Hectic in Seattle sent in some pictures that have nothing to do with each other, well at least two of them do. He thanked me for my time and consideration. I am thanking him for the pictures.

Clockwise: John “Grizz” Vallio at the cancer bowl in the Hills circa 1997. Danny Roland at the Tidy Bowl in Hell Paso, Texas. Dave Tobin at Tedders. Clay at his own house. You can see them enlarged after the jump.

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Gleaned this from a commenter (Curb Cobain, You’re killing me! Ha! Good one!) Check it out at Ghettopool Ripper, a new blog that just started, based out of Germany. (?)

When he’s not busy dethroning Enemy Combatant (who dethroned Neil) as most hated commenter (Actually, EC must have graduated from charm school lately.) Colin Walsh (He rules, you know!) is sending me pics of this mystery hole in Oregon and trying to get me to plug the Benton County Skateboarding Alliance, Inc. who are “trying to get $$$$$$$ for a better park in the cor.” Enlargements after the jump.

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Dave Tobin sent me a picture to tie in with the Israeli energy bar commercial that has skateboarding in it. It’s some very skateable architecture by David Resnick designed as a memorial for John F. Kennedy outside of Jerusalem, Israel. I had a hard time finding pictures of the “Jerusalem Kennedy Memorial” online, but if you type in “Yad Kennedy” you get better results. Must be hebrew. Still, there’s not a whole lot of information available on this site. The monument was built in 1966 with funds donated by Jewish communities in the USA. Would this be called street skating even though it has tranny?

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Ryan Hass hipped us to these shots, dude. They were taken in Rio at a pedestrian underpass south of the Flamingo Park. You can see full frame enalarged versions at Ramp Locals Only. Brasil - Brazil… Next thing you know we’ll have to start calling it Myanmar instead of Burma. I mean, George W doesn’t bother, why should we? (Warning! You have just experienced sarcasm.)

Our friend Tom Miller writes:

Just back from a work trip to Curitiba, Brasil. Conahan asked to shoot photos of anything interesting skate-related. Just when I was thinking I wasn’t going to see anything of note, we arrived at the Oscar Niemeyer Museum. The museum structure is novel, but skaters are going to be more interested in the walkway.

I couldn’t help but think if you call it “art” the dollars come running at you. If you call it “50 feet of mini ramp at Ed Benedict Park” suddenly the budget doesn’t allow for it until the mythological “phase 2.” We don’t need any more skateparks. We need public art that coincidentally accommodates skateboarding.

Nuff said.

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Jason Corley sent in a couple shots of Santa Ana California spots circa 1984:

I was just cruising around the site and thought you might appreciate a photo of what was probably the best natural ditch in Orange County back in the day. This is/was Flower Street. Located at the end of Flower Street in Santa Ana, CA. I took this one morning back in 1985. This is what the main section of this amazing ditch looked like. Thing was that it split into a “Y” at one end and further down the ditch maybe 60 yards was a smaller height transition with a long roll in, about 8 feet of flat ground that when coming down the roll in you could carve the smaller bank and then have access to a natural extension that just reached vert. I feel so lucky to have been able to slate this gem from 1983 to around 1987. Santa Ana also was home to the killer Lloyd’s Bank about 1/2 mile away. I also attached a shot of Lloyd’s Bank, the front portion. Not my best trick but I was 13 years old…

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The Royal Hawaiian Pool Service has a page documenting the Poi Bowl that is right up our obsessive compulsive alley. It’s a famous pool that aside from being skated, also had the honor of appearing in several episodes of Hawaii Five-O. RHPS has some pics from magazine appearances, a skateboard graphic tribute, and a little video footage from TV as well.

Late tuesday night I got a call from Chris Stevens, whom I never hang out with and have never given my phone number. Turns out he was bombing a parking garage with some of the Eastside Longboards crew. Our (Eastide) paths almost never cross, except when I’m covering the odd slalom event, which as happened exactly once. Anyway, back at the parking garage, Chris basically met Aaron in the elevator on the way up to bomb the parking garage. Somehow my name got mentioned. On the way down there was a tussle that lead to Aaron colliding with a parked car at speed and blacking out for something like 20 minutes. Maybe there were convulsions? I can’t remember. Chris Stevens’ almost immediate 911 call got the ambulance there quickly and the paramedics left with him. Aaron was only on a first name basis with the guys he was skating with, and nobody had his phone number or knew where he lived. Chris somehow remembered my last name and called 411 to get my number so I could notify his wife, who was very, very grateful to Chris for calling the ambulance and calling me so I could let her know. Who knows how long it would have taken for her to find out otherwise. Aaron had his helmet but was without ID, and was not coherent when he left. Because of Chris’s quick thinking, Aaron’s wife Virginia was able to arrive the hospital as he was being checked in.

[Photo: Unrelated shot of Chris Stevens from Eastside Longboards]

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Through a random act of Google, while searching the web for pictures of David Lee Roth on a skateboard (no joke!) a stumbled on Mohammad Burney’s travel pictures. Man this guy travels a lot. Japan, Greece, Saudi Arabia, Kenya, Morocco, Malaysia, New York, Kuwait, Egypt, England and India, which is where the bowl above resides. One of the three pictures (1, 2, 3) Shows that it is some sort of astronomical observational tool. Check out that coping. If you decide to ride this bowl and are take a chance on getting stoned to death by an angry mob, at least use copers. I’m not sure how Google pulled up this page in my search for “David Lee Roth” and “skateboard,” but it did. There’s a way to view it with comments enabled, and he’s essentially got reams and reams of comment spam. Maybe that’s where it came from.