Liz’s birthday!  We had dinner, hung out in the mountains and I skated Rampy while she read to the kids.  Nothing new went down.  I struggled a bit at frontside disasters, but got a few Rampy tricks I haven’t done in awhile.  Fakie front 50 stall to rock ‘n roll, fakie front smith stall fakie, front 50, it was fun.  It’s nice doing a short Rampy night followed by long hours in the streets the next night.

Pretty Epidumbic!

Jason biked to my house on a nice night then I drove down to the manny pad.  We warmed up for a bit as the last few minutes of sunlight dissolved.  For maybe the first time ever we both landed our first manual attempts.  It took me a few tries to get nose manny and Jason came close to that trick too.  I got a heelflip up the curb first try and thought I could back it with a heelflip manny, but ended up not being able to even get the heelflip again.  Love it.  Other then that I got a kickfrip manual, fake bigspin up, and was trying nollie shove manual when we left.  On the way out I took a few tries to get the stupid tiny ollie ollie up the two curbs.  So bummed.We cruised up Walnut like the old days.  We used to warm up at the manny pad a lot then cruise up Walnut.  But now Walnut isn’t so great so we walked here and there.  Jason seemed to be more in the mood for sleeping and backed it up by not really skating anything for another hour or two.  It’s so weird skating with someone who doesn’t seem hyped at all.  Ugh.  I guess some people would probably blame me for enjoying crappy spots too much, but I’m not gonna apologize for enjoying skateboarding.  So anyways, I skated, Jason kind hung out and sat around, bitched, watched, texted, etc.   I had fun at the median spot across from the bus station.  I tried front 180 nose manuals, kickflip manual, kick back tails unsuccessfully.  I had fun in the brick area for a bit trying flip tricks and ollieing onto the narrow ledge around the flowers.  I got a couple front 50s around the knobs on the red ledge, back 50s and even a couple front crooks to fakie using the wall  It’s a lot harder to manual with all the flowers sticking out.  I did a couple mannies and noseslide the tall two stair ledge I skated once over the winter.  I was happy that the ledge didn’t seem nearly as tall.   We hit the alley kicker for a bit.  I got a couple mediocre ollies, back 180, crappy b/s flip, slammed going fakie on a rock.  Jason did a couple ollies.We ended up at the white ledge spot and Jason finally skated.  We both got some back 50s.  He does them way higher up further than me.  Jason got a good noseslide too.  I ended up getting a few crooks which surprised me.  Not sure if I’ve ever tried them there before, but it worked out pretty good.  I grinded a lot further then my typical little jib.  I ollied the yellow curb into the lower sidewalk.  It’s not much of a drop, but it is fun.  Then we both started trying lines.  Jason got ollie, back 50 easy.  Then he did it with a little quick up to front board transfer on the yellow curb.  Tight.  I had a couple crappy ollies followed by crooks and then would bail a 3 flip.  Eventually I tried front shoves and ended up putting down a good run for myself.  Front shove, crooks pop out then 360 flip on flat.  That really hyped me up.We headed out to stop by Carleigh’s new place.  I’m not sure which route Jason went, but I decided to hit a few things on the way.  Front 180 up onto the ledge behind Wells Fargo followed by sw fs 180 off, back 180 up some curbs, back 50 the red knobbed curb, manual a median, manual up the bust station median, etc.  Fun way to end it.

I was super beat from the downtown denver session the night before.  So beat that I fell asleep on the couch three times.  I didn’t think I’d skate at all, but I ended up going out to Rampy for a short session.  Two Daisy Chainsaw songs on the boom box later I was done.  I landed almost everything I tried and got a few tricks first try like fakie pivot fakie, back 50 fakie, front tough guy fakie which was enough for me to feel satisfied.

I had no time to rest after work.  Get home, eat, load up car, pick up others, arrive late at 303, do business and boom  skate.  We started out by going to a ledge Jason wanted to hit.  Kinda tall and not as slick as last time, but we had fun.  Jason and I got back noseslides.  Nate did 50’s and 5-0s.  I got a lucky first try crooks jib and was unable to quite get a front 50.  I also dorked around on some little ollie over a parking block after a downhill handicap ramp which was super dumb.  A few powerslides later the cops came as Nate was getting into kick back tails so we left.We ended up at this weird curved ledge ollie into a tiny bank.  Nate ollied into it first.  Me second.  Carleigh third then Jason first try.  I got another one that was more directly into the bank which felt pretty cool.Next was a long curved ledge that Jason waxed up real good.  Nate killed it with long front 50s then long front 5-0s.  Carleigh almost got some noseslides.  This ledge wasn’t short and it was poorly lit.  Jason got some super long back noseslides.  I got some noseslides, short front 50 and shorter front 5-0.  Came somewhat close to a noseslide to crooks.  I may have even technically landed one as it felt like the truck got up on there, but if you aren’t sure then it don’t count.  Security kicked us out.Next up was hill bombing.  So fun!  I chose to do some powerslides this time instead of just pointing the whole way which was way more fun.  We hiked up to do it again, but a cop parked nearby so Nate, Carleigh and I waited til he left.  Jason wandered off somewhere so we had to wait.  The second hill bomb was even funner.A bit of skating down the street later we ended up at the long and tiny 2 stair.  Carleigh and Nate ollied it first try.  I took about 10 tries.  It was still fun though.After getting kicked out of the 2 stair boardslide ledge before any of us could land it we ended up at a wide two stair that we did tricks up/off or manuals.  Nate got manual and nose manual then ollied a huge gap over a ashtray.  So sick.  Carleigh got back shove down the two.  Jason got manual and the best slam on a back 180 attempt up.  I worked for a switch front 180 up then kickflip off.  I’ve never done a sw 180 up two before.  Yippee.We hit a nearby ledge for a few quick boardslides and sick manuals through the skate stoppers by Nate and Jason before getting the boot and everyone agreed we were too tired to skate anymore.  Three hours of downtown skating will do that.  Such a fun night.

Nate received his Trick Factory pie to the face.  Carleigh pretty much punched him in the face with it.  So funny.

Picked up Jake and met John at Nate’s place around sunset.  Instead of going inside to watch the new Blueprint video we started skating the basketball court.  After some warming up, a dog barking at us and chasing our boards, me accidentally shooting my board at Jake’s ankle (it barely missed) and Nate and I complaining about our hangovers a game of SKATE ensued.  Although my head was hurting, my legs felt better than normal.  Interesting.  The game went on for awhile.  Nate was being nice.  I ended up winning.  My favorite tricks were treflip, a solid f/s halfcab flip and a really good feeling heelflip.  Shortly after the game Nate did like 5 tricks that would have easily taken all of us out.  He landed triple flip, nollie double flip, sw double flip, so much.Next we cruised nearby to this little kicker to downhill then on to a new banked ledge.  It was pretty dark, but we skated it for awhile anyways.  Jake learned front blunts.  John did back blunt, blunt to pivot, his patented back smith.  Nate killed it.  Boardslide to fakie, boardslide regs, front boardslide fakie, blunt fakie.  I had fun there.  Back 50, back 5-0, front slash, boardslide regs, and came close to boardslide fakie and noseslide.  We hit a kicker spot for a tiny bit.  I got a kickflip.  Jake got sw front 180 and Nate cruised around ollie’ing some stuff.  John hung up on a crack and slammed hard, lost his shit and focused his board.  John is the nicest dude until he hits a rock or crack and goes down.On the way back to the car I ollied a little curb to parking lot gap and then 180’d it after boardsliding a parking block.  Nate ollied a taller part of it all steezey.  In front of Taco Bell I got kickflip up the curb, kickflip off.  Fun.  We hit the little bank halfpipe in the middle of 28th st for a bit.  John borrowed Nate’s board and did blunt pivot fakie.  I did a pivot fakie with my patents late revert style.  Fun night.  Then Nate and I watched the blueprint video which is pretty incredible.

Had a busy Saturday going and it was super hot, near 100.  Liz and I were having some friends over for dinner so I had to get my skating in after running some errands and before dinner.  Jason was down so I met him at the ballpark ledges.  We both dorked around for awhile to warm up by going super slow and stalling noseslides as long as we could which was harder than we figured it would be.  Eventually we got to “real” skating which isn’t much faster for me, but it now included bailed grind attempts as well.  Jason got his run a few times.  Back nose the first ledge, front board the second, chinese crack fakie ollie body varial, front noseslide.  Best run!  I mostly tried back noseslides to crooks.  Got pretty close once which is cool because I’ve never landed that trick.  I want to learn that one.  Other then a few landed 360 flips I mostly bailed everything and couldn’t ollie high enough to grind the ledge good.  Doh.

I just finished reading this book.  So funny.  It’s a story about a dumb man’s adventures in Callisto, KS and pokes some fun at the government.  I highly recommend it.

Another hot sunny day in CO.  Brought Ollie and Sam to the park around 6.  We skated for about an hour.  Sam skated kinda hard.  Ollie mostly just followed me around and looked bummed.  Ugh, I guess he’s not into skating so much these days even though it was his idea to go to the park.  I skated somewhat ok with the exception of taking forever to land a kickflip to fakie.  I tried a couple runs that I got most of.  Halfcab flip, back 50 the little ledge, no comply shove to fakie (which I never landed).  360 flip, crooks, roll in.  My legs are shot.