It’s crap like this that leads to skateparks getting closed down, insurance rates rising, etc. Morons! Take responsibility for your own actions. Apparently these two geniuses have never seen or heard of an overhead electric powered trolley car, train, or bus, or even bumper cars at the fair because they climbed up onto a train and got too close to the wire, then suffered electrical burns. Then they sued because they thought someone should have held their hand and told them not to. I don’t know who is more retarded, them or the jury that awarded the verdict. My appologies to retards for even placing you in the same category as these half wits. Klein and Birdwell… …They were skateboarding when they decided they wanted to see the view from the top of the boxcar, according to their lawsuit. Klein was shocked by the catenary wire, which hung 6 feet above the car… …Birdwell was burned while he tried to help his friend. Read all about it on Delaware Online, and the Eagle World News.

Due to feedback on the column, this month I’m starting a “weird” auctions section, that features some of the more unusual items from the skateboards section of eBay. As always, this stuff is totally random; whatever catches my eye. I may miss some stuff that goes off, but hey, that’s life. If you guys see something good I missed, send it in! And as always, thanks for all of the comments, keep them coming. Now, on to eBay Watch for October 2006.

And a whole lot of corn syrup! Now that I have a kid I have to start paying attention to these so-called fruit snacks, which are usually nothing more than a nominal amount of fruit inside a wad of something slightly less soluble than horse hooves. Mr Jelly Belly Fruit Snacks! Check out the packaging and pointless comments after the jump.

If you’ve ever owned or frequented a backyard ramp you’ve probably seen the attempts to ride the neighborhood gas powered scooter or small cc dirt bike on a half pipe before. It usually ends in a lot of pain or hole in the ramp. Somewhere there’s a guy in a cube getting paid to send emails to sites like this one in hopes of instigating a buzz about a product. It’s called viral marketing and it’s either ingenious or insidious, depending on how you look at it. In any case, it’s kind of fun to imagine the possibility that there are guys out there somewhere taking Extreme!™ to the next level by freestyle car driving on half pipes. Who knows, maybe some day someone will do something like this on a really basic level. Most of the videos are really well done. The screen captures are difficult cause the car is only is barely ever in frame with the ramp, which is why it sometimes works. When it doesn’t work it looks like crap. The official site is still being coy about what they are really advertising. Captain Obvious says it’s an upcoming video game. You guys owe me a…

Motorola is the latest consumer electronics company to use skateboarding to help market it’s products. In this case, a cell phone. I’m not sure which object in the picture they are trying to fetish-ize. Poached from Engadget who poached it from Phonearena.com. Not quite as impressive as a 24K Gold TV huh?

God Skates! Not to be confused with the seminal skate rock band McWilson’s tune of the same name. Skate churches are nothing new. Here’s a roundup of Christians and skatebording in the news.

Skateboard Champions. Flying is in style. Fun Colors and designs that let your kids show off their own personal look (as long as someone else has already pre-manufactured it.) That kid looks like a sassy Ryan Sheckler, and the little girl holding the skateboard has a head start on a beer gut.

The October 13, 2006 Seattle Post Intelligencer reports in an article titled “Artists bring a fresh expression to skateboarding in ‘Pushin’ 5′ exhibit”: There was a time when Charles Peterson wasn’t afraid to send himself sailing down the sidewalk, four small wheels and a wooden plank beneath his feet… But these days, at 42, the renowned Seattle photographer no longer slips the skateboard beneath his feet. After all, the body doesn’t bounce like it used to. And when bones break, it means something — especially for a man who relies on unscathed arms and wrists and hands and fingers to go about making his art… “Practicing yoga is more my speed these days,” he said.

In the immortal words of Squirrel Bait, I don’t need no pig stomping on my buzz.

Libraries sure aren’t what they used to be. Nowadays you can go tot the internet and look at questionable materials on the interwebs. In my day you had to check out the old issues of National Geographic featuring savages, but I digress. The