Tony Hawk appears on “Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?” tonight at 8pm (7 central). You can watch a few clips on the official Fox web site. Must be a celebrity edition for charity. Tony might be fond of game shows with question marks, as he was also on “Who wants to be a millionaire?” Is he smarter than a 5th grader? Who knows, but one thing is for certain, chances are he’s richer than your dad. Headlines like “Tony Hawk: The “Bird Man” with Hawk-like Vision” have got to make him cringe whether or not the web sites is “dedicated to redefining success.”

This one is electric powered instead of gas powered, and has more car club appeal. The Skate Scepter guy must be pissed, although I’m sure he’d win in a race. Check out the Electric Crusier. [Source: Gizmodo]

Does that background graphic look familiar? The article is an interview with a well-known fly-fishing personality. I wonder if he has a dark history – he does suggest he might have to kill the interviewer if forced to reveal his fishing plans. thisisfly.com is a web ‘zine targeted at dudes who like to get radical with a flyrod. I am told that the east coast saltwater scene is a more thrill oriented than the freshwater scene. I wonder if these guys are into the PBR rather than the single-malt scotch and briar pipes.

File under poor execution of a good idea. GameDaily has a gallery of images comparing real photos of pro skaters and their Tony Hawk video game series counterparts. Unfortunately only a few of the 11 sets manage to match the “pose.” Check out these photo mashups showing off Tony and the rest of the cast as they display some of their signature moves, in-game and in real life. Apparently Bam Margera’s real life signature move is to sit on his ass, while his video game signature is a benihana. The best matching sets are Tony Hawk and Ryan “Mr Awesomely Humble” Sheckler, as shown above. Only if you are bored. GameDaily is a super slow loader.

I got an email from CSS titled “Ryan Sheckler’s Must-Haves.” First I was grossed out, and then I got curious. Man they are really giving it the hard sell. Buy his crap and you can live just like him kids! Ryan Sheckler signature jeans? FREAKING AWESOME!

When I first got a copy of Wire’s Pink Flag album I was hypnotized. The music was unlike any of their punk contemporaries, but it still made perfect sense to a kid in the suburbs of Chicago in the mid-80’s. It was kind of like the missing link for me. Minimal, but incredibly rich at the same time. Catchy but abrupt and confrontational. Discovering music used to be a much more sensual experience. It required considerably more effort than it does today. After buying a record I would usually pour over every minute detail of the artwork while listening to the turntable. It was an experience that deserved my full attention. When you were in a cultural desert like the suburban Midwest was, you savored every morsel you got. The back cover of Pink Flag has fake biological data about the band, and one of the things I couldn’t get past was the drummer’s name, Robert Gotobed. Everyone else had regular enough sounding names, so was Gotobed a goof or what? Anyway, it fascinated me. I desperately wanted to meet him – remember, cultural desert… Others have waxed on about Wire much more articulately than I am apparently capable of,…

UPDATE: We’re back!!!!! Don’t pay any attention to the words below. We are experiencing technical difficulties with our web server/hosting company. Bear with us please. You won’t be able to read posts that have a “There’s more” link, you won’t be able to comment or look at earlier posts that aren’t on the front page, which makes this site 80% useless, just like a tech support line in India. This is a photo of Mark Conahan bailing over Kuna Idaho last year.

I had meant to include this in the Disciplinary Architecture post but it got a way from me. Sit-Stopping devices existed long before the idea of skate stopping anything was ever considered. (Those sitters are intimidating and cause property damage. Plus, they could sue me!) Skateboarders should band together with our wide-bottomed brothers and sisters to effect social change. The lazy and the active should unite as one! Transfer has a massive photo collection of anti-sit devices. Some of the devices are likely meant to prevent skating as well, but most are clearly aimed at your ass. I’ve seen these things before and not given them much thought, aside from “Why doesn’t the man want anyone sitting here?” As long as we are forming a union here, let’s reach out to our prone brothers who just want to pass out on a park bench. Somewhere out there somebody has probably compiled a gallery of anti-sleeping modifications on public benches. You’ve seen them before, the large bumps that prevent a person from laying down across a bench. I propose we name the group Construction of Anti-devices Needs Toppling – or C.A.N.T.. While I start making the “U.S. Architectural Discipline off our…

If you have an extra $1500 laying around, (and who doesn’t?) you can pick up Skateboard Joe for your kids to hang their clothes on. Seriously. That’s what it’s for, and that’s what it costs. Available from Boot Kidz. You can see it larger after the jump.

Aside from teaching you how to apply grip tape or remove your skateboard trucks, About.com has a whole section on home schooling. One of the units they offer has a skateboarding theme. There are word searches, crossword puzzles and multiple choice questions all based on the same 20 words. It’s a bit monotonous, but that’s your word of the day kids! Also, they make you jump through extra hoops to actually get to the pages where you can see them larger, so I’ve provided direct links, and of course the usual assorted flippant remarks. Children are our future, the little bastards.