Didn’t sleep well and got to work early since I couldn’t sleep.  After an ok day of work it was super nice out and I went to the ballpark ledges.  I took a lot of time to warm up, but did manage to get a back 50 which surprised me.  That ledge is tall and you can’t cheat the corner by going over the top.  I also managed a first try crooks.  Bernie showed up after awhile.  We were both doing whatever for awhile.  He had some good front tails.  Almost fakie back tail.  I had a few front 50s, accidental 5-0s, tried to shove out, but failed.  I landed a double flip at one point.  Then we started going for lines.  I wanted fakie big flip, pop shove, crooks, 360 flip.  Bernie was doing halfcab flip, nollie heelflip, front tail 270 out, but also throwing in a bunch of funny fakie flips over cracks.  I worked for it, but ended up getting my line.  That’s a good one for me if you think of the tricks, but the crooks and 3 flip were so bad.  Trying to pop a 3 flip as the 4th trick was so hard for me.  Bernie got the 270 out, but it wasn’t with the whole line.  Fun.  Then it was edit and collect footage time.That was day 270.  30 more to go!

I’ve been blowing off starting a new Null promo for awhile.  But with the Meta premiere just two weeks away I hit the wall and had to start working on it.  Four hours later I should have been asleep, but this silly 300 days this year thing got in the way and I went out to Rampy for a few minutes.  I did a few blah lines then took about 5 tries to get a line of back smith stall, rock fakie, fakie front smith fakie.  I also tried a few stationary kickflips without the reverse superman.  That’s so hard!

It’s been awhile since this show happened, but one thing or another and it took awhile to get this online.  Anyways, the night began at Fuzz’s favorite ska venue 3 Kings Tavern.  We were there to see my friend Zach’s band Straighten The Crooked open for some ska music that we would later have to pull Fuzz away from.  I was to shoot some video for for them to put up on youtube.  Unfortunately as soon as they went on stage 3 Kings shut off most of the lights and there wasn’t much light to film.  After filming one song I snapped these photos, but they didn’t come out too well either.  The show was sick though.  They have gotten tighter and a better stage presence.  So stoked.  Did I tell you I’m friends with the singer in the band?  Whew!   Both Carleigh and Fuzz blogged about the show too.  Well, maybe not so much about the show, but at least about how you can get socks in the vending machine at 3 Kings.Zach killing it on the bass.  After Straighten The Crooked we bolted over to the Larimer Lounge because I wanted to see The Henry Clay people.  A little band I didn’t know much about other than their new album is really fun rock ‘n roll.  We got there with plenty of time and ended up seeing an opening band called The Dig.  They started out pretty good, but by the end of their set none of us were feeling them.  They’ve got some potential for sure, who knows if they’ll fulfill it.I had taken enough “professional” photos already so I left my camera in the car allowing me to take such high quality photos as the one above.  Henry Clay people came on and immediately began rocking the house.  Lots of energy, lots of fun.  I figured they’d be pretty good live, but they exceeded all expectations.  As the show progressed it became evident that once again, an opening band at the Larimer would act like idiots, pretend they owned the floor and throw ice cubes at the headliner.  I don’t know if the Larimer requires this, but either way it’s annoying.  Henry Clay People took it in stride though.  In fact I don’t think a smile ever left the singers face.  I might even say that I’ve never seen a band have that much fun on stage.  They played most of the new album and quite a few covers.  Lou Reed, Op Ivy, Bruce Springsteen and closed with Neil Young.  I loved the covers.  I loved that it annoyed the hipsters.  They played them great.  The show was awesome.  Good times Rock ‘N Roll.  Everything and more I want to see in a show.  This band is awesome.

Is one of the best.  Nice fro.

Another busy day. Got off work, played football with Ollie for a bit, made dinner, packed up quick with boards to head to Fuzz’s. Picked up Jason and Jake on the way and Neil and Carleigh would meet us there. Jason and I always start out the best. By that I mean we can barely ollie up the blue curb. But things got rolling. Neil was already killing it. Perfect wallies into the bank, lipslides up the convex ledge, back d’s bricky, ollies over the rail super easy, etc. He puckered out pretty quick. Jake did a bunch of front 50s on the low to high ledge down the bank then manned up and did the 6 stair hubba. Gnarls! Fuzz was killing it as usual. Frontside sugarcane first try was hotness. Jason seemed to be right behind me the whole night. I worked on back 50s on the low to high for a bit and when I finally landed it curving to the right too much Jason was like “oh no I’m sorry” as his board shot out while front boarding the rail and went into me. We laughed. It was funny. Jason was ripping. Coast to coast feeble to fakie on brickey, front boards on everything, manuals, etc. I finally nose manualled the blue box again, followed it with front feeb on the quarta potty, back 5-0 on bluey. Treflips on flat were feeling good. After awhile something happened and I got frustrated though. So Fuzz being a kind sir agreed to dork around with me and we did some things on the mellow tall bank in the middle of the park. Fuzz started it off with manual, rock, fakie manual. I was trying to do a kickflip to fakie out of a rock on the top and Fuzz started trying it too. It took a few tries, but we both got it around the same time. We even did a couple of them. It was fun. Then Fuzz worked on b/s flips out and I worked on bigflip out which I somehow landed in less tries than the kickflip fakie. Hyped! Dork tricks rule! Jason was doing poppy back 180s into the bank then we ollied the six stair and I took some photos of Carleigh who had just shown up. Neato. Super fun night.

Getting hyped for this

After a very long drive down from the mountains involving somehow avoiding a muliple car pile up due to ice and then carving pumpkins I escaped for a bit to get some skate on.  Went to Southern Hills as it’s close and such a good spot.  The weather was super nice.  Neil said he’d meet me after awhile.  I haven’t had a couple days off skating in awhile and my legs were still sore so I was real rusty.  I like trying lines there and this time I tried to include more than just the ledges.  After a couple basic ones I had a decent one for me.  Front board, ollie up the 2, kickflip into the bank, noseslide fakie.  Back crooks the picnic bench, noseslide to fakie the bench, halfcab noseslide (horrible) another bench.  Front 50, front 180 up the 2, f/s halfcab into the bank, ollie onto a bench, ollie off.  Neat.  Neil showed up and cruised around too.  Like me he didn’t seem overly motivated.  For awhile I tried another run of fakie bigspin into the bank, fakie flip on flat, then fakie nosegrind a ledge.  Never got close to the fakie nosegrind.  At the end I started trying the hardest trick for me.  Ollies.  I wanted to ollie up and then ollie a gap, but I never did.  I could barely ollie up a bench with speed and survive.  Ugh.  Not my favorite session.  I left, stopped at a gas station and saw someone skate by with a “All You Need Is Null” t-shirt.  Awesome.  Then it was trick ‘or treat time with the kids.  Fun!

My brother was up at my parents for two days.  So after a late night at The Thermals then getting up super early for work on Friday we left right after work for Buena Vista.  Saturday it was family day and I played 36 holes of frisbee golf with my brother and dad.  So fun.

After a nap and dinner I went out and skated in the street while I waited for Carleigh to show up.  Basically just 180s.  I think it was all 180s though, including the tail scraping switch back 180.  Carleigh arrived and it was off to Crisis to spend more money then skate the Broomfield park for a bit.  A bit turned into quite awhile because it was so fun.  Initially though I was sucking and it was crowded so I just resorted to the blue ledge and tried slow switch front boards for awhile.  I got one.  People were hogging the quarta potty so I couldn’t line it out.  Oh yeah, the crew was pretty big.  Carleigh, Fuzz, Neil, Brian, Derek, Darin and more that added to the good vibes.  Neil was killing it quick as usual.  I ollied the six stair first try and it felt pretty easy and fun.  I hucked the double set a couple times.  It’s pathetic, but that would be the biggest thing I’ve ever ollied.  The best part is it felt pretty doable.  But rather then just land it and get it done with, I’d rather make it a big deal and blow it off for a later session when “I’m feeling on”.  Brian and Fuzz were working on backside sugar canes.  I saw Fuzz land a few and Brian slam a lot of them, but got so close.  At some point I saw Brian ripping the flow bowl so I joined for a bit.  A couple runs in I set my record for most coping touches in one run.  Hyped.  All kinds of goodness was going on in the park.  Carleigh got a pop shove down the double set.  Derek did nose manual into the steep bank.  I ended up getting a smith grind on the black ledge.  So fun.  We left and went to the thermals who held it down as they always do.

Temperature wise it was colder out then yesterday, but without the wind it didn’t feel too bad.  I pulled out the ol’ Null thermal for the first time and was layered up good for the cold.  I cruised around for a bit and ended up at one of the new buildings that John and I sometimes play SKATE at.  Maybe I should start paying attention to building names.  To get my feet warmed up I did a few flatground tricks.  180s, shoves, kickflips, nothing much, just enough to get the blood flowing.  On the way out I noticed a 3 stair I hadn’t seen before.  I did a little line up to it with fakie ollie a crack, switch 180 a crack, front 180 down the stairs.  Wowsers.  On top of the 3 stair is a ledge with another ledge to ollie over which I attempted to pose an ollie over, but was not even capable of posing the ollie over.All day I had been thinking of this new spot with a narrow path to ollie a little ledge.  I headed there.  On the way I saw quite possibly the shortest skirt I have ever seen on a totally smoking college girl.  That was distracting.  A hill bomb later I ended up at the spot.  It wasn’t as great as I’d remembered, but whatever.  I took like 30 tries trying to get a pop shove on this narrow path to setup for a kickflip, but it didn’t happen.  The path is surrounded by bricks so you can go off the path and your ok, but I’m a perfectionist (clearly, just look at my style).  I gave up on the shove, started ollie’ing a little two stair first instead then doing a kickflip on the path.  When I didn’t land perfect in the path I would turn around.  So this means every try until the last try so I finally go to ollie the gap and it’s weirder then it looks.  Narrow, downhill, sideways approach.  I clipped the ledge and bailed.  But I felt good and wanted it next try, I go to grab my board and it’s folded in a V.  Shit!  I guess that’s what I get for skating a totally cracked board when I have tons of new boards at my house.  Did I mention I saw the shortest skirt I’ve ever seen?  Wow.  Calm down Fuzz.