Aging Lifer Skateboarder

The Gnar-trooper!

2012-02-13T17:24:00.001-08:00

This is the guy making the boards.

2012-01-18T17:26:00.001-08:00

2012-01-18T17:24:00.001-08:00

Where has the "News" gone?

2012-01-03T17:53:00.001-08:00

Every day or so, I wake up and head to the old Jalopy (mac g5 tower) to check the "news" in skateboarding.

What I'm looking for is happenings and development that affect the skateboarding Community.

What I usually see, starting with the mag sites, and then on down to Skate Daily.net and Boardistan, is something kind of blah.
this or that tradeshow thing is happening...

But now and then, there's something that peaks my interest. Today two of them hit on Boardistan (or at least I found them today).

The first was a cursory probe into the whoring of skateboarders by shoe industry barons.
The second was another short foray into the fact that one of the ingredients of Mountain Dew is

"...Patented by chemical companies as a flame retardant, and banned in food throughout Europe and Japan,"

In a season where nostalgia and documentaries are carrying skateboarding media snoozily into irrelevance, there are still stories out there that are "news".

Maybe Thrasher or Transworld would have a go at these robber barons? Probly not, because they're not journalism--they're just catalogs now.

i'm looking forward to more stories like this, because this is stuff that actually impacts the skateboarding community. thanks boardistan!

Beard points... Dfaul...

2011-12-28T11:08:00.001-08:00

Thousand words. Nuff said.

None of your beeswax

2011-12-28T11:02:00.001-08:00

2011-12-27T07:42:00.001-08:00

2011-12-27T07:28:00.001-08:00

warmth

2011-12-20T03:56:00.000-08:00

taking a minute around 6am...
just pulled a bunch of boards out of the presses
then taking the TLG (the little guy) to school.
then pressing a new set of decks
then heading to try to finish MiniMatt's ramp.

it is a 3' mini in a barn near Cincinnati.
building it has been fun.
but xmas is crushing up fast on me. gotta get it done.

Today Mark Nolan is helping out! That'll do the job!
check out Mark Nolan. Gimp of the Rancheros. Seventies pro for Progressive. Epic man.

oh. this is titled "warmth" because it's like the 20th of December and its like 60 outside this morning...any day past november with anything like a warm temp is a real comfort to me.

religious guys

2011-12-17T03:56:00.000-08:00

i got to meet Christian Hosoi a while back.
word one was Jesus Christ
you gotta respect that
but you don't gotta like it.

that's one thing i like about America,
you have every right to say what you think
and everyone else has every right to rip it to shreds

and its allowed to go on and on.

well, i am a religious guy, too.
and even though my friends call me Lewcif, i'm a pretty poor satanist (at least in my better moments).
although i've never met a passionate metal fan that I didn't agree with on almost everything, including why they hate american christianity.

but yeah, i'm a jesus guy.
that's been my dirty "not so secret" for a long time.
and instead of just sit on it, i'm airing it out on a ridiculous sham of a blog, to match up with all the other ridiculous sham-living I engage in on a daily basis.

fact is, there's not a lot more to this aging lifer than a bunch of ridiculous shams stretched thinly over a warm, chewy core of God-Loving goo.
the facades:
skateboarding
the beard
the amazing fashion sense

they're all just that: faces
skins stretched thinly
over the goo.

One day the skins will fail
the goo will spill out
and you'll be stuck with cleanup

until then I'm an aging lifer who is a wicked believer...

oh, and Christian, if you ever read this... Cling.

this kid...

2011-12-15T02:52:00.000-08:00

this kid is one of my sons... he set this up and took this... he's really photographical like that...

but i think that this photo represents my feelings about riding a pointed skateboard... it is fun at some level down in there where your inner need to teethe still gets at you from time to time...

i thought of using this as some sort of ad for fickleboards, but instead i'm dropping it into aging lifer, mostly because of the shadows, but also mostly because this is a pic that inspires me to

REMEMBER TO KEEP LOVING SKATEBOARDING

and go out there and get a piece today.

...in the warehouse, because its rainy.

today i...

2011-12-14T19:25:00.000-08:00

...made some boards. i ship them tomorrow. that's going to get me current.
then i'll make some tee shirts.
and some new screens
and then i'll emulsify
and then i'll format
print
and burn
a sticker screen
and make our first batch of stickers
and all that will happen while i do the life...

and today i also prepped 2 new mold situations. I'll start pressing again soon, and there'll be plenty of boards moving out.

and on and on... and on. and on...
and i'm going to make some hats with heat transfers, too. I think.
that shit's fun.

Portland Maine Skatepark

2011-12-09T11:43:00.001-08:00

Toooo tight!
Some great obstacles put waaaay too close together.
Two of us in the park and we could already feel like its a prison yard.

At one year old, there is a lot of spalling and serious cracking, too.

But skateboarding is so fun, period, that it was a blast.

The good things? That cereal bowl.
The brick bank.
Tight bowl corners.
The big bowl was better than okay... With "noping" coping done in steel. Easy to grind, hard to lock on to for some pool elitists. In the deep, at high speed, it would have been better with a little more than the quarter inch bullnose they got on it.

This was done by ARC, bearing their mark of good obstacles, bad implementation. They should have gone with someone else.
I will return to shred it again and again though.

Cincinnatiamericano

2011-12-09T10:18:00.001-08:00

Here's a treat. A classic representation of what's going on in our heads 24/7 here at Fickleboards... Weston reps the Old Glory in proper dreadful fashion at the Georgia Bowl Riders competition. On behalf of Aging Lifer and all it is and may become, please enjoy/please destroy fickleboards.

missed a deadline on bud's blog...

2011-12-08T08:20:00.001-08:00

i just hammered out a post on www.fickleboards.com to try to update you on what's happening in the life here... and then i jammered myself over to www.everythingskatboardingmagazine.blogspot.com to check out bud stratford's mayhem...

as a "contributing editor" at ETSMag, I was supposed to submit a photo of myself for the intro article. There I would have been included with these other dudes and their pics... i immediately scoured around what I could find and picked this one, emailed it to Bud and crossed my fingies that I might get in there somehow.

I'm the king of beginning new projects. The ones I finish are the ones that the best people come to help me on! No kidding. If it weren't for Matt Simpson, Ian Brown, Andy Eschenbach, Ben, Weston, Sunshine, and especially the Magnificent, Mysterious JUDY, Old Lew would be buried to death beneath the weight of his own considerable-yet-fatally-partial genius.

So today i wanted to say how grateful I am to all the people whom skateboarding has dropped me on. I appreciate that it can be heavy, like when I'm arriving at your house with a vanful of sweaty skaters. Fabio's queen, Summer, in Savannah, GA, knows what I'm talking about.

All said, today will be a lunch with Tom, a sesh at a local park, here in Portland, Maine, and dinner with Queen Judy and friends...

I'm looking forward to getting home friday night, loading up the presses, and getting to work on orders, as well as building an indoor mini for our friend Matt.

i hope that wherever you are, you get to shred today. the winter weather is upon a bunch of us. anyone practising kickflips on the carpet?

Today's Ride

2011-12-07T08:31:00.001-08:00

It's rainy but I'm determined to do something on this ASAP.

for everyone number 2

2011-12-07T07:30:00.001-08:00

skateboarding is for everyone
and nobody is the same as anyone
though many people are similar...

choosing a skateboard is tricky for this reason.

Most people are similar enough that a similar type of board will work well enough, though.
round wheels
some axles to hold them in place and aid with turning
a platform/board of some sort...
pretty simple...

But today is about the person who sees the rail/gap/stair skating on TV and thinks, "that's not for me" about skateboarding.
Well, jumping down stairs isn't for me, either. In fact, I hate show-off behavior and the way it closes doors in the face of people who... well you get it because you're there on the other side of the door saying, "That's not for me."

It makes me think about the resurgence of Longboarding in Surfing. Do you know about that? Alex Knost's little vid here will show you what I'm talking about.

It's quite the same in skateboarding.
we have "longboarders", too... but this isn't actually about long skateboards... it's about the human tendency to Narrow good things down...

Why do we do that?
to measure.
measuring ourselves is our passion
and it's a bad passion
it kills the love.
it would be better to focus on stoking someone else!
but we gravitate to competition and measurement.

not that competition is wrong or bad... but it is.
but a competition event can be really good and right,
when people engage it with encouragement...

but we need to see the big picture.
rolling on a good quality, right-fit skateboard is a thing of great beauty.

learning to control our board and move with style and fluid coordination...
turning, carving, enjoying the simple motion...
these are the lost treasures of my generation!

Here I stand in the wreckage of a community that has been sold a bill of goods by human nature's tendency to commodify what is good and free.
and I'm making punk points and mad shapes and pushing for skateboarding to be free from "measure up" mentalities that keep us all boxed in.

i look forward to seeing whole families pushing down the street on a quiverfull of diverse boards, on their way to skate the park, get coffee and enjoy a morning out. Maybe Dad's a shredder and he kills it on rails! maybe the kid prefers downhill. Maybe the girls are into slalom! maybe Mom loves freestyle! think about it!

Yeah, human nature is to narrow it all down and get us all trying to look and do the same... but with a nudge here and there, skateboarding will be for everybody again, soon.

for everyone number 1

2011-12-07T07:16:00.001-08:00

Skateboarding is for everyone!

There isn't much that is more fun, more accessible and more affordable than jumping on a skateboard and cruising the streets or parks for fun!

Period.

That's it! That there is the fact that will shape the future for how things get done in my skateboarding stuff.

Everyone who wants to have fun on a skateboard is IN!

If you're talking about going skateboarding, that's IT!

if we're skating together, we ARE SKATEBOARDING!

Whether its downhill

big boards

specialty setups

street tech

tech gnar

ledge butter

rail/gap

park cruising

bowl trolling

vert crushing

whether you're a frat-boy

sorority girl

drama kid

band geek

metalhead

hip-hopper

screw-up

ex con

churchy

satanist

goth

emo

gay

whatever your deal

if we're skateboarding together

if we love to do that

and we think about it

and we're gathered around it

WE ARE SKATEBOARDING.

Skateboarding is a verb.

We Are it when it is what we are DOING, regularly.

When it is our intention to Go Do It.

And back in the first explosions of skateboarding, shortly after it's rise in popularity, this was self-evident.

Just today I learned, reading a Bud Stratford article, that Fred Astaire avidly enjoyed skateboarding. Farrah Fawcett got on the cover of Life Magazine doing it.

and Bob Dylan was totally stoked on it! He loved it!

It was everywhere.

I'm into that concept. That Dads and kids would go out skating on Saturday morning; down the street to the park. The kids are killin rails. The dads are carving lines...

i think skateboarding will be everywhere again, because it is simply the funnest possible way to pass time on the planet...

okay that was hyperbole. there are funner things.

But skateboarding is definitely top ten, or even top Five material for us. So, everyone! Get a skateboard you like and push that thing. go fast and enjoy!

Basic travel pack

2011-12-06T20:45:00.001-08:00

Ole Lewcif is on the road. Maine. Meetup with Whoskates' Tom while beautiful Judy does meetings with her company's honchos... Hopefully I'll catch a cab to something to skate, or get to visit the local skateshop...

Home Friday; boards pressing; building little Matt's halfpipe... That's gonna be a swell little indoor ramp.

"Aging Lifer": Coming soon...

2011-12-05T08:49:00.001-08:00

coming soon: www.agingliferskateboarder.com

the gloves are coming off.

in the meantime, get the unadulterated independent scoop in skateboarding industry analysis and overall good times from www.everythingskateboardingmagazine.blogspot.com

that there's Bud Stratford's little mess, coming at you full speed and with no apologies as what might just be the only full-on voice at the "industry level" in skateboarding media...

I'm not kidding. I've been starving for some information and some explanation of why things are so effed in this amazing community as far as industry things go.

making you angry...

2011-12-05T07:21:00.001-08:00

i decided to go for "substance" over "cleverness" with my tweets this week... if you're on my twitter feed you can see me pretty much lambasting skate shops. its an emotional thing for me. I'm a conflict-avoider at heart...

but someone's gotta say something.

There is a wide swath of failure cutting across the nation's parks and shops, while the industry juggernaut chuggs along a 5+billion dollars a year. Why?

I have become convinced that, as vehemently as many might deflect with tales of good intentions, it is the fault of skate shops and park owners. period.
you guys sit like clan leaders on your little thrones, and you have influence that, to this point, has mostly been used to affirm yourselves.

here is where your mind shifts into high gear, listing parties you threw, or benefits you put on to "build the scene", but I'm not backing down.
You are the guys who decided that so-and-so was a "Barney", or that longboards were lame, or that weed was cool, or on and on and on... but wouldn't really engage customer service with a smile, or be grateful to the people who bought stuff from you. Not grateful or respectful.

SEriously, the attitude of entitlement is so deep, many of you didn't even know it was there till you were choking in financial ruin. even then, you didn't see that if you had been more friendly, positive, creative, proactive... less dull, drugged, drunk, and "core", you'd be swimming still. But you're sinking. Pretty much all of you.

The age of the shop is coming to an end.

And the reason is pretty much because you thought that the community was there to "support" you. That is the bottom line. Your attitude. you really thought that you should be "supported" by your local community. For what? they can't even get what they want from you, unless it is shop approved.
your customers had to be careful that they their preferences were "cool" enough.
your wholesalers bent over backward, offered good terms, incentivised you, but you're still failing.

so many "core" brands are going to Zumiez. I mean, you can tell me they are selling out, but you failed them, obviously, right?
and now there are so many small brands doing the generic small brand thing, that you are swimming in it... and don't know which ones to choose for your wall.

not all shops will close.
some good ones will
some bad ones won't.
nobody remains unscathed after twenty years of stale commercialism.

but here's the explanation of our present season:
many people in this industry thought that the customer was "wrong" and needed to be educated, while the customer/community just wanted to buy a skateboard and go skating.

what was wrong with them wanting to just buy the board they wanted and get on it and go?
for every one of them you labeled as a barney or a poser or whatever, ten more caught the scent of your elitism... and were turned off...

for every community member you deemed unfit, twenty more perceived the hostile atmosphere...

I can literally tell you story after story of shop owners and workers who were distinctly "unstoked" and "non-positive" in the retail environment. not stoked I came in. not stoked that I skate. not stoked that i was part of the community.

I'm glad for guys like Dave Kappa and Macko at Anonymous, who are truly friendly and stoked about the skateboarding lifestyle!

I'm grateful for Jake at Demented, who is always down to talk about skateboarding! And he's just not negative!

I'm glad for friendly people in shops, who don't let the times get them down, but keep it about what its about. But alongside this, I have to tell you guys: there's work to be done!
Skate shops will have to swallow the pill that they exist to serve the community, and do a great job at it...

But they they have to serve First as RETAILERS.
they are shops.
they have to become places that are
easy
and
fun
to
shop
at.

see that?
no more vibing a kid because he wants a longboard
no more turning away soccer moms with your hubba calendars
no more thinking that some are worthy and some are not.

skateboarding takes all comers with a stoked heart
be they kids with moms
tapout chads from the frat
or washed out barney skate dads

this is where skateboarders running skate shops dropped the ball.

Then they said "No" to getting creative and cooperative in strategizing how to sell stuff.
i watched as Deluxe rolled out a million ways to save the shops from their end!
and shops just wouldn't do it.
i have wanted to be able to order from shops, but coming back in a week to the same "down" vibe, to pick up my stuff just didn't stoke me. i have done it anyway.

I have remained loyal.
I have remained supportive
and will continue to do so.
but I can't remain silent!

shops!
Please change
please grow
please cooperate
and create new ways to do things
that work.

that's why I'm letting the inflammatory tweets fly this week.

THE TLG

2011-11-28T13:52:00.001-08:00

Watch "2011-11-20 Seth Rainbow Grind at Woody's.mov" on YouTube

hanging out in the wind...

2011-11-09T07:53:00.000-08:00

bud stratford, master of hyperbole, has just published an article on what i've been doing over here...

Click this

or

copy paste:
http://everythingskateboardingmagazine.blogspot.com/2011/11/small-company-spotlight-fickle.html

please enjoy...

I feel good about the general gist of the article.
It isn't always entirely accurate...
the press isn't 600 tons.
and now there are only 3 molds in use.
and i can only make, presently, max about 15 to 20 boards a day

and one more thing:
Fickle Boards isn't going to press wood for anything but Fickle Boards. At least there's no plan to do that now.
Some day there may be a wood shop/factory running in our Findlay St. location, but so many things have to go right for that to happen that I've made it a matter of patience and faith.

But the present goal is for you to have ONE BRAND that you KNOW will provide you with the best quality maple skateboard you've ever ridden. Long-pressed, Long-cured, Lovingly made.

Period.

Oh, and I'm NOT ordained in the Christian Church. I'm part of a renegade non-conformist Jesus People church here in the inner city... The difference is not that big, though. We'll all get thrown to the lions soon enough.

Please enjoy the article.
and please destroy fickleboards today.

wrapping my head around it... Religion, Sport, Art, Play

2011-11-09T07:38:00.000-08:00

...skateboarding is an activity, besides being a community and an industry...
and my best effort at describing the way we handle this activity puts down a few categories:
Religion, Sport, Art, Play.

it is technical
it is soulful
some would say spiritual
i wouldn't necessarily disagree.

how does it rank?
for many it is number one.
it is the fulcrom of their lives' lifting lever
the friday hope of hung-over mondays

to some it is just a fun thing
made less fun by those who take it so seriously.

some speak of skateboarding
in identifiably religious terms
"thank you skateboarding"
"skateboarding is everything to me"
"skateboarding will always be there for me"
...because skateboarding (the activity) was a salvific alternative
when the chips were down...
...because skateboarding (the community) was an agent of
rescue for them, and a shelter from the storm...
...because skateboarding (the industry) has provided them with purpose, focus, and daily bread.
yes, the spiritual/religious view of skateboarding is here to stay.

Others approach it as sport:
Dew Tour
X games
Olypmpics
Mega Ramps
Maloof
Street League (yawn)
and on and on... How many are there?
Slalom
downhill (with stopwatches and radar guns)
...and on and on...

And to many it is Art:
A Kinetic side-show performance art display.

To many more it is Play:
just the sensation of speed
the Great Cheat: Standing still at 35 mph.
with a shift of the hips and a flex of the knees and feet, you're flying!

Religion, Sport, Art, or Play, skateboarding is one of the most important social phenomena of contemporary American Culture. We are all affected by it, and it'll serve us well to be aware of it.

More random thoughts from a moderately tortured mind.

wrapping my head around it a bit more... Industry...

2011-11-08T05:52:00.000-08:00

...i see another "Skateboarding": an Industry.

By industry, I mean a community of people whose interests bring them together around the goal of making a living off the expenditure of moneys on skateboarding equipment and skateboard-interest-cultural accoutrements.

that is, folks who (for better or worse) are trying to make a buck off people's willingness to suffer (passion) for skateboarding.

that is, folks who fleece the sheep.

yep, skater dude. You're a sheep!

Some pro skates some plank and you "gotta have it".
You usually do as you're told, or as you're shown
in some media
...like a magazine
or a video
or a website...

and there is a whole community of people brought together wanting a bit of that wool (and sometimes a bit of mutton).

They're your shepherds. they exert influence and leadership in the decisions YOU make on how you dress and what gear you ride, and where and how you spend what you have (and don't have) on your skateboarding "needs".

do you mind that?

Suck it up, because that's life on this rock. People follow leaders. Period. find me a community without leadership... people who are not sheep, who don't have shepherds...

its in our nature. you do live with it, whether I tell you to live with it or not.

Now, there are the few iconoclasts out there who move to the woods and build their houses and bowls and lives independent from the masses, who are neither sheep nor shepherd. they are rare and admirable; respectable and... difficult to enjoy.
their talents are theirs, for themselves and only a chosen few from time to time... and we admire that, too... because we're sheep.

I am a sheep! To a great extent my choices have been formed by corporate propaganda... and I don't mind it, really. I'll lay all that down when I die, so it's only temporary. I'll just roll with it and try not to let it freak me out. I'd advise you to have a similar or better mentality.

but when it comes to the skateboarding Industry... well... these people (I am one) are... well... PEOPLE!

People with tempers and fears and histories and baggage...
...stress and strain and frustrations aplenty in this economy... and being hard on them for being hard on us isn't going to help too much.

yeah, it pains me to see shops vibing kids, and instilling an inferiority complex, bullying and badgering us to conform to their INVENTORY selections...
But that is shrinking more and more as there are more and more skaters who can now go to the mall shop where they may or may not know a thing about skateboarding gear, but they're plenty happy you showed up!

Why does it pain me when I walk into your skateshop and smell weed? Or the "pro" behind the counter is stinking up the whole community? Or when you spent a bunch of time calling old dudes "barneys" for the last 10 years? Or you're belligerent? Or you think you gotta pick on kids? Or you're a naysayer? Or you have such a competitive, belittleing mentality that the air around you is heavy and you're surrounded with yes-men?

(and if you read this and think I'm talking about you, please understand that in the last 7 years of working in the skateboarding industry I've been in easily 100 shops and these descriptors fit an anecdotal HALF or more to one degree or another)

Why does it bum me out deeply to find negativity in the skate shop? To find territorialism and inferiority-driven dominance... pro-drugs, overdrinking, anti-social negativity?

Because we are a community, as an industry, and if we work together and focus together on the amazing experience we SHARE on our boards, we'll deepen community, widen the industry, make plenty of money and move on to the memory-making that we need for when we're old, if we survive...

No kidding.

I have no illusion that a grand, sweeping change in mentality will strike the industry. i think that bottom-line-driven, corporate greed will continue to be the main driver of the actions of companies (both small and large).
But... I'm refocusing MYSELF on bringing folks TOGETHER to skate, relate and share the joy, building an industry that reflects the community's joy of skating.

Irony number one is that this is/has been already happening all over the place, as MONEY RUNS OUT and folks are having to re-evaluate why they are in this...

Irony number two is that a lot of "big corporations" actually Nail this! Like Vans. and a Lot of skateboard companies that even have boards made in china.

Irony number three is that folks who fit the description of negativity in this article also have "another side" to them that is already about this stuff, and always has been...

So this writing is 2D, flat, flawed and ill-fit for any medium other than arrogant self-publishing. I accept that. I only hope that this becomes part of a larger coming together. Let's skate together and dream about what the industry community could look like in ten years, working together...

wrapping my head around it a bit more... Community...

2011-11-08T05:29:00.000-08:00

...i realize that skateboarding, as a community of like-interested individuals, with it's history of punk rock rebellion and outlaw surfer mentality...

...is just a bunch of people trying to be happy.

...is caught in the same miserable conundrum as the rest of "society", "humanity" or what have you.

...is catch-22ing itself out of relevance to many...

what I mean is that skateboarding as an activity is always good, whenever and wherever, period. It is hands-down one of the very best things a person can do with their body, no matter what "style" or form it takes:

freestyle
slalom
downhill
cruising
street tech
tech gnar
bowls
pools
pipes
vert
mega
...and on and on...

Youngsters
Old dudes
flip tricks
bertelman slides

to the coffee shop
to a gold medal

skateboarding is a self-standing "good" in the world, capable of transporting us back to childhood, nourishing our nerology, strengthening our muscles, and betterfying our day. mahalo!

And "Skateboarding", as often treated in (industry-sponsored) media, is a community brought together by the willingness to suffer in the pursuit of the experience of skateboarding...

People are literally not making money, but going skateboarding instead. Making real sacrifices to stay current in the experience of skateboarding. This is a great community, at it's core. That is a great ideal, on the scale of thing...

Oh, and let's not forget how ridiculously privileged we are to even have the option to do this. Around the world, the gnarliest skate-bum lives like a king compared to most people.

So that is some of what I thought while pooping the dog.

signs of the present era in skateboarding

2011-11-06T15:42:00.000-08:00

I recently ran across the classic question, "Wasn't skateboarding better when they hated us?"

...so far, the only people that hate me... are other skateboarders!

benjo is blogging on this today, too.

What i'm talking about here is the FACT that in the last decade of my skating life, I have literally ONLY been vibed on by OTHER SKATEBOARDERS!

My city wants me on committees. Banks want my business. Neighbors want me to help get the kids pushing. And on and on and on! Heck, even the Cub Scouts are stoked to have me in the neighborhood, with my workshop and backyard bowl project...

My next door neighbor is STOKED to have a skateboard bowl going in just across the fence! Oh how times have changed!!!

But again, over the past decade, I have been vibed and marginalized as "some barney" and "not a skater" and on and on behind my back and to my face... at SKATE SHOPS!

I mean, one time, a skate shop owner threatened to kick my ass in the parking lot. I was patently not misbehaving. This individual had kids and everything.

Another time, I was promised that I'd never have any business in an ENTIRE STATE, because the owner of a chain of shops was under the impression that I was "a barney" who sold decks at skateparks for $20.

Man, I'm over these guys and this jock mentality, running the skateboarding community into the ground over and over as they promote elitist mentalities and alcoholic lifestyles! I mean, literally "pro drugs". crazy.

I am devoting my efforts to the formation of the skateboarding community outside of these institutions. Period. time for backyard ramps, underground scenes, and non-industry community formation within skateboarding.

My brand will most likely remain underground and handmade for the duration. I'm doomed to be forgotten, but I'm going to have a Blast!

2011-10-31T05:13:00.000-07:00

Skate togetherEat togetherlive togetherWork togetherCreate togetherDiscuss, disagree, grow, think, create... Thus is daily life here at the Cincinnati Skateboard Workshop for Fickle Boards. In about an hour I will be covered in sawdust, making you skateboards that are the best that maple could ever be...

2011-10-31T05:05:00.001-07:00

2011-10-31T03:39:00.001-07:00

...seriously, that anti drug thing is how i really feel. i hate what synthetic happiness does. it compromises our journey toward any real happiness... anesthetic without the surgery leaves you sick plus stupid.

anti drug rant?

2011-10-31T03:38:00.000-07:00

I wrote the following after a week of having riders fade out, closing their doors of opportunity, and watching THIS GROSSO footage... all i'm saying is that you'll be a lot... happier? hmmm... depends on the definition... but you'll be a lot more SOMETHING if you just steer clear of drugs, kiddos! that said, i'm not sure you'll be "happier" in the suburban-americana vision of happiness... but you'll be Awake, and less Damaged! you'll age into some wisdom that's deeper than "don't shoot up heroin in the toilet of a gas station"... so don't fade out. don't waste your intensity on synthetic happiness. dig deep and farm up some real happiness of your own.

Frozen moment...

2011-10-31T02:36:00.001-07:00

Old Mr smith comes for a visit... Shot by Matt Allen at the Fickleboards HQ ramp.

One of the reasons...

2011-10-27T14:56:00.001-07:00

...one of the reasons that i post so seldom is because the stuff i handle all day every day is so EPIC that if i told you about it, i pretty much think you wouldn't believe me... today the boys and I did some rearranging in the workshop and we went from one tried and tested mold, to THREE molds. this week i'll be pressing on the two new molds and seeing how we turn out. I think they'll be longer, mellower boards. If they aren't, I'm stoked; if they are, I'm stoked, too. You see, the thing is that i make molds on trial and error. I hand carve them the very best I can and make the concave to my liking, along sculptural lines, and then cast them in special reinforced concrete. the first three rounds of mold making produced four molds that are good enough. the next time, we're going to be able to make them thinner. These sets all weigh literally about 400 pounds. more soon.

Skyline.

2011-09-28T13:41:00.001-07:00

Sunshine and Benjo scarfing skyline. Come skate and scarf!

Quick update.

2011-09-26T18:10:00.001-07:00

Been making some handsome planks. New background colors and graphic ways.
Every set of truck holes is measured with a serious caliper 22 times. No joke. Holes are PROPER.

I was BUMMED that a certain skate shop thought the holes were off... But had NO MEASURING DEVICE present on site.
I did a rough measurement and found things were good, but returned to replace it with an indubitably perfect one.

Sadly, I later found that the original WAS off, but a measurement had to be taken with shop devices... BlablabLa...

The thing is that shop owners who care about wood at all will have measuring instruments... Otherwise, they are posing.

My Eight Eighty-eight

2011-09-23T09:54:00.001-07:00

I know I make them all by hand right here in the workshop...

But seriously, these are the boards I've always wanted.

Stiff, but flexy enough for pop.
Durable against abrasion... And the dimensions... Cadillacs. Killers.

We know about heavy stompers who go HAM on any setup they didn't have to pay for, and our stuff is flat out holding up.

I don't know what to say. It's an honor to make boards for folks.

Some of last weeks work.

2011-09-16T07:11:00.001-07:00

PitPuller

2011-09-09T18:01:00.001-07:00

Rocko the Dog pulled a couple of us tonight on blow off cruiser runs after a gnarly sesh. ...for like a HALF MILE, each.

The critter loves to pull. Period. Now to get him skating.

Safety gear...

2011-09-09T16:08:00.001-07:00

Simpson... 35 into a pole...

2011-09-09T15:29:00.001-07:00

Thankfully, Matt Simpson didn't hit a pole.

Awesomely, his board didn't chip, because fickleboards are so strong and stiff...

You gotta see it from the ground zero. If this had hit a kid, it would have been lights out. That's how fast it was going.

As it is, we are planning to YouTube a repair...

And we'd bet that the thing will last WEEKS after a patch and a regrip.

Keep looking for the vid, and the review...

Swaaaaag

2011-09-09T15:11:00.001-07:00

Swagsters at the skatepark. Tom Penny Rules!

This guy

2011-09-03T10:59:00.001-07:00

...Dakota from ft. Wayne

The dog

2011-09-03T10:57:00.001-07:00

Rocko kills.

Morning rituals...

2011-08-22T08:47:00.001-07:00

Taking a crap with Rocko sleeping on the floor, reading through six years of Thrasher back issues. Coffee on the radiator.

Thats how we get it done.

The bottom line on product reviews...

2011-08-14T18:56:00.000-07:00

Here's the thing...

I recently had someone ask me for shoe sizes for Fickle's crew, so we could take part in some product reviews...

We aren't professionals at product testing, but we are definitely able to steer you right on what has worked for us for the last 20 years of skateboarding... and we can definitely spot some of the rip-offs that are going on right now...

But the thing that is fueling the whole thing right now is this:

INDUSTRY ought to serve the best interests of the COMMUNITY.

NOT take advantage of people's gullibility with gimmicks.

Skateboarding, as a true community, has at it's core a central value for AUTHENTICITY.

And SERVING the BEST INTEREST of the COMMUNITY with good value (quality for the price) is so important to us because WE SKATE pretty much every day, and are stoked when something is good.

Vans are pretty good.

Indy Trucks are EPIC.

Chrome Bags work great.

NorCal is nailing the culture and the DIY.

Northwest is killing the park culture...

I mean, pretty much everyone everywhere is bringing a strength to the table. What will the Midwest bring? We have oodles and oodles of mediocre to incredible parks... But we'll see what the next few years bring... maybe a surge of keyparks? maybe deck quality standards?

Something Positive

2011-08-14T18:22:00.001-07:00

Look, we don't know anybody.

We aren't anybody that anybody would especially care to know, that we know of... and I mean me. and I mean Matt and Ben and Weston, and anybody inclined to hang with the FickleBoards vibe over here... its just skateboarding to us. No hype necessary...

And when I get stoked, I like to say so. And when I get bummed, I mull it over with my friends to see if it matters, and I tend to say something if I think it might help someone out, or keep me sane...

This time, I got Stoked!!!

Some of you may know that a few years back Judy and I became the guardians of a 300+lb. Samoan mixed kid who loves skateboarding for life. He ollies, carves, grinds... pools, halfpipe, street... on and on.

Frankly, I'm pretty proud of the kid...

And a while back our buddy Ian Brown (like 200lbs) gave old marcus his SMA popsicle board, having acquired something of preferable dimensions...

That was AGES and AGES ago. Like winter?

So this thing has been stomped on for months and months and the Big boy finally laid it down. And it's still strong.

Atop all that, there appeared to be a veneer-break--a 2-piece ply--right at the tail... This was confirmed by a bunch of us...

and that thing still lasted like IRON. Man, skipper, if we make a board like that (we have) we'll be stoked (we are).

So there was that... Something positive...

Think About it: Technological DE-evolutions

2011-08-14T18:07:00.000-07:00

Hey,

Think about this:

Up until about 1988, you used a tail-protector to keep your board from razor-tailing!

Why do I bring this up?

Because no matter what technological gimmick a company is pushing for $50 to $70 per board at Zumies, you aren't going to be able to use it longer than razor-tail is going to take it out.

Take the Blind Eternal-Life decks that have a huge guarantee on them for like 90 days or something like that... who cares? You're going to razor tail that thing and its going to chip and bum you out. Besides, those are BAD SKATEBOARDS in terms of dimensions, shape, size, and concave (opinion/bias, there kids).

You couldn't pay me to skate those turds for 90 days.

The fact is, these popsicle boards aren't worth saving (opinion), so don't put a tail guard on them. Period. They are boring (opinion), soulless popsicles designed by Rodney Mullens (who is an epic genius and technical innovator, but doesn't major on soul and style. Sorry rodney)(also opinions).

The fact (opinion) is (are), these "technologies" are just gimmicks. Composites don't work the way these guys are saying. you can't just put them on there like a sticker, instead of proper laminate layers, and expect them to work.

I got a friend in the industry and he wrote me this:

The problem with these composite decks is that they break all of the engineering principles govern the use of composites.

1. The high stress areas of a deck are on the perimeter of the deck, and around the trucks. That is where the composites need to be.

Duh.

2. Unidirectional composites are useless applied to decks, which endure stresses from all directions.

3. Composites need to be added to the top and/or bottom of the deck to be effective, as the strength gains are directly proportionate to how far apart the composite layers are.

Farther apart = stronger.

Burying composites into a deck is counterproductive.

Duh again.

Until our industry eggheads read Composites 101 and actually learn how to use this shit, they'll just keep churning out gimmiks that don't actually work.

Except the SMA blackbirds and the Foundation Fiberlams- those actually do work as advertised- everything else just blows. -B.

So you see? This guy knows what he's talking about. I don't really. I just figured that longer press-times, quality glues, and the best wood I could scare up with my best possible french, from the coldest stands of maple on the continent would make OK decks. And I'm sticking to it...

We owe a lot (all) to the innovations of Stecyk and his Ilk. And as you can see, Skip Engblom is still RULING at making great wood at SMA. We have a tester from him--more on that later--that lasted MONTHS and MONTHS without breaking down...

But the factories that are producing wood for major labels, under major distributors... they're dropping the bar and the ball at the same time... tweeeeeet! (whistle)

All I'm saying at this point is...

2011-08-14T18:01:00.000-07:00

...that all of my friends and I here in the midwest have been watching wood CRUMBLE under daily use, and the "new technologies" like the P2 and Game Changer and whatnot, are all following suit. Big surprise?

Well here's the part that IS a big surprise:
The boards are falling apart in a worse fashion than the mass-produced maple-type boards from the same companies (if that were possible). Honestly, is there any voice for quality in this wood industry?

It doesn't take long to calculate that the average skater, at one board a month, is outlaying about $50 per board and dropping a solid $600 per month. The daily skater is looking at an outlay of around $120 per month. Anyone that just LOVES SKATEBOARDS is going to drop $200 per month (to the dread of his wife), easily.

Now, kids who are ripping through the stacks real hard usually come under some form of care from their local skate shop, and enjoy some form of help, if they are making a name for themselves... that is ONE OF A THOUSAND KIDS WHO ARE RIPPING THROUGH THE STACKS!!!

That's right. Almost NOBODY has any help.

So I'm going to take a minute and post some thoughts, in incomplete form, to stimulate the folks who ought to be talking about all this...

Confession: An Axe to Grind

2011-08-14T17:58:00.000-07:00

Hey, when it comes to reading journalism, you the reader need to ask yourself about the bias of the writer. In this case, I'm educating you about detecting whether the person "has an axe to grind".

Basically this boils down to you figuring out whether the person writing the article has anything against the stuff they're reporting, or gains from slamming the subject of their journalism.

You gotta have a head on your neck when you're reading articles like the ones I write... You can spot some pretty honest, albeit limited in intelligence, stuff on here...

Why?

Because I'm about to drop a hammer on the P2 phenomenon... no kidding.

Confession: A Conflict of Interest

2011-08-14T17:56:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I review stuff on here and you need to know: I have bias!

First off, I am the hand-maker of all the Fickle Boards, and I sell them. We started trickling some out last month, and there will be more coming soon! So when I talk about industry stuff, I'm speaking as a hand-maker and seller of boards. It's up to you to tell if I'm biased beyond reason in that regard...

Why?

Because I've been putting off posting a pretty scathing commentary on the whole P2 "Spring Loaded Pop" technology thing. I've written and re-written it and just haven't had the heart to put this out there, because it's just gnarly.

So there's something to look forward to.

The Brigadier

2011-08-13T17:16:00.001-07:00

Dude, I got this backpack back in May for my birthday. SIIIIIIIIIIIICK!

First, it's HUGE! Mega-capacious! It's a dump trucker.

Second, it's waterproof! Legit, longterm waterproof. Made with ninja fabrics. I know a guy who has had his chrome bag for years and it's still waterproof.

Third: roll-top.

Fourth, front pocket, large.

Fifth, huge laptop pocket.

Over all, the design is simple and sick. Period. These chrome guys are nailing it in true NorCal fashion. and then there's that pic with Cardiel in Urban Velo...

Seriously, how am I not gonna become a gear head this year?

Ft. Wayne vacation days

2011-08-13T06:16:00.000-07:00

Just finished my two week course... The one I do for state department diplomatic exchange students... No kidding.

So I'm full-time board making now. Hoping to provide a lot more wood this month, and lock in a good winter of getting the kinks worked out of the workshop.

It has been a wild ride to this point... Starting Fickle with my friend, just as a fun possibility... Seeing that there is a real need out there for great quality wood, and that mysterious positivity that we bring... What is that?
For old lew, it's definitely an outworking of a spiritual trip. I'm a Jesus People and will never recover from the discovery that I am loved...

Stick that on a 35mph wooden toy... And you have the Old Man... At 38, I'm hardly old, but with all the flat-out life going on around me daily, I have mileage... The gray in the beard is earned, and I am looking forward to the other side... While I'm gonna go Shred the hell outta some concrete today.

I know a lot of people are waiting for the wood. In just a little while I'll have a solid supply flowing out there. For today, I'm gonna go carved like a Christmas goose.

every year, two weeks

2011-08-05T07:50:00.000-07:00

every year Old Lew here takes 2 weeks off the daily grind to teach an English Culture and Language Orientation Program for State Department selected diplomatic foreign exchange students. That's a mouthful. These kids are all about 17 years old, and come from countries like Moldova, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Azerbaijan, and Russia. They have been selected from about a hundred thousand applicants. They are the real deal in world-changer-types.

And Old Lew is the face of practical experience on entry to American Culture. A daily skateboarder, owning and running his own wood company, hand-shaping all the boards himself... I'm convinced that the government NAILED it on this one. I may or may not be able to be considered patriotic by one or another wing of the spectrum, from time to time, but I am definitely a GREAT welcome mat to these young heroes.

I'm one week deep, and skating tomorrow and sunday, but wood production will re-start in earnest on the 14th, after I cleanse my mind with a weekend trip to Michigan and Ft. Wayne skateparks... With FickleMatt. schralptastic.

Hey, take my advice. Relax. Focus on how little you control and make the most of opportunities to grow. Keep pushing. Skate as often as you can, and value each and every moment. Werd.

2011-07-29T19:31:00.000-07:00

ribs are still out.
stokage is high.

check out fickle's facebook presence and catch up with what's happening... sick shapes are coming out of here in small trickles, daily. just a few boards at a time down there. all made by me. I couldn't have anyone else down there. I got no money to pay, and still have barely any idea what I'M doing, much less teach weston how to do anything...

Besides, Ben and Weston are hair models, not board shapers.

No Makes...

2011-07-29T19:25:00.000-07:00

as an aging lifer skateboarder, I constantly find myself reflecting on some stuff that is going on that I always thought would self-police itself because its self-evident...

But here I am, 25 years deep into reading skate mags and peepin the interwebs and I'm finding the need to just say "WTF?" about: NO MAKES in skate photography.

Here's the thing: I've probably had my head firmly inserted my whole life long in regard to this little dynamic, so "My Bad" if publishing a NO-MAKE photo in a series of attempts is EVER okay to do... But the skateboarding world is getting deluged with the best looking NO MAKE photo of a session. This is legitimized if the skater MADE the trick later...

I call foul. With digital technology, we have no more costly film wastage. Hit delete on those no makes and get a REAL photo of a REAL moment in skateboarding.

Did some of those No Makes look better? Who cares? They were No Makes! Seriously. I'd love a little more Lo-Fi in skate media for the sake of some authenticity... For real the likes of Busenits and Josh Viles are able to stock any photographyer with plenty of authentic skate destruction...

Again, "My Bad" on being a curmudgeon here... I'm prolly hopelessly outta touch.

back injuries and bad angles...

2011-06-23T07:01:00.000-07:00

i blew two ribs out of place about 7 weeks ago... no big deal on some levels, but it makes me skate like a hunchback and raises my caution levels to Orange. They're not back in yet, but I'm working on it every day... Hurts when you breathe, every day and night... but it's all good, because where there's life there's hope.

yesterday we were skating the jersey wall and talking about how much we've all enjoyed this one board we call "the destroyer". it's a custom cut from a small company, pressed by a factory, with Indy 169's and Pig Cruiser 61's. We all use it at different times. It has a half inch of riser pads to deepen the turning, and has had some washers removed (bottoms) to make it's steering more squishy... It's an epic, large cruiser for going to the store... the soft wheels feel GREAT on the Jersey sessions...

...and we've owned the thing for over three years...
...and we finally noticed that the destroyer's SHAPE is waaaaaaay off! It's shape is off by a mile, and we never noticed it at all. And it didn't matter!

If I were the people in the wood industry that I was talking to some years back, I would have told me that ALL good skateboard companies produce lots of flawed wood, and that there is no guarantee that maple veneers will hold shape and be precisely cut by anything but CNC robots.

Heck, even with CNC and a precision guarantee, our best woodshops produced pretty low precision results.

So I'm considering all of this as I'm hand-drilling the holes on your boards with a level and a press, and getting Stoked! Stoked to put the wood out without agonizing over small imperfections, while stepping up and saying that we CAN guarantee that our wood will stoke you because we stand behind it...
We can afford to do that because we aren't selling batches of thousands of boards. We are making and selling them one at a time... I am, that is.

...and isn't it awesome that all of us are enjoying SKATING this board, without picking knits on it's perfection? that there is a picture of how it really is.

epicnesses!!!!

2011-06-22T19:26:00.000-07:00

sessioned our home workshop jersey barrier tonight as the storm rolled in... lightning all around us... got my four tricks done: front rock, rock to fakie, back rock, back pivot, front 5050... Old Lew throws down basics all day...

But I did it all on a board that I hand shaped, pressed in my own press right here, alongside a BUNCH of other sick boards that we shaped up this week, me and Mark the Moustache--gimp of the Rancheros--Nolan! We've been having epic times here making boards and getting our graphic screening process dialed... needless to say I'm stoked as all get out.

Nolan is the coolest. Miles and miles of perspective, always down to stoke the good stuff of skating. Endless goodtimes and encouraging chatter.

Old Man Skateboarding

2011-06-19T20:16:00.000-07:00

I'm sitting here at my computer waiting for the Tylenol PM to kick in, hoping for something more like sleep than the last few weeks... some of my ribs have declared independence from my spine and their brethren... it's been like this for weeks and weeks and I'm more than cool with it, because it all comes down to a life lived on terms defined by love...

Man, i was built to skate. Not my body, necessarily, as I don't seem to manifest a "natural talent" for skateboarding... but my MIND and my Heart are dialed into the flow of motion and kinetic poetry that I experience while I'm carving a line just under coping, or flowing some piece of smooth concrete, or throwing down on a jersey wall, or ollie-fly-out-ing some spot somewhere as fast as I can...

and don't get me started about the joy of frontside slashes and smiths.

But I'm here reviewing footage from the time we had at HQ with the Old Indy Skaters, Saturday. Bart the Heart and Bud Stratford hooked up with Fickle Old Lew ("casually indecisive") and we had a shred-fest... the footy is taken on Aaron's new D-90, Lew's fishy-piece, and some phones and a flip cam...

Just looking at the raw footy has me stoked at a deck full of guys who are all simultaneously amazed that we are all doing this stuff... And it has me appreciating the fact that my life wouldn't be complete without friends. Isn't that the best thing about skateboarding? The fact that outside of the experience of flight we get from doing it, our loneliness and grief gets tempered by a camaraderie? Bart the Heart said it best, but I wasn't able to hear it clearly... something about having a crew... I'm down.

The Skate for a Cure thing at Local was epic, too. We were pumped. There is so much good stuff going on in the community of humans who are devoted to skateboarding. Where would we be without friends?

Long ass read...

2011-06-19T07:19:00.001-07:00

that last one is long.

2011-06-19T06:43:00.000-07:00

right about now, TSBJ is preparing an article about Fickle Boards. What can I say? Really, Fickleboards is so young, so tender, so unformed, that anything anyone is saying about it will probably beef up or die off soon enough...

But I trust these guys to get a few things right. One of them is that , to us (Lew), the whole idea about being a skateboard company meant making the boards ourselves. When we first contacted a factory production wood supplier, it was in the interest of building a BRAND and a financial base from which to build presses and have a hand-made line, in addition to the classic cookie-cutter, factory production line with the heat transfer graphics and whatnot...

Making the boards ourselves was going to be an experimental line that we started some time after year 5... We ended up having to pull the plug on factory production before the end of year three. We looked everywhere for a good wood factory, and saw that the entire idea of getting 200 boards a month, with any reliability in terms of graphic quality or supply integrity, was unrealistic at best.

New board brands take note: There is not only NO INCENTIVE for wood factories, no matter how cool they may seem on the phone, to tell you the truth about what kind of wood you'll get, or when you'll get it... There is actually an incentive present in the wood industry to consolidate the ordering bodies with the Larger, more corporate branding houses. What I'm saying is that that cool skater guy on the phone who says What you'll get, and When you get it, is most likely practicing deceit. Yep, I just said that.

They KNOW that your order, if it's under some huge number like 1,000 boards, is an absolute LAST PRIORITY. But they'll give you a ship date... Let me know how often that works out. It is nigh impossible to build a business on these ethics.

They KNOW that the highest quality boards will go to the "BEST CUSTOMERS". And who are the "Best"? Money moneymoneymoneymoneymoney... the biggest.

They can afford to piss you off, and disappoint you and bum you out, and they are counting on you hanging on, because the skaters who are DOING it (starting stuff) are the philosophers and dreamers who are out there for the love. And aren't usually the hardest-headed at the whole business thing.

But if you don't hang on with it, and you look for a way out, your options are basically board pusher, or another wood house that'll steer you wrong in the end...

...all because there's no incentive for the creation of new brands, Like Funhouse, which was just about the most awesome shit to hit the fan in a decade because JJRudisil over there in like Brooklyn, was producing SHapES and graphics on artistic lines that are to die for. Outside the box, Truly creative... Totally insupportable in today's skateboarding industry.

What?

yes.

Outside the box
Truly creative
Totally insupportable.

Now, for the record, We were working with probably what is one of the very best Non-california American wood shops. No kidding. You all know who that is. And the second best one is in Alabama, and the third best has like 20 Better Business Bureau complaints on them for literally JIPPING the crap out of the little guy! STEALING, and slaughtering the best of what skateboarding can be in 5 or 10 years at the same time... all to make some longboards for more money.

Well, we aren't a company with CNC robots, now.
And we aren't a company with heat transfer graphics in 32 colors
We don't use heavy science in our pressing, so our glue lines tend to be heavy...

but we are free...

...and ironically, we will most likely never be a company that represents threatening NUMBER of skateboards or dollars. Looks like we're small for life... BUT, we do represent GREAT ideals that have driven the outlaw culture of skateboarding (an a bunch or other movements in art and culture) for decades...

...and for shedding light on the fact that the big-money, california-style industry cats are OFF TRACK... we don't know. We'll keep you posted.

How about a medical column?

2011-06-19T06:38:00.000-07:00

this one is a public plea to the skateboarding media out there to put a regular column on treating injuries and dealing with the practical issues of daily skateboarding. I put bud in the title because he is the editor of the soon-to-transform-into-legitness Skateboarder's Journal.

That's right, SBJ is coming out in print, and beefing up their online telestream into a legit source for us hungry stokers.

So check out SBJ, and don't we all hope they'll have Barry Zaritsky or someone put in a column on how to ice or heat or stretch or rest or wrap, or lance and drain all that ails us?

Every time one of these types of articles pops up in Thrasher or some other mag, I get kinda stoked. Hell, right now I have 2 separated ribs and a left foot decimated by multiple bad things happening to it... and I work around hella injuries all the time... That's how I get that sweet hunchback style when I skate! Cripple schwagg!

do the work.

2011-06-19T06:29:00.000-07:00

I'm approaching 40 years old.
...and yesterday I spent the day skateboarding with people from all walks of life.

I've been playing with these wooden toys for many years... 1985-1992 and 1996-2011. what is that? 8 complete years on the first part? 16 on the second part?

I'm actually almost done relearning the lion's share of the stuff I did as a youngster, because since 2007 I've been skating more "daily". That's because I started working in the skateboarding industry stuff... more on that another time...

I actually have some tricks I'm learning that I never had dialed as a youth... I'm LEARNING and GROWING.

And any time I get around skateboarders who are Learning and Growing, no matter what their present skill level or background, I get STOKED. This here is what I'm bringing to the table! I get stoked on people being AWAKENED and quickened to learn and grow through their experiences with skateboarding.

If there's a person who's got mass skills and tricks on lock, and they dominate sessions and have a crew and all that... Ho Hum. Boring. Been done. Same for all the kids cloning that game, trying to climb the inferiority ladder and clone in on becoming some dominant elite.

But when there's a person on a journey of growth and learning, who is awake to themselves and others, and skateboarding is part of that--their skateboarding stokes me up.

Hey, do yourself and all of us a favor. do the work of being a human being. And enjoy skateboarding. Period.

learning how to everything...

2011-06-11T04:01:00.001-07:00

one of the themes for the last 2 years is something like "learning how to everything". kind of a "fill in the blank" learning curve... No matter what it is, whether it's all the different factors that come into the process of hand making our own boards, or filming each other skating, or building ramps and concrete stuff... we are learning it all...

looking back to the period of time in which I realized that there wasn't a place for me to do a cookie cutter company--just putting our logos and graphics on factory boards... this whole crew has grown TONS in our ability to work together, see things through, and make it happen.

Thanks to Josh, Weston, Ben, Sunshine, Marcus, Caleb, Matt, Ian... and on and on and on and on it goes!

unplugged...

2011-06-09T06:54:00.000-07:00

i got to spend some quality time in the workshop yesterday, custom shaping a board for Chris from Unplugged Skates. Mark was there, too. Let me just say that when a few old guys put their heads together about this stuff... it's encouraging.

On Not Ripping...

2011-06-08T05:58:00.000-07:00

Look, here's the long story short of it. I grew up as a kid with very little to skate. But the love of it was in me. I did the skate rat thing as a kid, over focused and self-identified with it until it got eclipsed by a big Jesus/faith crisis in the early nineties... I didn't skate for about 6 years, with any regularity or intensity, because I was seriously preoccupied with God, life, marriage, work, kids... and it was GREAT.

But around 1996, I got an old school deck and started to shred again.

Since then it's been more and more daily...more and more intense.

I'll never skate like Josh or Weston, but I will never lose the love of it. And I'm happy with that. All I need is a nice frontside carve, or a smooth ollie, and I'm set for the day. Easily contented.

Old Lew Down For Life

2011-06-03T06:36:00.000-07:00

Here's old Lew, a couple days after hitting KnoxvilleBikerKid, cheerily concussed, and opting to join Forrest, and Josh in the down for life Skate and Destroy tattoo club. I'll tell you what, a concussion like that one made me feel pretty good. Made me skate pretty careful, too.

Wear a helmet. ??? yes. but i still don't and won't. do I know why I don't make sense? That's going to have to wait for the other side.

Mad Props to all the heads at Black Orchid Tattoo in Savannah GA for clearing their schedules for us on such short notice! Saved us from the WalMart Tattoo Factory around the corner. Really. BlkOrkd was all full up, so we went down the way, but they cleared the slate and hunted us down by phone and got us back!

Skitched Up.

2011-06-02T04:08:00.001-07:00

drink and drug deaths bum us out, but have you considered the insanity of towing lately?

HERE is a collection of articles from boardistan.com that puts things into perspective... skitching, towing, whatever you call it... man, be CAREFUL when you do that!

Sometimes you need a pull to a hard runup. I get that... but just playing around on the street? stay alive, man.

Parts, Childress, Kanights, Unite!

2011-06-02T02:35:00.000-07:00

this is a video i found today on boardistan... childress and partanen... partanian... part alien? Parts is the man.

these guys are so funny and have unforgettable personality and style in their skating. no joke. Bryce Kanights put it together solid on this one. wow. too bad this thing didn't get run bigger.

Straight Trippin' from SKATEDAILY.net on Vimeo.

how cool is it that this enternett thing makes us able to put up other people's stuff? Thanks BK and Chet and Al and all the folks who worked on a vid that gets us thinking about the open road.

2011-06-01T15:38:00.001-07:00

...man, if i had my druthers i'd write you a big deal about how the new p2 technology crapped out majorly right before our eyes. it's insane... insane. i just can't believe that all that californian/chinese/mexican money machine monster, massive "industry" megaramp competition winner editorpublishermanufacturerblablablabuybuybuy.... This? This is what they're throwing at us? This is their answer to the decline of quality in the skateboard manufacturing world?

man... too bad I can't write about that. why? I have my own, little tiny company that makes like 2 boards a day from scratch and sells them on such a small scale... hey! maybe that gives me the right to talk, since I know how they're actually made and I understand firsthand how slow curing, long pressing, and not shorting the glue, can produce the most solid (and not heavy) board you may ever have ridden?

Maybe... but probly not...

oh well. I'm going skating.

Yesterday's work...

2011-05-14T06:01:00.000-07:00

Yesterday and the day before, Ian, Matt and I spent a lot of time and energy getting the workshop updated with new tables, painted floors and walls, and whatnot.

I still haven't got the screen printing stuff set up.
I still haven't got the floors finished...

The press has our one-off mold in it adn another concave is carved and ready in plaster...

There's a full pallet of concrete outside in the lot, and There are prototype molds strewn all over the backyard. We're thinking about building a staircase out of prototype molds... How cool could that be?

So we're later than we had planned, and more stoked than you can imagine...

Bulldog.

2011-05-04T17:01:00.000-07:00

There in now a young bully in the family, so Old Lew's time is being taxed in the training of Fickle Board's new mascot, Rocko.

The kid is amazing, and the shop now has the requisite "pitbull factor".
Rock's a rescue, so he's got a scar on his neck from a bad tie-up... tough as nails... So please enjoy Rocko. We know we do.

As for Old Lew, he's in the workshop cooking up a recipe for wood this May. There will be wood this may, and more and more after. Prototypes have done really well...

Conceptualizing a board design...

2011-04-16T06:40:00.000-07:00

Okay.. so our friend fell down last week and broke his hip. No kidding. Good guy, too. Mike. ...a ripper in his own right, and he falls on a back 5050 stall, setting up for a trick on some 5 foot bowl somewhere...

So mike calls me up and is like, "I broke my hip! I'm going in for surgery!" and I'm like, "Hey! Let's design you a custom board for when you're all better and ripping again." Because Mike is such a ripper, actually... and he will be ripping again soon!

So we get down to it and I pull out that epic tool of skateboard design... the napkin.

So there you have it, if you turn it sideways... these dimensions go into the file, with a cut template ready to go, for when Mike gets better... Until then, we're all rootin for ya, man!

As for me, this is how it is... you get an idea, you get a napkin, you go downstairs to the lab and you start making a template, you cut a board to shape and you go ride it.

I've spent a week punishing that first punk point.

Ian Brown (our builder and electrician extraordinaire) cut himself a new shape yesterday, that we'll definitely look into making for you...

and on and on... it's all pretty simple.

Now I'm working up multiple molds in different lengths so we can produce a huge number of boards for May and June. ...by huge we mean around a hundred or three hundred... like that. Not huge like 40,000 or 100,000.

Rainy Day. HQ sesh.

some dude shot a whole clip in our direction as we drove by last month. emptied it. slugs hitting the building behind us... HQ is in a dodgy neighborhood so curb your lurking.

struggling with small defects...

2011-04-05T16:29:00.000-07:00

today i spent a good deal of my time trying to craft an imperfection out of a new mold... it was fun, and I didn't lose it...

But I'm still looking to "lower a hip" on our mold... The boards I have been making all have this one "high hip"... it's like a 32nd of an inch, but I can tell it's there...

it wouldn't show up on boards that are under 9 inches, too...

but it's still there. you know?

So while I'm working up new molds that are flatter, I'm looking to perfect the one that has the hips on it...

Man, this stuff is really fun. Keep up with us, and spread the word. Pretty soon we'll be stocking the Galaxie in the Cinci area, and Woody's in SAV... We have a lot of other shops to stock, but most of all, we want to come and SEE you where you skate, and visit your shops face to face. The sessions and the friendships are where I'm at...

Now go do a gnarly smith grind.

One more...

2011-04-04T21:05:00.000-07:00

just HAD to drop another pic of this great board...

I'm really going to enjoy making more of these this week...

Skate Park Profile: Loveland Ohio

2011-04-04T16:52:00.000-07:00

hoo boy. this one's a doozy.

I tweeted "Loveland Ohio hates its youth." on this one.... The thing's been there for a while now... And it's got gnarly sharp-ass edges on every thing there... and massive surface-drainage issues... and the ramps (true to ARC form) hold the rain from days and days ago underneath, only to release it in spurts when you hit the thresholds... just enough water, on a DRY day, to make you slip crooked and hit those gnarly edges...

Seriously, I know the guys at ARC are nice folks, but what the heck?

to be fair, they ARE nice folks at ARC, and they have several product lines that make a super park... But LOVELAND's folks are the ones that have chosen to do the least possible on this one. ARC offers this crap so that instead of "NO Skatepark" you can have "SOME Skatepark"... but man, a bunch of locals with the DIY heart could have crafted an amazing park on a slab with a proper bowl done by pros.

I don't have a lot to say about the good folks at ARC. They're doing something... I have even less to say about a town that marginalized its youth like this... but all us skateboarders!!!! especially the older dudes! Man, let's get something rad built where we live, from backyards to municipal stuff. Get out there, old men, and make it happen. Otherwise... well just look at these pics...

A Dream Realized...

2011-04-04T16:29:00.000-07:00

Two days ago I cut my own custom punk-point shape. I created a template modeled on a certain EPIC lifer, tweaked it down from its hefty 10 inches to a slimmer 9in. model. I adjusted for a wheelbase of 15.25 from 17 in. That's right. A certain amazing lifer, who is also gracefully aging, struts his stuff on SEVENTEEN INCHES OF WHEELBASE.

so I settled the thing in at a 15.25 wheelbase.
On wood that had cured 5 days...
...after pressing in my hand-chiseled and sanded mold for over 4 hours...

8 inch nose.
7.126 inch tail. (that's fancy talk for "seven and an eighth")

(I have to laugh at the ironies of using decimal points in a system of measurement that's loosely based on the length of some medieval royal's pinky toe... Canada, who shares the medieval roots, has gone metric... Irony!)

All ironies aside, The Thing Shreds...

I took it to Delhi park for a good old fashioned bank and block street shred.
I know. It's retarded to make a pool board and take it out to ollie over things... but I've always just done whatever I wanted to with skateboarding and this is no different. Breaking rules? I acknowledge no such thing as rules in skateboarding. LIVE DAMMIT!

So I'm out there and, of course, I ding the nose on my first wallie. No problem. The ding is totally no big deal because the wood is so solid! I'm serious. It buffed almost completely out. many bumps later, the tip is still proper!
The wood! No pressure cracks.
5 hours at the park, Popping waist-high ollies on the banks. Wallies, Wall-rides... I even kickflipped the thing! I. Love. This. Board.

For the quality that I got on long press time and a full cure-time.
for the fact that I designed a shape that is gonna be in my quiver lifelong, period.

and here's another thing.
I'm pressing these using all of my worst plys. There are literally 3 knot holes right in this thing, but the glue is holding it all solidly together... The glue had a chance to fully cure before the massive vibration of drilling, cutting and sanding.

Oh it's epic!

Please be patient with me as I get boards rolling out. I sent out 3 testers with Matt, Weston, and Josh last week. This is my first run on it... and I've already started a second and third mold...

But we will have punk points, old schools, cruisers, and bigger-sized popsicles (think creature sizes) out very soon--all on our custom, hand-crafted concave... all on our full-quality, long-press, full-cure wood...

We will be re-launching our website and presenting our new line of boards this May.

Hey, I'm grateful to be out there skating. And I'm stoked to offer you all something of quality in the near future... Please, enjoy FickleBoards and go thirty.

Some werds about what fickle is about...

2011-03-26T10:27:00.000-07:00

About 6 years ago I got acquainted with "Have a factory make and screen boards and ship them to you" skateboard company production. I was working for a really rad small skateboard company. But my big ideas freaked them out and they let me go. That all worked out when they brought me back again, so I was stoked!

But when my buddy Sam got a wild hare to start Fickle Boards, I jumped in to help and wound up owning it outright and running it all in a minute... Sam got married instead. he feels like he dodged a bullet. I feel like I found a career.

So with Fickle, I knew I wanted to get to actually pressing everything here and running a company that actually DOES all the stuff RIGHT HERE... but serves the skateboarding community wherever we meet up. Fickle Boards may have location, but we are definitely all about just the plain old stoke of YOU, SKATEBOARDING, NOW, WHEREVER THAT IS GOING ON! That there is what fires us up!

So we started pressing with an amazingly high-quality, but also very high-quantity board pressing house in Pennsylvania. If you go back and read the history, you can know that we respectfully had to bow out of buying from a high-quantity house, because we simply couldn't produce the sizes, shapes and dimensions that we have come to love...

Well... Here's the thing about coming to this point, where we are pressing up our first batches of prototypes...

Making skateboards is crushingly simple stuff, but it takes a lot of work to get it to work well... and making LOTS and LOTS of boards (like the fairly typical 5 to 15 Thousand a week in a factory), is REALLY REALLY hard to get to work well.
So we are taking the easy way and making JUST OUR BOARDS, which puts us at a weekly output under 200 at pretty much maximum momentum in the summer... That means that we are fully in charge of the process all the way through, and it all gets made in a workshop, not a factory.

Literally a basement workshop, on a very low-hype level. It's insane.
I mean, the press is DESIGNED, and WORKS, VERY WELL and very simply.
The rest is a simple assortment of glue spreading by rollers, band saw, corner routing, drill pressing, templates, sanders, ventilation, humidity controls, heat controls, light box, screen press, and some other very simple tools in some very simple systems...

And we're not going to hide the fact that pretty much anyone who really really wants to can do this. This is perhaps the best-kept secret out there: that you can make a good skateboard if you really want to. No kidding. And making them is almost as fun as riding them, in our opinion.

Well... Please enjoy the pics of our process and we hope it will inspire you to create, as well! Turn off the TV and get strong and make something today! Go Fast and please enjoy!

mid-life... WINNING!

2011-03-25T05:46:00.000-07:00

last night, i threw together a board that contained some of the very worst pieces of veneer I could find... this should be the most warpy, gonna-snappiest board I ever skate... I'm giving it to Viles later to see how long till he kills it. But I'm pressing it for 12 hours. That's a long time in press-time. ...and all science aside, it makes a HUGE difference.

That's one thing about my approach to board-making... I'm giving all the boards a long time in the press... Four-Hour Minimums. That's how I'm doing it... I'm not saying it's right. I'm not saying its the only way. I'm not even saying it's better. I'm going to let YOU say its better.

So last night I slathered some layers in glue and stomped them in the board-squeezer-together-er... and we'll see what pops out.

Viles, Wes, Ben and Sunshine continue to kill it at every opportunity, destroying Beech Acres and a couple of other locales yesterday... Sessions ended well after 2am.

Charging my forties, I'm loving this mid-life crisis. Feels like a mid-life CIRCUS! More like mid-life... WINNING!

first round of wood...

2011-03-22T20:19:00.001-07:00

well... there's work to be done, but progress is steaming onward... tomorrow will be spent duplicating and refining our pretty darned successful mold... that's right... pretty darned successful!

The workshop is getting tweaked and developed all week... the space is taking on a life of it's own.

Soon there'll be a good flow of FickleBoards out there... We'll keep working for it to be epic... it already is.

Lab Time...

2011-03-22T05:59:00.000-07:00

Okay, there's a lot going on in the workshop, and there are exciting developments and potentialities all around us here... but First Off, I just wanna say something...

I'm just a janitor.

I'm a guy in a really messy lifetime, just working bit by bit behind the scenes, after school and whatnot... bringing a little piece of clean to the situation...

I Hope.

There are plenty of other janitors. Many much better than I am.
...anyone could be a janitor... a waaaay better one than I am.

yep... if Paul Schmitt is The Professor, and this stuff is a "School" or something... I'm just a janitor.

Again:
There are many others.
There are other betters.
you could do this better than I am doing it.
but this is what I'm about...

...a janitor.

That said, my first prototype mold is set, in the press, and ready to test... I admit, I'm expecting it to be flawed, and am planning to create a side by side mold set without these flaws, soon, using the wood I press this week... but the first prototype wood is coming out this week to a small number of Fickle folks.

letting you in on the process...

2011-03-10T05:23:00.000-08:00

Okay here's the thing...

making a skateboard from veneers...
pressing the laminate of the board... (designing and fabricating a serious press)
curing that laminate. (framing, sealing, insulating a controlled wood room)
drilling (outfitting workspaces, benches, lighting, electric)
cutting
sanding (designing ventilation and workshop safety)
shaping... (creating templates and designing a router setup)

screening graphics onto the boards (designing and outfitting a screen printing shop)
Spraying the final results (making a spray booth with all it's stuff)

This whole process... none of it is really that complex!
Really.

There's nothing to hide here. No secret silver bullet.
It's as simple as keeping a passion for quality and a curiosity about how to do it, alive and growing.

And that's what is going on in my little workshop. We have a passion to do this. We aren't quitting. Slow starts and small beginnings are all part of the process... We are patient.
But the curiosity about ways to do it... it's alive and well.
And the energy of anticipation as we are staring our first boards in the face...
wow.
It's on.

Mold.

2011-03-10T05:02:00.000-08:00

Last night I popped Fickle Boards' first concrete mold out of the box and knocked the plaster off it.

I made it of a custom blend of Quickrete 5000, Portland Cement, and mystery fibers... by "custom" i mean "guessing". I hope that this will cast a top mold well. I'm sure it will.

From there, I'll be pressing a form-prototype out of Maple Veneer.

Then I shape that custom (guessing again)...

Then I cast final prototype molds off THAT.

So this is a busy week in the Fickle Boards Lab... (which is a workshop, a la santa-style)

I love this process, and riders from the team are constantly dropping in and dreaming over what shape and dimensions they want on their boards!

Imagine that! Being able to test out dimensions, shapes, concaves? This is a process that we're going to continue for years.

Northside Skate Park

2011-03-10T04:58:00.000-08:00

Last night I enjoyed a meeting with the Northside Skate Park Committee. Things are on track and speeding up.

I was massively stoked that Ali and Michelle Calis have stepped up to head up design for the park. They're a dynamic duo, with Ali's skating and artistic life embodying the true core of skateboarding, and Michelle's professional architecture career providing the skills necessary to get legit design done.

We have the land.
We have the support of the community.
The City of Cincinnati has gotten behind this.
It IS Happening.

And I get to see it all spreading out there right there in my community.

I am so grateful for all the heads at the table, at every meeting we have. This park is going to set dials for artistic, community-oriented, eco-aware, skateable community park desigh. Seriously.

Happy Feet...

2011-03-10T04:49:00.000-08:00

My sweet coffee/chocolate HalfCabs that I bought in OBX at the half price sale at DVO have worn thin.

That's been a rare occurrence. I usually can't wear an aging shoe. My feet "need" support. But over the last year that's been changing.

After years of pretty massive foot pain, years of skating regularly have beaten my old dogs into submission. These feet just don't HURT as much!

For the past year or so, I've been able to just skate what I'm in till they're done. It's epic, actually.

And at 37, I'm LEARNING more stuff on my board than I expected I could. And it's all come from a resolve to relax and enjoy skateboarding with a grateful heart, as often as possible. All the building stuff, all the company stuff, all the production and planning... it's all a crime of passion... part of a journey that is healing me up.

So there, blogosphere. Here's a guy whose feet are being put back together by ENJOYING skateboarding. I hope you all enjoy today, too.

Updates and updates... and on and on...

2011-03-08T04:54:00.000-08:00

Thanks for hanging in there... you all know that the periods during which I am not writing regularly are the times when I am not sure what the hell is happening around me... right?

I mean, in the past 2 or 3 months, I dabbled in product reviews, immediately got swept up in some next-level discussions with industry people, held it down and followed through, even personally going to San Francisco and meeting some of the folks who make it happen, face to face.

So, since the snowy adventure to OBX, during which disappointingly small amounts of skateboarding were done by Lew (Ben and Wes shredded a lot more), I have been to SF to meet the Deluxe guys... I also have been straining at my harness to get a legit wood shop installed in my basement... it is going pretty well, honestly. And I have been nonstop in trying to craft an approach to skateboarding industry that SUPPORTS THE ACTUAL SKATEBOARDERS WHO ARE SKATEBOARDING DAILY, rather than an industry that points at itself and commands skateboarders to support IT.

All in all, it's going very well. There is a lot of love for what we're about...

Oh yeah, in the middle of hand-shaping molds and getting them ready for concrete trials, I took a 9 day trip with Fickle down through TN and GA to Savannah, where we bro'ed down with the good, kind folks of Woody's. We brought on a new rider (and we don't even have boards yet!)... and on and on...

Today I'll be interviewing a book keeper, and Forrest (new rider) is coming in to stay for a few days, session HQ and look at where and how he wants to help out. A light box will be built this week, and a screen printing shop will be roughed into the workshop.

Atop it all, I play with my kids, make them do their homework, and Judy and I went and saw a movie after a burrito and Graeter's ice cream. It was "The King's Speech". It was epic. for real.

So there is a small update...

oh, and my apple is in the shop, so I'm going to be working from the android and this little acer pc dealio... enjoy the lowness of tech.

Let's skate!

concussion on the trip

2011-02-27T18:13:00.000-08:00

man, if the riders for fickle could get any cooler or awesomer as people, I don't know how.

The second day of skating on the SAV Trip, we were at the Knoxville Skate park and some young biker wound up intersecting with my path... handlebars across my front thigh, my left ear to his head, right side of my head to the ground.

For the next three or four days, I was like a child being led by the hand. Really. I mean, I passed all the concussion tests, but what nobody knew was that I still wasn't all there... about 5 days into the experience, I started to get sharp again.

Describing things was tough. I didn't know words for stuff.
Menus got real tough. I saw pictures but they didn't mean anything... and words just fuzzed out.

It was tight. I didn't worry, because concussions happen and they go away, too.

And it made me a nicer person, because I needed help. And ALL of the crew really did just that. And they helped each other, too.

There were a lot of injuries, all relatively small, on the trip, including more than a few noggin knocks and elbow shocks. Everyone pulled together no matter what and we got through it in the best way.
Seriously, this is one of the best crews I could ever hope for.

I'll post more about the people we met along the way later... just needed to say this.

Juggernautica

2011-02-21T10:47:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm out there again... i left the woodshop behind, and will return to the operation when I get back... I'm out here with 5 riders and a photographer... it's really fun... gotta go. I'll post on fickleboards.com and stuff. I'll tweet at fickleboards and ficklelew, too.

Crow meal #23

2011-02-16T07:17:00.001-08:00

I am living this crazy journey we are on, me and the whole lot of us around fickle...

Yesterday I got the awesome opportunity to actually sit down with and listen to the rosa's people at deluxe sf...

I got two immediate takeaways.

1. Deluxe cares about us as riders. Quality is absolutely paramount in their priorities. They will always back you if you ever have any problem.

Because deluxe is all about heart.

2. The ONLY wood out there that is actually deluxe wood has REAL, KROOKED, or ANTI-HERO written on it.

So if your shop, or local brand is claiming deluxe as their wood source, the fine folks at dlxsf beg to differ.

The Lab.

2011-02-08T17:46:00.001-08:00

hey kids,

I have spent the better part of the last 2 weeks in the Laboratory, shaving and sanding and pouring casts to create a whole new concave and kick that is 100% Fickle Boards.

The prototypes are ready just in time for me to jet to California for a week off. I can't wait to get back and start perfecting them in high-pressure concrete on a casting table... Once I've got them poured, shaken and cured with heat on the table, we'll have BOARDS started up.

It's still going to be spring before the general public sees any Fickle wood appearing on the walls of skate shops, but our prototyping will be exciting.

Amazing progress has been made in putting together a kickass workshop! Thanks to Ben, DFaul and TButton for time spent helping out.

Powell Future Primitive Deck: Con't.

2011-02-08T17:43:00.000-08:00

after 12 days, this deck showed just the tiniest bit of cracking in the paint.

It is stiff and proper. Period.

This is wood like it used to be. George Powell has it down. Period.

Even though this is a big, old school shape, there's not a question in my mind that the quality coming out of Skate-One is top notch. Every plank out of there lasts like it ought to, as far as I've seen.

I'm not bonkers about the approach to concave that I see from powell... zero points an inch in front of the kick, with tight-angles to create a "Pocket". Okay.

But the quality is tops. Even the paint job on the thing has lasted amazingly. What's up with that?

Heading to California.

2011-02-08T17:41:00.000-08:00

Old Lew is headed to California in the morning. Judy, TLG and I are going over to visit friends and whatnot around San Francisco. I hope to get my head clear of the workshop stuff here and get ready for the massive trip that Fickle is Taking to SAV on the 20th.

I'll be back in the saddle in about a week. Don't look for me.

I'll post up a few little things here and there before I jet.

L.

My friends at Woody's

2011-01-21T08:01:00.000-08:00

Savannah GA came up today. I posted a thing at Fickleboards.com about The Yard. The Yard is a memory maker. It made me cuss. I mean it. I really got mad when I went there my second time... I wanted to shred that thing. It just gets under the skin...

But I really got to thinking about Woody's. Woody's is the BEST, because of a guy named Fabio. On my first trip down, Fabio took me into his home and showed me around, took me to the show, took me to spots, fed me pho... Fabio is great. He runs woody's with the heart of a true skateboarding man... mellow, people-oriented, relational... there just so much love there.

I miss Woody's, and today Weston and I are going to work extra hard to get molds made and wood pressing to get us back down there with wood that comes with a relationship to the company that makes it, direct. One brand. One press. One crew. Straight up.

Click this link and check out Woody's and know that these guys are holding it down in SAV.

There is also a TON of other stuff going on down there that we can't wait to get into. SAV, brace up. Fickle's got your number...

The Mile High Ramp at Matt

2011-01-21T06:47:00.000-08:00

Do you guys know about Matt's Ramp? Check out Simpson's blog over there on the right side of the Fickle Boards site. "The Mile High Ramp" is one of the funnest things ever built. It is the polar opposite of the HQ ramp, which was built super clean for practicing... TMHRamp is all about weird and fun.
There are 2 huge extensions. One of them has it's coping up around 12 feet above where you'll end up if you fall off. We have already seen our beloved Dfaul take a tumble into the netting that matt took off his trampoline to help prevent death. Death was helped to be prevented for sure.

There's the Rainbow. Evident in this shot of my inaugural session. Everybody gets their pic taken on their first day going over the rainbow and has to set it as their facebook photo...

There is the "Learning Curve"--a quarterpipe on the deck that you can ollie out onto and then get sped back into the ramp (that's a backside roll-in if you're regular footed). And across from that, there's the super steep jersey quarter that makes a halfpipe with the "Learning Curve".

Things are covered with snow today. I'm taking TLG (the little guy) and we're going to get Weston for the weekend. Wes and I are going to perfect a mold and do some board prototype work... Sledding will happen today. There will be a session or 2 at HQ for sure...

Look, all I'm saying here is that Matt Simpson loves skateboarding. For all of you who shred with the guy at Ollies, Florence Outdoor, TMHRamp, or on any of our trips, that's something that comes through clearly... Matt finds it impossible to take himself too seriously, and is always just the most chill and cheerful guy. He must have been through some pretty terrible stuff to get this mellow.

That's where you'll find us. Tie-Dyeing tee shirts for our new company release this spring, painting boards, whatever... Matt's the guy...

New Ride #52

2011-01-20T09:41:00.000-08:00

Here is the new ride... Picked it up at DVO in OBX, down in Salvo, NC.

Got it with my custom mod indy 149 trucks with red soft bushings from indy... no top or bottom washers... a riser front and back (not like when I was a kid and rode high-fronts).

I find that this setup turns super quick and doesn't bite hard...

I'm taking it to HQ right now. No more of the offset rear truck holes!

Nice and straight.
Powell.

Gimme a Break!

2011-01-20T07:58:00.000-08:00

Seriously. Did you see that treatment that I gave the Z-Cult Board?

I mean, look at the two following comments...

for $55+shipping... you get a board with the rear wheels a full quarter-inch off-center, and a 1/8" warp!!! Even if the warp happened from some kind of mis-handling... I don't care! The thing is ridiculously poor with those truck holes.

And when I looked into it, the thing was produced by "Westside Skate Co." with a graphic dating 2004... Looking it up, I found them on Manta.com and Brad Dorfman is the president of that company...

who is that guy? Vision? Big Five? That's Brad...

You know what? We are skaters, and when we shuck out bucks on wood it ought to at least have the truck holes on straight. It ought not pop and mush, or turn into a blue-raspberry slushy under our feet. I know you all agree.

The problem with the boards I'm seeing out there is that even the ones that come from companies that care don't come with a connection to the company. For example: Deluxe is awesome! The new REAL video is something I'm totally going to buy, and so should you.

And your skateshop has till business end today to get a copy booked! Do it!

But in order to skate a deluxe, I have to personally take down all the deluxe boards and step on them and find the ones that are going to last by my own discretion. Otherwise, I'm gonna have a pop-smush... Otherwise it's going to snap... these are the facts as we see them in the trenches at $60 per board off the wall at the Galaxie! Unless you go with the same wood from Gary Collins' Instrument, in which case Gary has your back! He will personally guarantee his wood to you.

Now that's a great way to go.

What am I saying? I don't know. I guess it's a "buy local" thing? Or "search for the connection" thing... but seeing so much just plain bad laminate product out there in the skateBOARDing industry is bumming me out. Good thing I'm doing something about it over here... too bad I may be far too small to make a big difference...

any way you cut it, if your board fails you or doesn't make sense, give your company some feedback. This is getting insane.

What I'm riding #42

2011-01-20T06:52:00.000-08:00

Time for another installment of "What I'm Riding".
This here is what I've been riding for the last 72 hours or so... 2 solid sessions on the min this week...

I bought this at Ollies YEARS ago. I put it on the wall after opening my head on a backyard pool a few years back. I was running tunnel rocks wheels on Krux trucks... ridiculous wheelbite combination, I know. What was i thinking? I just felt like i wanted to ride something weird and different.
What could be more epic than a jay adams board? Here are the specs. They're sold out. Maybe this post is about me ruining a great collector's item. But I've never been a collector! I skate what I buy. Always have.

I do this kind of thing. It's just how I am. I have learned that it's no use to be ashamed of being the guy who cuts up cutting boards and glues them to a deck... It skates great! It lasts forever!

Okay... it doesn't skate great to have plastic plates... but it's fun to add my own crap. And it skates fine... It's miniramp season and i'm loving it... This board is too flat for me to really really enjoy, but I'm used to it in 2 sessions and just amazed that I get to skate.

So there's what I'm riding #42.

adams, the younger

2011-01-17T15:09:00.001-08:00

Santa Cruz! Santa Cruz! Wherefore Art Thou... Pt. 2

2011-01-17T06:41:00.000-08:00

here I want to try to continue my review of the Santa Cruz Tom Knox Smashup that I picked up in OBX.
For sure you might want to go back and read that review setup... HERE.

I know it's blurry here, but go on and see the vid at thrasher, where the screaming hand is interviewing Sam Hitz... "Talk to the Hand"... There's no shame about Chinese sourcing at Santa Cruz, or Creature or anyone like that. It is how they do business and no one here would care either, except that the WOOD...

Dudes this wood cracked and flexed and went mushy and was just really all-around pretty terrible within a simple 4 hours of skating... Really.

oh gosh! the wood. Dangit!

All I want to say is the less said the better when it comes to this wood. Mushy. Mushy. Mushy.

All the cracking you are looking at happened within the first 4 hours of use!

And yes, the griptape is TORN all the way through and the first ply has completely given way on those cracks...

There is no bottom cracking... the board is just too mushy... mushy.

That's all I have to say about that.

So, if You can get past the disappointment of the wood itself, you'd be stoked to hang this one on the wall. But as a skateboard deck it is clearly inferior... The fact that it is made in china and mass produced under uncontrollable circumstances... well, who is running this stuff? What are the priorities?

The Aces review I put up had a response from Deluxe within 12 hours. Jim Thiebaud, the VP of Deluxe! And he and I have since had a LOT of great conversation. Anybody over there at Santa Cruz want to talk to my readership about why the wood is so bad? Better yet, Get yourselves over to china and talk to your production crew.

Is this maple? Or some kind of birch?

Who cares? Who among us has time for this crap?

I can't even drum up the energy for a good post on this plank.

to top it off, we have had 2 Jason Jessee boards in use the whole time and each exhibits a similar quality. Period. I'm going to go skate somethign...

footage of Josh Viles... worth watching all the way through.

2011-01-15T12:06:00.001-08:00

JV no longer stands for Junior Varsity. Welcome to the elite team, Josh... You are a winner now.

dan drehobl, a miniramp and a jersey barrier...

2011-01-15T07:58:00.001-08:00

sometimes I watch footage that just blows my mind. I'm serious. Stuff like what Real is up to... serious rail-gap, tech-gnar amazement... progression that is just astounding, these guys nowadays... you can see what I came up looking to (hensley, knox, dressen) and imagine how blown my mind gets seeing this stuff...

when I watch Dan Drehobl, pretty much no matter what no matter where, I see this depth of committment to this essential style... balance, simplicity... and it blows my mind. Guy's not young. Guy's not flipping huge gaps, but I'm blown away, AND I want to go spend a whole day on a jersey barrier, like when I was a kid...

So as soon as it warms up, I'm heading out to get some stuff finished in concrete. Who's gonna help out!

We Push. We Go!