I changed my mind!! about a lot of things

I have decided to move the ramp approximately 22 inches to the left. This means off the patio and fully into the yard. It occurred to me that if I have the ramp propped up on the patio then you will have a hard time fitting a wall ride against the house. If you take the ramp down into the yard and make the skate surface even and level to the patio then you can skate from the patio to the flat bottom and the ramp and vice verses. Then later down the line if I want to build skate-able structures else where; the flat bottom of the ramp extending the patio area is more advantageous to my endeavors. This all occurred to me as I watched a episode of Built to Shred with Jeff King. He was having concrete blown into many skate-able structures in his back yard and I was like "hey, a wall ride in the back yard would be cool." A wall ride in the back yard means moving the ramp 22 inches to the left, ha!!

That means I need some help moving that flat bottom frame out of the way. Then I can level some concrete blocks then move the flat bottom back to its spot where it should stay. This whole process of building, making mistakes, learning and patience is a good time. It is frustrating as well, you can hear deathly screams of agony coming from my back yard as I run into issues through out a day. I cant wait to session back there, it will be so rad!! I know I am going to suck at it for a while though, hope fully progress, learn my old tricks and some new ones.

YOU ARE 38 YRS OLD!! WHY ARE YOUR BUILDING A RAMP NOW??

It never dawned on me before because I did not have a place to build one. I moved into my house 2 and half years ago and thought about it then. To skate right out the back door onto a ramp, such a cool idea, but I was not currently favoring my old past time, or was not in touch with what is good about the world - Skateboarding and Board sports in general.

That poses another question to myself. Why this back and forth motion with your interest in skateboarding. I skated from 7th grade up to 11th grade hardcore, laid off for 9 months and then skated again in 12th grade a little. Went to college and did not touch a board for two years until I was in Steamboat Springs and skated a mini ramp out there, I was over whelmed how hard it was to skate a ramp when just a few years ago I was easily bombing a vert ramp every day. Came back, moved to Memphis, street skated a little bit. Years went by, no skate, then SPOM was built. I skated a 6ft mini ramp/bowl there periodically, I accomplished nothing really special. Was able to drop in and do front and back side grinds, grab the nose on the grinds a little. Skating was load of fun but not very accessible. What I did figure out at SPOM's bowl was  that I loved to skate transitions more than anything. At the time I was into racing road bicycles, finding a job, not having to spend money and go out of my way to skate.

My latest rage into this discipline came out of me when I was on Aspen this summer. I went for a stroll through a park in the downtown area and then happened on a skate park. It was a concrete park that has all kinds of magnificent bowls to skate. How cool I thought would it be to come back next summer and skate the park?? That means you got to get skate ready which takes a lot of practice.

The only way in my mind to do this is build a nice little mini ramp in your back yard so you can skate it any time you want. Take that and then apply that to skating the Greenlaw ramp and other local stuff. Take my skate on the road when I travel for work and find skate spots there. Skating a miniramp is a work out, let me tell you after pumping the Greenlaw transitions back and forth a few times I was  winded. Going back and forth is not just rolling, it takes leg strength, core strength, upper body strength and endurance. Then there is the falling, all skaters fall, it is part of the sport. You may only see skaters in videos landing tricks but it usually takes a bunch of falling on their ass before they land it. So having a miniramp in the back yard is like having a gymnasium. 

WHAT ABOUT THE MID-LIFE CRISIS?. You know, if this is part of a mid-life crisis then so be it. Some  guys go out and buy sports cars or sail boats, divorce their wives, change careers (that might be a good idea), they just do crazy junky crap that gets them no where but jail or further depression. Hopefully I will loose weight, have fun and gain some new friends, not jail or further depression.  Two out of three things have already happened, the weight part has not happened yet but I am still hoping. The boarding culture is where I feel like I belong and have been evading it all these years. It is when I sit down and hang out with my 16 year old cousin (who is a sick sick skater) and we know no separation of age. It never occurs to him that I am 22 years older than him because we talk skate or there is some kind of bond that we have that is rooted in skateboarding. I mean yes, I am much older but you wouldn't know it,  the way we sit around and cackle like kids. That doesn't just Happen with Devon, but it happens with many of other the skaters I meet.Skateboards are in my blood. Maybe I am reinventing myself, who knows. I am building a miniramp in my back yard and I am going to skate it. Also, how many good years do I have left in me to skate a ramp?? Better start now before I get feeble!!! Hey, I tried playing soccer again as well. Played a bunch of pick up games in the park - that sucked for me!! Maybe I will revisit that one after I loose the weight and get my fitness under raps. For now it is time to skate!!! late!

Have a nice day!!

Started the build!!

Last weekend I collected a good amount of wood to build from, though as I got into cutting the wood down and sizing up the transitions I discovered that there were issues with the wood it self. As I started to cross cut the many 2X6's that I will frame in the transitions with it was apparent that many of them were not long enough to be cut into the sizes I need. So I have a lot of pieces that I cannot use because they are an inch of less to short. I could just  resize my ramp width to fit but all I need is 9 10ft 2X4's to finish the framing part, so no biggie.

I decided to build the ramp in a slightly different spot than my original conception. As you can see from the picture I am building it just off the patio.

What  you are looking at is the flat bottom of the ramp that is 8ft long and 10ft wide. I had use concrete blocks to level it. I did not finish the flat until two in the after noon and then spent the rest of the afternoon trying to get it level. I could probably work a lot faster if I had a helper, but that is ok, it just takes a bit of ingenuity. That flat bottom frame is so freaking heavy. I put it on skate boards this morning to move it out of the way so I could relevel the flat bottom this morning. I also had to finish the framing. After building the framework and leveling it the first time I revisited the plans and noticed I had not used enough pieces of wood to frame with, Uhgggg!!!! I fixed it as you can see above, but here is it before. 

At the moment I am in the process of leveling the sections of the ramp where the transitions will sit. I probably should clean my house and wash clothes but I dont seem to care about much else other than getting this ramp build. The only reason I am writing at the moment is because it is raining outside. I need to make a trip to the Lowes and buy plywood and a few 2X4's so I can build four of these:

Ok, so that is it, I would be outside leveling and finding a ride to the store but we are in a rain delay. Maybe I will go take a shower and go see Jackass 3D, clean house and wash clothes.

Later!! 

Rufus comes into some luck!!

Awe yes, Friday and my day off after driving back from St Louis last night. I wake up around 8:30 thinking my co-workers are just settling into a second cup of coffee by now where am  I about to make some fresh ground coffee and have a nice bowl of cereal, booyah! I have a leisure morning, unpack from my four day trip, lounge around the house watching some tube and read up on the latest happenings with Liverpool football club, good stuff. Around 12ish I make my way downtown to the Greenlaw Community center to skate their 3ft mini ramp that is indoors. I show up in the parking lot and there is one car there (a Honda S2000 with a Andrea the Giant Obey sticker) and the center's metal gates are down. It is suppose to be open but no dice, it is closed. So I pull up to the Honda that is obviously a skater. Yep, the dude in the car is named Cody, 19 yrs old and a Freshman at southwest college, it is his day off and now we both wait. As we talk I find out that Cody has a mini ramp in his GF's back yard that is 5ft tall and 10ft wide by 30ft long that he has skated twice, it is unfinished. Hmm.... and he has no plans of finishing and the GF's parents are tired of looking at it..... Hmmmm.... so what are you going to do with it?? Well.... how about let me take it?? Ok dude, it is yours for $100!!! That is, it is mine for $100 and I have to take it away.

Ok, so the guy who is running the center shows up around 115 or something close and we finally make it to the ramp. This is a new day for me, I have not skated a ramp in like 7 years. I start skating it and easy pumps up one side and then up the other side, nothing glamorous. I do some front side kick turns and back side turns. Then during one of my pumping and turning sessions I bite it and hit the ramp, everything ok but it did not feel great. I could probably manage the pumping and turning better if I lost 40 lbs, I think the extra weight is throwing my balance a bit. I finally get to where my turns are coping high and I can start  to move my foot positions around a bit, well I get a bit to comfortable and I bite it hard. I smack the ramp and go light headed, my wrist and both elbows are crying out. I have hurt my wrist for sure, i kept skating but as i type this thing is sore. I dont think it is broke for it is not swollen and it does move, just very stiff. My left elbow is bruised as well, but I will keep going back to the ramp in hopes to drop in and grind. Next time i will have a full set of pads and a helmet for sures. It was like skating a ramp for the first time, I  did not expect to pull off rock-n-rolls or hurricanes but maybe a grind or two. I got close to grinding but was chicken, could have, but I need some pads so I have a bit of confidence. I will get there, loose some weight and work on my fat man balance. Also, it takes fitness that I dont have at the moment. all kinds of things to work on. Here, look at my fat ass and cody on the right:

So we get tired of skating and I am like lets go look at the ramp. I meet him out east and look at the ramp. I am satisfied and go home. I line up some trucks to pick it up, that part is done and then secure a electric drill, go to Habor freight hardware supple for some drill bits and back out to the ramp location. check it:

I did not get it totally torn down but i made some major head way:

And here is where I left it, about 2 hrs left and a pick up and haul it to my house:

So there it is, I want to thank Cody very much, he is a very cool guy and a fellow skater, what else is there. I will cart this stuff back to my house and work on a new plan. I am going to build it a bit different than what he was trying to accomplish but 5ft and 10ft wide will be the same. Will even use the same transitions but in four sections instead of just two, it will be awesome. 

I skated today, got started on my mini ramp and made a new friend, a great day all in all. Peace out people!!

Mud island Skate Demo

I got a invite through Facebook from one of the local guys, Aaron Shafer, to attend a skate demo at the Mud Island River Park. A park that is located on an Island in the Mississippi river. There are plans to build a skateboard park here (this event has nothing to do with skate park), the project has been approved by the city government but the when and how long have not been finalized, so who knows. The skate demo is part of a community get together for some foundation, I did not pay attention to some details, not sure of the name.

I got there right at 1pm expecting  some skate action, paid my $5 to get through the gates and proceeded to an empty parking lot that had various skate obstacles: grind boxes, launch ramp, grind rails and a wall ride.   There were a couple of basketball goals on the adjacent area (out of the way) set up with games going as I walked through the lot but no skaters any where I could see. This was the spot, the notice I got on FB said 1pm but no skaters here. Even so, the pavement was awful for skating, no wonder no one was here. It was a cheaply done parking lot surface that was rough and had tiny tar pebbles scattered all over the surface. This surface does not make for smooth rolling, a skaters peeve. So I kept walking.

As i walked past the area I heard the clatter of boards and concrete, there they were set up in an area that had a couple set of stairs and smother concrete and brick surface. They had a wedge ramp set up on the stairs and were riding up the ramp doing flip tricks up and down the ramp. There was one Caucasian man and  a few teenage African American boys skating the site.  The white guy is named Mark, he works at the GreenLaw community center and manages a skateboard miniramp built there this year. Mark is from the UK, London area and hates football, haha.

I find out that the demo is now going to happen at 3pm, not 1pm, so I decide to just wait and hang out. Other people started show up, another white guy named Darren, then Chris, Shannon from Cordova Skate shop, and  Michelle Shafer. Then you had this 18 year old kid, Ace, from Greenlaw attempting Laser Flips down the steps. We sat and cheered on Ace as it took him a good hour to land one successfully, congrats Ace.

3pm rolled around and the skaters went over to the badly surfaced skate area setup for the demo but again, no demo happened. It was just several skaters hitting the grind box here and there, no one seemed to be motivated and the people throwing the event made no effort to show case any type of spot light. Mark and company decided to pack it up and many of the skaters said they were headed across the bridge to Marion and session there. This was not the skaters fault by any means but the organizers of the event, who seem to be clueless when it comes to skateboarding.

I ended up going to Highpoint for a visit to the Greenline grand opening party and home.

And i have not skated this week at all due to tendentious in the left ankle, maybe next weekend. And no, I have not built a mini ramp yet, I have the details mostly worked out, going to start working on the fence maybe today or next weekend, moving the fence is step one. will post details as I have them.

Later folks