Let me start quickly by stating this – we all need to get behind the push for the skatepark in St. Kilda, and I’ll explain why.

For those of you who have responded to my previous posts with vitriol and poor grammar, I’ll warn you now, this post will contain a lot of big words and complicated sentences. So if that scares you, just take a look at the poster below, write the date down in BIG CAPITAL LETTERS and get down there on the day.  

This park has taken far too long to come to fruition.

Its not a complicated thing, St. Kilda skateboarding residents have been waiting for an exceptionally long time for this park to be approved and built, and I am sorry – Elwood bowls just don’t cut it as a substitute. My riddled elbows can tell you that themselves.

The problem that has irked me for the past few weeks just popped into my head today, and it lies in the horrendous contradictions displayed by those who oppose the park.

I attended all of the council meetings, and sat through a lot of the barely lucid diatribes of those who opposed – and supported – the park (a special thanks must be awarded to Nick Buskins and Renton for being the voices of reason). The arguments of those opposing centred on the concerns of parent groups from the near-by primary school.

Much of their argument cantered around the supposed ‘anti-social behaviour’ that skateparks somehow attract, and the detrimental impact it would have on the beautiful façade that is Fitzroy Street, St. Kilda. The park would be to the detriment of the children at this school. This behaviour includes, but is not limited to, drugs, alcohol, graffiti and violence. I’m sorry, but when was the last time you were in Fitzroy Street after 10pm? How many skateboarders did you see?

Do these school children not travel down Grey Street early in the morning when many of the ‘workin gals’ are looking for that last job before they head home?

St. Kilda is a perfect illustration of all that is wrong with modern society. Homelessness, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, violence and lets not forget gentrification. How much damage can one skatepark do to exacerbate this problem?   

While I should credit those parents with children at that school who DID support the park, and skateboarding as an entity, I take huge offence to the contradiction of the opposing opinions regarding the construction of this park in light of recent events.

If you read the paper, or at least know what one looks like, you would be aware of the fanfare surrounding this particular school and the invitation of controversial photographer Bill Henson to ‘scout for models’.

Let me state from the outset, that I am a great admirer of Bill Henson’s work, and do not subscribe to any of the horseshit that he has been subjected to in the media. Henson is one of Australia’s greatest internationally recognised artists, and should be treated as such.

I would also like to state that I do not criticise this particular school for their actions in any way. I understand the concerns of the general public, however I think it has been blown well out of proportion.

Here’s the problem though - my argument lies with the parent groups. Many parents have come out in support of the school, and of Henson. The Olympic rower James Tomkins, who has children at the school, did not find what Henson does offensive.

Piggy-back comic Trevor Marmalade -  a vocal opponent of the skatepark – also voiced his support for the school in the media.

My question to these parent groups is this; if you believe Bill Henson is subject to great societal misunderstandings, then have a close look at your opinions of skateboarding.

Skateboarding is not represented by drugs, alcohol and violence. It is represented by the same forms of base expression and emotion that Henson’s work exudes. Not all skateboarders take drugs, not all skateboarders are violent, not all skateboarders are un-educated welfare cheats – much in the same way that Henson is not the creepy paedophile that the Herald Sun would have you believe.

How can you validate one form of controversial art, but not another? It does not make any sense, and smacks of cultural elitism – it is not a valid reason to oppose a planning permit.

If you can allow the utter monstrosity that is the façade of Sam Newman’s ‘Pamela Anderson’ apartment on Canterbury road, you cannot oppose a skatepark that will be landscaped in such as way to make it invisible to the school and – heaven forbid – passing residents.   

Sure, Henson is exhibited in galleries across the globe and is rightly considered a legitimate artist. Why then, is skateboarding any less legitimate when culturally rich cities like Barcelona allow skateboarding on their streets and monuments as a valid form of artistic expression  – specifically the Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art (MACBA)?

This park has been put to VCAT again and again, and it is getting ridiculous.

Please get down to support this. The local nay-sayers no longer have an argument to stand on.

It’s been a while I know, but like I keep saying – I’m busy - so get off my back.

I’ve been hanging out with these guys lately… and they’re an exciting bunch of dudes, let me tell you. They’re all sleepy but bitey… it’s a good way to be!

I must admit that I have thoroughly enjoyed the often enlightened discourse my last post created. I was secretly waiting it out to see if I could tap out at 20 responses to my humble critique of a skateboarding show that ran at the same pace as Wayne and Garth’s contribution to public access television.

I’m sorry if you didn’t like it. And lets be honest – not many of you did. Some of you got so angry you forgot how to spell! I’m a real stickler for grammar, and so I was amazed that my post could lead to so many fundamental spelling errors.

Case study…

1. Hey duD3 SK8 2 death is a mad show man lay off it you ignorant bastard.. Every episode is awesome az my cousin will hine iz AllWAys in it hes a mad sk8a from dandy wayz. Do you even sk8 you sound like some old bowl guy that trys to skate but is shit az. You need to take a chill pill bro. They allways have da sickest music on da show what do you listen to emo of sumthing.. Eat a cock fag if you get on that show you gotta be like a mad cunt sk8a pro like my cousin will. Your just jealous.

skate 2 death fan

04 / 04 / 16:28

Discuss…

Anyway, I’m not interested in appeasing those who didn’t like my last post, Chamberlin tried to appease Hitler in the 1930’s… and look how that turned out!

However, enough of this sparkling reminiscence, I feel like telling you about something I love. Skatepark Graffiti.

How good is turning up at the park for a sesh and finding a decorative, spray can motif of a marijuana leaf emblazoned across the flat bank? What’s even better is when the artist has taken the time to provide a definition of his work….

i.e. “SMOKE BONGS 08!”

Its like you’re walking through an art gallery and you have to read the little placard next to the masterpiece…. ‘Oohhh, so that’s what the artist meant!’

There are some amazing examples of outsider art out there, almost too many to mention.

‘No rollerblading’

‘Call this number for hot sex’ (insert some poor sucker’s mobile number here)

‘Steve SoandSo is a low dog’ (a particular personal favourite – so emotive!)

‘‘No BMXer aloud’ (I seriously saw this once, I nearly went to the store to buy a red spray can to correct the spelling errors, like I said, I’m a stickler for grammar)

‘Don’t wax the coping!!’

‘Launch here!’ (Usually with an arrow pointing up the tranny, ‘cos BMXers are apparently that stupid)

…. And lets not forget the tried and true…. Cock and balls.

One of my favourites of all time however, can be found everywhere. Get down to the nearest vert ramp, or crazy deep bowl and you will find a line sprayed across the transition right where it hits vert, and I can guarantee it will say….

‘If you cant pump past here, you’re a pussy’

There are a bunch of other words that can be tacked onto the end of that statement, but most of them aren’t very cool. But this is where I get to the point of all of this ‘drivel’ (my apologies again ‘Big Brother’).

Back in the day in Mornington, there was a Vert ramp in the parkland close to where the concrete parks now sits. It was the ‘Dunns road ramp’. And for my group of young tykes with single kick boards, it was scary as shit. All the older guys could drop in and actually skate it, but for the most part, all we could do was pump up and down, maybe with a frontside kickturn to add a little flair.

Somewhere near the vert line at Dunns road, some junior Donatello had sprayed…

If you cant pump past here – you’re Gary Sleet’.

I went to high school with that particular dude. He wasn’t your typical high school pariah. He wasn’t annoying like a class clown failure, or the object of incessant beat downs and bullying. He was, in actual fact a really big dude, and a little weird looking. Imagine Lurch and The Hunchback of Notre Dame had a love child…. Getting it? Nevertheless, I always tried to pump past that point, just in case I might become Gary Sleet.

I always wondered what it was like to be Gary. He was huge, and like I said, kind of weird looking. Everyone was a little weary of him, he didn’t say much, if anything at all, he just kind of lumbered around the school yard by himself. I don’t think he meant to be anti-social, he just hadn’t figured that particular part of life out at that particular point. But he always made me think of those oddball Lithuanian centres who somehow make it into the NBA; all hairy and unpredictable.

It was not like anyone could pick on Gary directly, because he could take your head off with his bear claw if the moment demanded it. He was one of those dudes that everyone snickered about, but kept silent the second he walked past. I guess it was the fear of the unknown that drove everyone to write him off.

I don’t know if he ever saw that crappy graffiti scrawled across the vert at Dunns road. And if he did, I guess he might have been bummed out. The ramp has gone now anyway. Or maybe, he was stoked on the idea that he could inspire so much fear in people without really doing anything.

Some numbskull with a can stolen from Dad’s garage wrote that on the ramp, next to the Impressionist bongs, cock and balls and rat bones. But he managed to push a whole bunch of kids to get past that point on the ramp, and I think a few of us even did it once or twice.

What I’m trying to say skatepark graffiti is a powerful medium. So next time you’re thinking of spraying ‘Smoke crack’ or ‘Graff is sick’ or even ‘Vote Liberal!’ ….

….. Be careful what you wish for..

So I’m kind of procrastinating these days. I have a pile of homework, and I’m avoiding it like Wayne Carey avoids reality. Turn off the laptop and turn on the Opiate of TV I say! Cruising past Law and Order Special Elevator Unit and CSI Cranbourne, I made it to Channel 31… and Skate 2 Death.

Bummer.

This show sucks… Badly. Its one of those things that makes you ashamed to call yourself a skateboarder, like Blue Crush did to women surfers, Skate 2 Death does so for skateboarders.

Imagine if you’re struggling for your civil rights in the ghettos of Soweto and Nelson Mandella comes on TV with a goatee, his hat backwards and pretending to be ‘street’ with a bunch of awkward gang signs and jeans big enough to hide rollerblade pads? Imagine that Nelson hollers out ‘Yo yo yo! This is what’s up with Civil Rights… It’s SICK!’. You’d be bummed right?

So was I. Welcome to Skate 2 Death.

If you haven’t seen it, I’ll give you a run down. Skate 2 Death is a 30 minute TV show constructed by a couple of dudes who lurk around skate parks, demos and comps with a two-bit VHS camera. Couple that with some stolen footage from legitimate videos.. and you have your half hour show!

I’ve pushed myself through this half hour of water torture a few times now, and I was secretly hoping they would get better, or go away… but apparently they did neither. God bless public access television.

The problem is that the production values remind me of a year nine video that my pot head friends and I made to appease my media teacher. The dichotomy lies in the fact that it’s been running for several years now! HOW?

The production values are what hurt me the most. There are wipes, fades and crazy negative/positive screen switches that remind me of an episode of Countdown. Come on guys… Invest a little cash in a decent camera and editing program… stop building a half hour program with two VCR’s and an AV cable.

Imagine a half hour of these guys.

Now we’re getting close.

Tonight’s episode featured some bad rap metal flavoured ‘extreme highlights’ of random skate action. There were pro ‘spotlights’ on Gareth Stuhr and Don Nguyen, which were just ripped from the latest Foundation video. However the bit that stung the most was the footage from Mornington skatepark. Now I’m not going to shit on Geoff Cook and his bro’s, cos they all rip… but the footage nearly gave me a seizure.

As a matter of fact, I have a feeling the guy holding the camera was having a seizure! For a whole afternoon! It was jumping around worse than Dave Keating on deadline day!

There’s only so many times I can watch somebody do a frontside feebs down a handrail. Let alone in slow motion three times and then with the positive/negative ‘feature’ going back and forth!

Imagine if Fred Durst was given his own public access show and decided to dedicate it to skateboarding. He did it all for the nookie… but nobody asked him to did they?

Yeah you got it. Its like a bunch of frat boys filmed themselves smashing beer cans over their own heads, slamming Jeager shots, and getting naked for no reason. Within that they found a link to skateboarding… and somehow were granted their own TV show…. Oh wait… some moron already did that.

So right now you’re hoping I can provide some kind of youtube link for Skate 2 Death.. Well guess what? It sucks so badly that the show doesn’t even rate on the worlds biggest spit bucket of ill conceived ideas and aborted screenplays. There’s no link!!

So the choice is now yours… Do you make the effort to find out for yourself and post your snide remarks underneath this article telling me to shut the hell up?

Go ahead! I’m not going to bother to make something better. I’m studying hard to make sure these crimes never take place again. Don’t stress… I’m doing my part for the cause.

I can’t imagine what the Snowboard version of this show would look like. It would have to involve some sort of white kid in a bright jacket, rapping like a gangsta doing ‘switch cabs’ over a man made bump to the sounds of ‘Souls of Mischief’… Oh wait… Never mind.

Um… Boy is this awkward… How do I wrap this up now… Uh, I hear there’s snow on Buller already, so load up dad’s Range Rover, grab the keys to the chateau and disregard everything I’ve said. Sorry if I offended you ‘brah’……

It’s been a while, I know. I’ve been busy! I have a life outside of this blog you know! I’ve been busy with my new collegiate lifestyle, and have spent the last few weeks sewing leather patches onto my tweed jacket, or is that tweed patches onto a leather jacket? Either way I’ve ruined two perfectly good jackets.

Anyway, outside of being elbow deep in an academic quagmire, I’ve managed to take a trip outside of the cultural vacuum of Melbourne. I went to Darwin!

What this has to do with skateboarding is pretty vague, but I’ll get there I promise.

I always regret forgetting my board when I go travelling. There is nothing worse than finding the most incredible park in the most unlikely location… and all you can do is cry that ‘you would totally shred this place’.

I will never forgive myself for travelling mainland China with no board and meeting these kids…

At this spot…..

I didn’t forget my board this time, and actually got to skate a park most people will never see, and in conditions that most nancy Melbournites would wilt under. It was the beginning of the wet season, 10,000% humidity, 38 degrees, and I was out at a neat little country town called Humpy Doo! I’m not kidding…..

The park is by no means amazing, it’s actually pretty rough, but the fact that people even skate up in Darwin is mind blowing.

Everything at the top end wants to kill you. Snakes, buffalo, spiders, crocodiles and dingoes would all happily take your life. Shit, in the wet season the soil produces a particular spore that - if it were to come in contact with an open wound – would kill you. The dirt will kill you! Darwin is raw as shit.

So are the locals….

Imagine you had a big night with your bro’s and instead of waking up on your couch or on the floor of your ‘artist’ friend’s studio, you woke up here…..

Scary huh?

Darwin has skateparks and skateboarders who both manage a triumph against adversity. Imagine waiting 6 months for it to stop raining to get your shred on! Keep in mind that street skating is almost non-existent when non-stop rain and cyclones have rendered the streets to ‘cheese grater’ status. Its not like you can go surfing in the meantime… there are things in the water that will kill you faster than those on the land!

Darwin is exactly what is so cool about Australia, its scary, full of rednecks and really fucking dangerous! As if you don’t want to take your board there and try your luck!

This is the part where I take umbrage with Melbournites. Recently I took a night out of my academic toil to sink a couple of longnecks and mix with the world. Granted St. Jeromes is already a cliché, but what the fuck is up with the way kids ‘slap on a persona’ these days?

I understand the inspiration, but the uber tight jeans, pointed shoes, tucked in shirt and the ‘I don’t care about my eastern suburbs, private education upbringing… its so passé’? Their attitudes are so fucked. It’s a visual representation of the forced laughs of 1,000 art-house movie patrons.

These anorexic pricks sole their feet with K-Mart shoes that would be better employed as bloodied tourniquets for World War One shell shock veterans.

Couple this with deliberately loose fitting ‘ironic’ tees and their equally manicured girlfriends; that put any Stella at Q Bar to shame - and you have irony upon twisted irony. Who’s going to fix the broken light bulb at home when your jeans won’t let you get onto the chair?

For the most part, they look like extras in a Dexys Midnight Runners film clip. Lost, confused and weird. Did you see how many dudes were in that band? Lost, confused and weird.

Shit, some of them look like they never made it off the casting couch at Dexy’s and headed straight to the Thompson Twins instead.

Get your constricted genitalia out of those designer (yet trife) jeans and swing them in a different breeze. Return your pants and attitude to Fat for a full refund, and find out where you put your board that time you decided avant garde electro pop was a much cooler pursuit. Jump into a creek that might have crocs in it and slappy a curb you never thought you would, or try a frontside 5-0 in a place where the ambulance has to fly to…. You might feel better for it!

One of the greatest joys in life is taking the piss out of very serious people. I discovered this when I raised the very paranoid ire of Frankston City Council with a few well placed words and pull out quotes.

When Frankston Council officially opened their long awaited new skatepark in 2006, it was a big day for a lot of people. SLAM mag editor Jake Frost asked me to cover the festivities for them - Sorry Dave and Rick…. They meant nothing to me I swear, ‘cos I love YOU!.

Being a Mornington Peninsula native, I was naturally stoked to put my fingers to the keyboard in Frankston’s name. I grew up skating there, and most of my youth was dedicated to that shitty metal car park set up that posed as the previous skatepark.

They were awesome days; we skated with an amazing crew of people, old and young. We’d shred all day, and then spruce up and hit the Saloon bar for $10 buckets of bourbon….. Good times.

Suffice to say, while I never lived in Frankston proper, much of my youth was spent dodging beatdowns at the train station and skating the park and a loose collection of crappy street spots all across the great city by sea. You get the point, I have Frankston pride.

So on opening day, I’m late for most of the major events, giveaways and ribbon cutting – and - BRUTALLY hungover. Its so hard to remain positive at these times. Nonetheless, there were old friends left and right. It was like the high school reunion that I never went to, so unfortunately I didn’t really pay that much attention to what was happening around me. I had a writing pad in the car…. But no pen. I figured i’d just bang something out when I got home.

So anyway, I wrote the article and sent it to Jake thinking there were need to be some serious revisions required. Not so, he took my first draft and sent it to the printers.

The thing with writing for print magazines is that you often forget what you wrote ‘cos it takes a few months to come out. So when it hit the shelves I scanned over the article in the newsagent, had a little laugh, and then I noticed something a little concerning.

See, I mentioned the hangover for a reason. When I got home to write the story, I realised that I’d spent most of the day trying to control “the shakes” and hadn’t really noticed any of “the hammers” being thrown down by the famous skateboarders. So, my backup plan was to write a little homage to Frankston’s amazing skateboarding history and it’s – shall we say colourful? – reputation.

While I didn’t exactly research any official statistical data, I relied on poetic license to speak a little truth about Frankston.

So what does Jake at SLAM do? He uses a pull out quote – you know, the bit of the article they enlarge to get you interested - that made some people VERY mad! So there’s two pages of photos and words and this enlarged, highly visible quote……

“Aside from the home invasions, missing teeth, scorpion tattoos and moccasins, Frankston boasts one of the largest pregnant teen populations in the nation”

Great…. Thanks Jake!

I’ll admit I talked a fair amount of shit in the article that may not be entirely true. It was however, very tongue in cheek and I did state my love for Frankston AND I thanked the council for building the park.

So a few weeks after it hit the shelves I get and email from Jake saying he’s sent me a package that “I had to check out”.

What I received was a 500+ word letter declaring the bitter disappointment in my efforts from Frankston City Council’s PR department!!!!

The author was incredibly upset with me. I had gone and undone all of the good work they had put into improving the image of Frankston. Many of the things I had mentioned in the article were simply not true, and Frankston citizens were most certainly sick of hearing them. My remarks were declared negative and derogatory.

Ooooppps!

The greatest part of the letter however came towards the end. The author was obviously struggling to restrain their vitriol - two wrongs don’t make a right - as the words were chosen very carefully.

“Fortunately the majority of SLAM magazine readers are probably only interested in the pictures (OUCH!). Nevertheless we would appreciate that in future, if you plan to write about the Frankston Skate Park, you please refrain from creating negative perceptions about a City that does not deserve such ridicule, wether tongue in cheek or not. We all like to laugh at ourselves, but in this instance you have overstepped the line.”

So after I recover from this keyboard created cheek slap, I realised something pretty awesome. That article probably crossed the desks and in-trays of several key figures at City Hall, and more than likely, the Mayor. So naturally, I was stoked.

The cherry on the pie however was that Frankston PR had sent me a ‘Gift Pack’ with their letter of angry machine gunned saliva rage. It contained an “I love Frankston” tee shirt and sticker.

My friends and former employers had created this design concept for our skateshop to parade the very pride I had talked about in the article. They had sold thousands of them… so naturally somebody in Frankston had bootlegged them and sold them at one of those Wu Tang Wear shops that’s essentially a glorified Vic Market stall.

Guess which one the Council sent me?

The fucking bootleg version!!!!!!!

I considered about 10 differing replies to this letter, one of which would discuss the theft of intellectual and design property of my friends’ work. However my Dad in his infinite wisdom, reminded me - between howling laughter - that I can’t afford a defamation lawyer.

Sage advice – I’d already shot one toe off, there was no point reloading and shooting off the rest of my foot in the process. So I let it go through to the keeper - as they say.

During World War 2, British and Australian POW’s stricken with hunger and disease discovered they could infuriate their Japanese captors if they totally ignored the rank, power and authority of their enemy. Dry wit was their only remaining tool. It helped maintain their morale and I suspect, was quite entertaining considering the horrible circumstances.

Extreme example I know, but inspiring none the less. I encourage you to take the most serious person you can find and break them down a little.

Its completely juvenile….. but a lot of fun.

So I’ve been sitting on my ass, temporarily out of work for the last few days, thinking of what to write about. Unemployment is a sweet ride, but it’s a real bummer for your motivation. There’s only so many times I can take Liverpool to the title on Xbox before my motor skills expire for the day. Still… smashing Man United 4-0 in a fantasy world will never get old.

Now that I’m finished with skateboarding employment once and for all, I’ve been thinking about all of the weirdo’s that I dealt with on the daily. The junkies, drunks, hippies, hare-krishna’s, skate-fans, sponsored prima-donna’s and has-beens.

They have a frustrating way of leaving an annoying mark in your memory like a cigarette burn on brand new duds. The worst of all however…. Is The Lurker.

Anyone who has ever worked in a skateboard shop knows what a lurker is. This ‘unfortunate’ is the kind of desperate loner who clings to skateboarding like the last life raft on the Titanic. Fucking skateboarding and its egalitarian rulebook.

At least with Snowboarding you need to have a little coin to stay involved, skateboarding takes everyone in like a ‘lost men’ shelter at 4am. Surfers have an even tougher entrance fee, because if you cant punch 15 cones on the way down the coast, you’re left holding the towel and fetching chicko rolls.

All the weirdo’s wash up in skateboarding…. And spend their lives in skateshops.

The Lurker will fritter anywhere from 1 to 8 hours making your day a living hell, and they’re either compulsive liars or social pariahs. They follow you around the shop, telling you about their fantastic lives of injuries, feats of skateboarding greatness and personal relationships with pro skaters, wether you feel like listening or not. You have no choice.

Unlike a skatepark where you can roll away, the skateshop employee is confined to the counter, and no amount of busywork, customer service or general indifference will deter the lurker from soaking up the attention, because essentially, they have no other friends.

I’ve heard every story you can imagine. Everything from unfortunate tales of contagious conjunctivitis, fictitious sponsors and friendships, to tales of social events that you know for a fact, simply did not happen.

The problem with lurkers however, is that no matter what you try, they wont be deterred. Oblivious to their own offensive personal hygiene, and a manic stare called – according to one pervious employee – ‘weird eyes’, Lurkers leave you with the feeling you’ve haven’t showered after a night sleeping on the floor at Warnie’s house. Dirty and weird.

At times I felt like John Cusack in High Fidelity. Jack Black and that other oddball keep coming in, crapping on about the most obscure and insignificant facts, and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it.

Like John, as yet another Lurker creeps toward you at the counter like a pervert with a pocket stuffed with roofies, you wish for the glory days when he was a daring young actor and always got the girls, despite the hi-jinks.

This story is nothing without anecdotal evidence of course. His name isn’t Warren, but its pretty close. Warren would be in the store at least once a day. He would try on 5 or 6 pairs of shoes, analysing everything from the stitching to the quality of the insole glue application, without buying a single pair. He would examine at least 10 boards from the highest part of the wall and dismiss them all for being a crap shape.

Warren would soak up about 4 hours of your life each day, leaving you to add a new punch hole in the wall in the back room.

The truth was that Warren could barely stand on a board, let alone perform a passable manoeuvre! In the countless years he’d hung around like a noxious weed, I think I witnessed him land one trick….. a nollie.

This well known evidence didn’t stand in the way of a good story though. Rumour had it that he claimed to be a sponsored snowboarder (cos anyone can claim that shit), filming for international videos, bro’s with any pro that was in town at the time, and at one point he claimed to be the brother of one of our staff! It was always a really weird.

He’d bring in product with barcodes from a nearby surfshop where he worked, claiming it was from a ‘package’ from his famous pro friends. Swapping product is the exclusive and desperate domain of struggling amateur skateboarders, one that Warren desperately wanted to be part of. We later found out he got fired from that shop for stealing.

The problem with compulsive liars like Warren was that no matter how many times you caught him lying, he would simply keep lying to get out of it! I even specifically asked him once, why was he so fucking retarded. He didn’t know what I was talking about…. But continued on to tell me about the party he went to the previous night at Dustin Dollin’s house.

It always made me wonder what would happen to these guys in later life. They’re the sort of people who becomes really unsuccessful con artists, or better yet, become victims of really good con artists! I’ve seen at least one lurker metamorphose into a full time Hare Krishna.

They’re the type of guys who become Pyramid scam salesmen, and end up on a week long feature running from Today Tonight’s camera man with a towel over their head.

But I’ll leave them to that wonderful man Hank Rollins…. There’s someone much scarier waiting for them.

The worst thing is however, that while I’ve done my best to rid these weirdo’s from my life. I’ve just traded up and taken a job serving alcohol to alcoholics. I just got a job in a bottleshop.

I’m an idiot. At least I know that already.

I quit my job last week, and I have to say, it’s an entirely satisfying experience. It’s the second time I’ve quit a good job this year, and I highly recommend it! Nothing beats the feeling of whiling away your remaining days with no responsibility.

I won’t bore you with the reasoning for my resignation, but suffice to say, 2007 was the year I decided to never work for a multinational corporation ever again. If you currently give your time to a CEO in a far away Ivory Tower, you would know the disconnected sensation of smashing you budget only to raise the carat count on your boss’s new golden back scratcher.

If you haven’t been reading my previous entries (for which I don’t blame you), you may not know that I’ve worked in and around the skate industry for almost 10 years. For the most part, I have been behind the counter gripping boards and lacing shoes as a manager in a city skateshop.

Like any job, it had good and bad days. The good days were filled with fun kids, fun staff and all round good skateboarding vibes. It’s a dream job for any teenage skater. But when it was bad, it really sucked. Unstable junkies, kooks looking for longboards, mind-numbing tedium, primadonna amateurs, smelly teenage feet, cranky mums, sketchy thieving graffers, mid-puberty weirdo’s, lurkers, compulsive liars and rollerbladers can all contribute to harshing your carefully constructed mellow.

So after 10 years working on both sides of the counter, I quit.

What I did gain in these years, was a short lifetime of stories and people. I’ve met some of my heroes, and discovered that most of them are rad dudes. Except for Tom Penny, I don’t think he knew he was even in Australia. Remember that Simpsons episode when all the parents have gone away and the kids are wandering the streets? You can see Ralph in the background walking aimlessly into walls? That was Penny. He’s pretty fried.

I’ve known a lot of shop lurkers who have grown up to be well known international skaters, and some who blew it before they got the chance. Lay off the bongs kids…. Drugs are bad.

Ultimately, I hope to use this blog to share some of my better stories. But you’ll have to wait until I’m out the door because - in the words of one well known powerbroker holding an ‘influential’ position in the industry - I’d be committing ‘skateboarding suicide’ if I did so.

When quitting a job, however, there are always people you don’t want to leave behind. Have a quick look at this kid and try and tell me he wouldn’t make you day that little bit more interesting!

But I guess the whole point of this sob story is to tell you about a really old friend of mine. He was hired the day I was, and like a fatally wounded street cop, he’s just 3 days away from retirement. Old Filey, Scratchy McBoardgripper…. In 10 years I haven’t decided on a name for him, but he’s an old trusted buddy. On my last day I think I might sneak him into my bag and take him home for a comfortable retirement. Because if you look closely at his weak and feeble edges, you will understand what 10 years in skateboarding retail will do to you!

So if you’re so over your job you’re turning prematurely grey…. Quit! I did and it’s the best!

Stay tuned for skateboarding suicide!

I was at the Lakai Fully Flared premiere last night, and all I can say is Guy Mariano. The Lakai team have produced a film that is so fucking amazing that skateboarding just got a whole lot harder for every other skater in the world. If you look at the names in this video, you would expect nothing less. But Lakai have produced something better.

I have to premise though, that I utterly despise skate video premieres. I very rarely attend them, as I can usually watch these videos at my own pace at work, free of the hindrance that awkward conversation provides. While it is often a good chance to catch up with a significant majority of really good dudes, premieres are for the most part, a celebration of the historic art of handshaking and small talk.

Testosterone levels are at all time highs at these events due to the unfortunate male domination of skateboarding. Its nothing short of a dick forest, a brodeo or your average sausage sizzle. To those women who were at the premiere; rest easy in the knowledge that you unknowingly kick started the puberty of every underage skateboarder in the room.

However a gratuitous thanks must go to the handsome gentlemen at POP Magazine for stepping up to the plate and putting a premiere on when it looked as though nobody else would. This video was worth the potential danger of grasping enough hands to contract a venereal disease! Please don’t fire me guys!

I do digress, lets talk about the video. Its awesome. You can almost guarantee that the Girl and Chocolate family will produce amazing videos, but take that crew and add a few selected amazing skateboarding ‘relatives’ and you have some frightening talent on show. Ahead of all of these however is Guy Mariano.

To help you snow bunnies and surfers understand, Guy Mariano was and now is again, The Man. Back in the day he rode for Powell Peralta as a teenage prodigy alongside Bones Brigade luminaries Tony Hawk, Cabalerro and Lance Mountain. He went on to produce some incredible video parts for various World Industries companies and then for Girl.

He had the dopest, most effortless style, and then somewhere after the ‘Mouse’ video, he disappeared. For several years he didn’t have a board, a shoe, or any coverage whatsoever. Where he went lay in the hands of hearsay and conjecture, and while those are ‘kinds of evidence’, you can rest assured that he is back.

Mariano’s part was so rad that it will hasten the retirement of a lot fledgling pros. In a time when skate team line ups are so geared toward marketing an image that they begin to resemble boy bands, Mariano has reminded us all that style and substance together will triumph over fashion and flair. Its like the second coming of Jesus, Mohammad, Buddah or L. Ron Hubbard.

Take note the Ryan Shecklers of this world. All the beni-hanas, back tattoos, reality shows and obvious steroid abuse will never put you in Mariano’s league. You will be forgotten just as quickly as Chris Branagh.

I won’t ruin it for you by telling you what Mariano did, or by posting the youtube clips – go pay for it you techno savvy Gen Y tightarse! These guys worked on this for the past three years, show some fucking respect and blow the cobwebs off your wallet and buy a copy! It’ll make you shred a little bit harder.

Enjoy!