February was an interesting month, and not just because of the decks that went off. Don’t get me wrong; there were some great decks going off, but none for the crazy prices that we saw in January. No, February was more a return to normalcy. However, there were some interesting doings outside of eBay. First I got asked to write an article for the Canadian skateboard magazine SBC Skateboard. It’s a short piece specifically for folks who don’t know anything about skateboard collecting, so my loyal readership here probably won’t get anything out of it, but I enjoyed writing it. It was tough keeping it to 700 words though! Just as a reference point, this column is running to over 6000 words these days! I also got asked to write a piece for a Portuguese/English online magazine, and I’m doing that one as we speak. We’re also planning on putting together an eBayWatch Facebook page, so look for that and become a fan if you would! T-shirts and stickers are also in the works, so watch this space. Finally I’d like to thank Nick for his box of goodies. It’s much appreciated, thanks!

Long story short. Penny Skateboards in Australia is making injection molded plastic skateboards with wheels that use modern bearings and mounting hardware. It’s retro in more ways than one because they come in all kinds of 2000 era iMac colors. The video spot for these boards is really well done. The whole execution of this idea is excellent, and near perfect. The one flaw? The wheels on the yellow board should be red. Every single banana board that was actually banana-colored had red wheels. One more cool thing, these boards are actually manufactured in Australia. As cool as those Creature coffin boards are, I like these better. I wish the web site had detailed images, I’d like to get a look at those trucks. So far skate shops only, Penny isn’t selling direct. Catch the vid after the jump. [Source: DudeCraft] – Thanks to Concretin Nik for the tip.

Adventure Time may be the best animated show on television, although It’s tough to top the Venture Brothers. I’m still waiting for skateboarding to show up in the Venture Brothers, somehow I thought it happen there first, maybe Dean trying to impress Triana Orpheus, or Dr Venture getting hassled by teenagers on the street… Meanwhile, Adventure Time snuck in some skateboarding. The kingdom of Ooo may be magical, but it’s not a free or all. It’s fairly flushed out, there is some crossover with the real universes, but then again Finn is the only human alive, and skateboarding has always been the domain of homo sapiens. I want to see skateboarding in my favorite shows (is that wrong?) but I don’t want it to be awkward. What the math indeed. Spoiler alert, don’t watch this clip if you haven’t seen the Mystery Train episode because it will give away the ending.

Another gem from Punkerbean featuring more than one cool spot. Enjoy. – Thanks to Franks (Shaw?) for the tip.

Danimal turned up this 6th grade math textbook during his travails in the education world. I can imagine the publisher and editor brainstorming for the cover. It’s not that hard actually, i used to work for a college textbook publisher. “How do we get the kids excited about math? Put a skateboarder on it!” Sure, just don’t make it a discipline that most kids think is for weird old dudes. Junior high school, where the sine wave of boredom intersects with the bezier curve of apathy. Enlargement after the jump. Let’s figure out who this guy is. Official NoPrize to the first person names the title reference.

This segment from fuel TV is kindof old actually, but still amusing. Sometimes I don’t post things like this because I see them as a a reminder of my failure to produce more original content on SNA. As soon as I win that lottery I’ll make up for it. – Thanks to Sarib Khalsa for the tip.

At long last we’re finally shipping some substandard manufactured goods to China instead of receiving them. The Fanling Vert Ramp in Hong Kong being perpetrated by American Ramp Company. It’s prefab concrete, which I gotta say kind of makes sense to me. I mean, if you’re going to build a concrete vert ramp, prefab might be the way to go since uniformity is more desirable than creative artistry, assuming they have the skills to set it up right. Look at the size of those vert panels. This thing looks like a beast, although at that height it’s going to seem narrow. – Thanks to Chad Balcom for the tip.