Home foreclosures and mortgage woes mean lots of empty pools in some parts of the country, and it even affects people with built-for-skate facilities like the Barrio Bowl in Las Vegas, reportedly selling for 32k to appease the bank. This picture comes from Picasa user Eric, and minimal details are available on Concrete Disciples. – Thanks to unlikely CD troller MC for the tip.

January was a fun month overall. Normally we get the post Xmas letdown in January because everybody is all spent up, but not this year. We got plenty of high priced decks in every category with a number of decks going for over $2000. Alva decks of every description were going super high, and we had a couple of classic Chinese rip-off graphics. Plus a great selection of bargain decks too. Editor’s Note: This marks the first appearance of eBay Watch on the new back end for the Features section. It’s a work in progress and a bit buggy but I decided to push forward regardless. Right now you won’t see the comments in the “Recent Comments” on the sidebar. It’s segregated right now, but it will come together soon. Same thing goes for the search function, segregated for now, but when the whole site gets integrated… I’ll have to actually make features again.

Check out this photo of Powell Peralta rider Aldrin Garcia setting a new high ollie record of 45 inches on Tuesday. He almost looks like he’s doing a lien air off an invisible jump ramp, but as you can see in the video, it’s his tail tweaking out. Amazing stuff. UPDATED: Indeed a superior camera vantage point, notwithstanding the seven second PG-13 intro thanks to, uh, Barf.

I’m swapping out hard drives and cleaning out an email attachments from a program I haven’t used in two years. (Eudora is dead! Long Live Eudora!) and I found these blurry cell phone snaps of some skateboard valentines from 2009.

Just checking in with kids. Over the course of 2-3 years these guys have progressed out of their pre-pubescent kick flips into some really mature skaters. Full of pubecences. It is easy to make a good video with good subjects. Enjoy GVK Out. This has nothing to do with the image above.

I was hanging out with Subsonic Scott, who is nice and all, but I wish I actually knew someone in the Subsonics. Scott had a brand new bucket of something from Franklin Adhesives called Multibond SK-8. From what he gathers, it’s just a relabeled version of one of their other adhesives. I guess they are selling enough of it to skateboard manufacturers that they renamed it in hopes of getting more of the market share.

Besides playing host to hoards of skate tourists from other parts of the country and world, Pacific Northwesters still find excuses to go on road trips to less fortunate places like… California! ( I kid, I kid….) Here’s a couple road trip videos from KC (found at EPM) and Frank Shaw. If I didn’t already know any better I would think that the “K” in K.C. stood for “Kilwag’s record collection.” KC reps for Scum but the also stopped by Billy Runaway’s headquarters, who happens to be an Addikt.

I don’t do many strictly music posts lately, but this one really appealed to my love of all things postmodern and post-punk. And of course, toys. It’s a recreation of Joy Division’s TV appearance on the BBC show Something Else. Compare it to the real thing after the jump – Thanks to SteveB for the tip. [Source: Kottle.org]

SE Portland has a new spot in the works called Commonwealth Skateboarding. Yes, it’s going to be pay-to-play, but it’s also indoors and concrete. I haven’t seen it in person but I hear it’s comparable in size to BSSS. Who is behind it? Check out Sherkowski Daily for the scoop or visit the Facebook page. Meanwhile, Grover gained entrance and shot some work in progress.