I am predisposed to not like Jamie Thomas, I’ve heard rumors about some unethical practices, and I don’t appreciate the fact that had a big marketing campaign and skate video with the same name as my skateboard company. So, I am definitely biased. What about you?

From ESPN:

New Balance is the latest mainstream brand to throw its hat into the skateboard footwear market.

Based out of Boston, Mass., New Balance is strongly positioned in running and other traditional categories, but has not succeeded in their previous attempts to enter the skate market with the hi-top V74 and the V45 low-top sneaker, released in 2010. Their new entry into skateboarding is called New Balance Numeric or NB#.

New Balance, looking for a strong skate company to help ease their way into the market, will be manufactured and distributed by Black Box distribution of Carlsbad, Calif. Owned by professional skateboarder Jamie Thomas, Black Box currently distributes board brands Zero, Slave and Mystery, along with Insight Apparel and Fallen Footwear

I swear I recently saw an episode of SNL or Portlandia where they equated New Balance shows with senior citizens. When I think of New Balance I think of nylon running shoes. Way to jump on the bandwagon at the very last possible moment.

Another skateboard stairs concept reaches reality. Though featured on Recyclart, those are clearly all new skateboards, and kind of crappy modern Kryptonics if I’m not mistaken. The metal supports are a custom fabrication.

See skateboard stairs: Part 1 – Part 2

Addendum: I was looking at the Kryptonics web site, and they have a little page bragging about being around the original Burnside skatepark! There are some weird illustration/caption combos in their timeline.

Indoors, a video from Elias Parise covers some of Portland’s indoor spots, well known and otherwise. 155 days of rain a year? Who knew?

Brooklyn Street Skate Spot – Benefit / Contest / BBQ / Meeting of the minds…. on Saturday December 15th. Hope the weather holds out. Sponsored by no less than three local PDX skate shops Cal Skate, Shrunken Head, and Rip City. Maybe there will be a wrestling match in the cage at the top of the stairs too.

EVENT POSTPONED

Got 15 minutes to kill? You could do worse. Maui babe is a pretty mellow video that has high tides of intensity, some good music, vert, street, ditches, pools and skateparks. What else could you ask for? And it’s from Thrasher.

Zhu Zhu pets were all the rage with the toddler crowd about two years ago, then they kind of jumped the shark and sputtered. They even tried to branch out with some ninja appeal but it didn’t seem to work because they were soon relegated to bargain bins. I caught a few minutes of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and was surprised that there was actually a Zhu Zhu Pets float. It reminded me that I had some skateboard-related Zhu Zhu pets in the hopper.

This bottle of Dylan Rieder/Thunder Trucks wine is part of an auction to benefit skater Billy Moyle who was recently paralyzed from the waste down. Actually, they’re still figuring out how to do it since eBay doesn’t allow alcohol sales. If you’re not into wine the other items range from Jason Adams art prints and Spitfire Wheels ninja stars. Say hello to Fargo.

Good ole William Spencer. I thought he was trying to be a stuntman in Hollywood. Maybe he still is, but he hasn’t been letting his skateboarding skills suffer. Then again, maybe this is a really old video of him skating at the Berrics. I don’t follow mainstream skate media (just mainstream media about skateboarding). I met Steve Berra once a few years ago when he was here in Portland. We talked about the big vert ramp demo that Zeltzer Seltzer and Island Water Sports put on under the shadow of the St Louis Arch circa ’87 or so. He was amiable. Back to Spencer though, that kid is fun as hell to watch, gimmicks included. I suppose he’s a young man now and not a kid though. Bah! You’re all pesky kids to me now. Watching this video though, makes me feel like a kid. Interestingly, it was uploaded by Richie Jackson, another maverick of modern skating.

– Thanks to Zane for the tip.