Reader MC pointed out that there was a Gratuitous Tony Hawk Appearance (aren’t they all?) in my post on Flyaway Helmets and concussions. It’s buried at the end and not really that visible, so I separated it. The article is from the October 05 issue of Thrasher covering the Skaters for Public Skateparks convention in Hailey Idaho, where Tony made a surprise appearance in connection with his foundation.

Not that kind of concussion. Yeah, you aren’t cool if you wear a helmet. If you have to wear one, you want to try to look cool right? There are a couple ways to approach this, but before I get sidetracked. This post was supposed to be about yesterday when I watched my friend Steve take a hard slam that rung his bell but good. In the middle of an otherwise ordinary session he bailed in a medium sized bowl and did the classic “land back on your board to Wilson” which resulted in his head slamming back into the bottom of the concrete transition. I could tell by the way he hit that his helmet wasn’t going to help much. Keep reading to find out how to look cool in a helmet and how to get a concussion while wearing one.

There’s a kick ass web site called spamusement.com whose description is “Poorly-drawn cartoons inspired by actual spam subject lines!” Tony Hawk just happens to appear as a reference in one of the cartoons. At this point he has entered the collective subconscious of the non-skating public and has become a pop culture reference. This cartoon isn’t one of the best or worst from that site. There are some that are laugh-out-loud funny. I highly recommend it. This one is currently 164 out of 323 which would date it at approximately 2005 according to the copyrights on the web site.

Kicking off the inaugural post of Gratuitous Tony Hawk Appearances is Deck Dogz, an Australian movie out on DVD. Here’s Tony greeting the protagonists towards the end of the flick.