My web host (IXWebhosting) sucks the big one. I’ve had repeated problems and headaches using them over the past couple of years. Yesterday we were down for about 16 hours before we got back online, and I had to spend almost four hours on the phone getting it fixed. Now that we are back online everything is glacially slow. IXWebhosting is preparing for a move at the end of the month and they are experiencing some major technical difficulties that they won’t come clean about. Expect the site to be spotty and unresponsive until I get switched over to a new host, hopefully by the end of the week. I apologize for the suckitude.

Look out for this amazing entry into the heated surfing simulation battle from On Shore Boards. No seriously. I mean look out for it, because if one of these things catches you in the ankle, your walking days are over. These guys are so into simulating surfing, they made a guy ride a board into a water puddle. Now you and I both know that a company with such amazing technology is going to stick around for the long haul. They obviously have a lot of business savvy since somehow managed to squeeze three patents out of combined pre-existing technologies. Just in case they aren’t around in a year or two, I’ve got some highlights for the archives.

No that’s not a still from the first Bones brigade video, it’s 20 years later and Lance is hitting that spot for Elwood clothing’s 1st and Hope video, which came out some time last year I believe. Has anyone seen this? It looked like a good concept for a video, instead of the usual scattergun barrage of tricks planned and practiced and over and over to make it for the video (shot on 16mm film), it features a group of friends skating together in various spots, meeting people along the way. There are a few old distinguished names in there like Eric Dressen, Lance Mountain, Matt Hensley, Ray Barbee and Salman Agah. EXPN has a nice write up with more background and some production stills. So yeah, this is old news by a year. The second hope is Athletes for Hope, which is an organization of some of the more famous names in sports whose purpose is to “educate, encourage and assist athletes in their efforts to contribute to community and charitable causes, to increase public awareness of those efforts, and to inspire others to do the same.” Basically, it’s a bunch of famous athletes trying to get other professional…

People are always hitting me up for my sticker collection, which isn’t for sale. Some people have actually gotten bent out of shape about the sticker gallery, saying that it makes it easy for people to flood the eBay market with counterfeit stickers. I have no empathy for that, stickers are just little pieces of colored vinyl. They don’t need to be kept behind glass in a museum – No photos please! Every once and a while I get some scans of stickers via email to add to the gallery. A few kind souls have even mailed me the actual stickers. (I swear I’ll get them posted!) Sometimes people just want to trade, like Flickr user theoneholyghost, who has an extensive collection of doubles that ranges from 80’s to the 90’s. He’s got 50 photos with at at least 10 stickers to a photo, and these are the doubles in his collection! Then there’s Mobb Skates. You may have seen their logo, which looks like but is unaffiliated with the old Christian Hosoi line. I just got an unsolicited envelope full of stickers from Mobb and no explanation. I guess they are trying to save me.

You’re the one for me, fatty? The Baltimore Sun reports that Extreme™ kids are less likely to be lard asses, in so many words. Actually, the article titled Ramped-up exercise states a Hopkins study finds that kids who skateboard or rollerblade stay fit longer than those who play organized sports. You don’t see too many gargantuan pro skaters, whereas in football and even baseball it’s not uncommon to see massive guts. Actually, there are some large beer guts in our crew, but we’re not pros. The study also says you need to engage the the activities at least four times a week, which explains it more. Further empirical evidence is provided in these screen captures from a Rob & Big episode where Rob puts on a fat suit. – Thanks to Stephanie Murdock for the tip.

When is an action figure not an action figure? When it’s life size, because then it’s a mannequin, or some sort of sex toy. Chalk this up to things I don’t understand, like sneaker fetishes. Coarse Toys makes some action figures, or collection figures? I don’t know what you are supposed to call them. Some of them are small (bottom row) but as you can see, some of them are life size. Creepy. See those shoes? Coarse “collaborates” with Vans. I’m not sure what that means, but I’m sure it involves some check writing. Check out Coarse Toys. – Thanks to Bobcat for the tip.