoping by next weekend. It sure felt good to get out and push a little though.

Officially the most hyped I’ve been for a video in a long time. I think more editing went into this teaser then the entire Real Since Day One video. Ha. Seriously though, the Girl/Chocolate teams are stacked with legends and young rippers and I want to see parts from every one of them!

Rob made everything in this sick clip that makes me wish even more that I could get out and push down the streets.

The final diagnosis is poststreptococcal reactive arthritis. Basically I had a strep infection and it caused my immune system to go haywire and start attacking my joints. Not cool. By itself, the Amoxicillin helped some of the symptoms, but it didn’t do much for my arthritis. I was feeling better over the weekend, but by no means good. I couldn’t walk very well, stairs were hard and Sunday was full of painkillers and wrist pain. The natural course of reactive arthritis is to get better over time. Some cases are weeks, most are several months, even a year. With how severe my case was I have no idea how much longer it would take under normal circumstances.

Last night I took a dose of the arthritis drug Humira which is supposed to get me feeling better quick. And wow it did. I would say overnight I went from about 30% to 40%. Everything that ached felt better. I feel encouraged to say the least. The million dollar question is of course, how long before I can skate again? The nurse estimated six weeks (which would be 3 doses of Humira since you take it every two weeks). I think it’ll be awhile, but not six weeks. I don’t think she understands how determined skateboarders can be. I’m gonna be patient and try not to rush it, but at least I can finally start leaving the house again.