Today is free comic book day at participating comic shops. Runner Runner from Tugboat Press is one of titles you could pick up.

Portland’s DOS bowl has openings, and is in fact in need of some new blood, even as the weather turns dryer here. Your membership gives you entrance from 6am until 3am every day. That’s 21 hours of skating a day, rain or shine. That’s Larry Martin enjoying said access. Larry gives free sweeper lessons weekly. The photo is presented here with the kind permission of The Skateboard Archives, without knowing it. Hey Michael, is it OK if I post this?

I think these books are supposed to teach traffic safety, but in fact they inspire kids to pretend to run into the obstacles. In this case, a skateboarding elephant. Then there’s the gratuitous electronic noise designed to stimulate young minds and make parents want to jam a screwdriver into the speaker. (Thanks for that helpful advice Shawn F. ) Now that these pictures are taken I can finally make a run to Good Will after 5 years of sitting on this thing. Yes, this post title is my attempt to help David Bowie free associate some new lyrics.

Rolled out to Bob’s place for the first real warm day of the year. Mark Frady with a floater over the hump and Jon Horne with a Potty Plant & Miller flip. Stay tuned, more to come from Charleston. Steve

Marty McFly’s hoverboard props and replicas have been sold a dozen times over. I’ve seen Biff’s Pit Bull once before, but in an unfinished stage. This is the first time I’ve seen a finished model for sale. The LA Times reported that was going for 13k back in February, but it must not have sold. Right now it’s listed with a Buy it Now of a cool 10 grand. Nucking Futs!

Two instances of world class athletes using skateboards for cross training purposes. First up is 10k Olympic gold medalist Mo Farah allegedly building balance on a skateboard, though admittedly just an experiment, and more likely just a photo op for the The Oregonian. On the right, Daniel Woods “prepares” for the 2010 Bouldering World Cup at a skatepark. With the event just two days after the video footage was shot, he was probably just trying to relax, get his mind off the competition, and of course, not get hurt! Video footage of Daniel after the jump – Just a tiny bit of skating and a lot of bouldering, but it’s some amazing bouldering footage. – Thanks to Jim Lilly and Chris Yeager for the tips.

Recycled skateboards used to make a birdhouse. Add a truck and you’ve got a bird feeder. Skate and Aviary. Check out Skate:bîrd, by Florian Dohrmann. See also: Facebook. I like the bird house. Maybe I’ll make one this weekend. [Source: Skateboard Mag on Tumblr via Selekkt] – Thanks to Matthijs for the tip.

The Cheeky Weekly was sort o the English equivalent of the Weekly Reader found here in the U.S., although maybe less education oriented. It merged with another publication in 1980. There’s a blog devoted to documenting those old issues, which is where these 1977 skateboard pull-out issue images were found. They go into quite a bit of detail about everything they post. That Cheeky sure is a handsome fella. – Thanks to Boy from Skate Malasia for the tip.

May 4th, in Portland, at the Unheard Ramp, soon to be renamed the sweat box. It’s the Unheard Invitational. $2000 in prize money. Sponsored by a brewery? Yes, Hopworks. I (un)heard the HUB night raised about 3K in sales and donations for Powell Blvd. Skate Spot.

In this edition of Bootleg Boards we have a Denny Riordon bootleg. Kryptonics used this graphic in 1988 for Denny’s first street deck. Later that year, after Kryptonics reincarnated into Toxic, they released a seemingly identical shaped Rordion deck with a slightly different ‘people in my head’ design. In 1990 the head popped up a third time on a Toxic Riordon freestyle deck. Maybe whoever copied that deck thought it was a very popular design, although the ripoff we have here was clearly based on the first version of the graphic. Even the skull with the dagger on the top side reminds me of the Ripstik and mid to late eighties Kryptonics decks or maybe it’s because their boards looked kinda cheap as well. Sold on Ebay for $15 on a Buy It Now.