PR Inside reports: Hip-hop producer PHARRELL WILLIAMS has hit back at his critics in the skateboarding world, accusing them of being ungrateful for the publicity he has given the extreme sport.

Here in the Pacific Northwest we have a chain called Fred Meyer. It’s a combined supermarket and department store: food, clothes, plants, hardware, electronics, film processing, pharmacy and sporting goods. I had a good laugh in the sporting goods section one morning. Did you know Flowboards were being sold under the Kryptonics label? Get yours for $60. $19.99 completes! I actually picked up a couple of those plastic helmet mohawks because they once came to me in a vision.

That’s no typo in the the title, it’s editorial commentary. The April 20th issue of Entertainment Weekly has a “Style” page with this breaking news: “The latest hip-hop style trend? Skateboard Chic.” Apparently, the style is called Skurban. The layout features a couple DGK decks in the layout, and assorted trite skateboard culture observations. If you can stomach it, you can see and read it all after the jump.

In spite of the fact that it was pissing down with rain in Portland Saturday morning; MC, Rich Burton and Shawn Reinert hit the road for the Irrigon Skatepark Grand Opening. Smay was right behind us with Lance Leisher and Brogan Robinson and Chris Stevens. The new Grindline creation was packed, 200 people or more watching and skating. The park was as unique as we had hoped but just crazy crowded. The grass hasn’t grown back yet so the crowd tracked a lot of sand into the park and everything was smaller and tighter than I expected but it’s a really fun skatepark.

Yup, we’ve reached a milestone here at eBay Watch! This is #50. Pretty incredible really. I started doing them because I was collecting and was interested in the (relatively) new eBay phenomenon. I did the first one in September 2001. Back then there was still a number of online stores offering vintage decks for sale at pretty normal prices. Oldschoolskates.com used to have Jessee Sungods, Ben Schroeder Big Ben models, McGill skull and snakes, and Cab dragon and bats, all for around $75. Skatepool used to have a Salba witchdoctor and plenty of Salba tigers for under $100. Kilwag guest writes the Weird Stuff category this month. Check it out.

What, no Don’t shred home without it? Err, yeah. Here’s an American Express commercial featuring Shaun White, who needs his credit card to allow him to fly from California to Utah, Canada, Japan and Norway at the drop of a hat. I thought that was what his sponsors were for? Apparently, American Express is trying to tap the demographic for spoiled rich teenagers. Is it just me, or is post-puberty Shaun White starting to look like Howard Stern with red hair? Oh yeah, the gimmick in this commercial is the old skateboarding used as transportation indoors – look at me, I’m radical! Extra points (and $, I’m sure) to Shaun for managing to get a Volcom shirt in the shot as well. Check out the commercial after the jump.

Some enginerds have built a low cost version of an existing skateboard/snowmobile hybrid. It’s basically a skateboard with two tank treads replacing the truck assembly. Even though they might have even used drills to power it, it’s still a step above this, but lowering the cost also lowers the perofmance, as the Sno Deck seems to have a top speed of 2 MPH. It’s no Scarpar, that’s for sure. The best part of the video is when the Beastie Boys cut into the super lame OPM Heaven is a halfpipe song. (Q: Sugar Ray wannabes, how lame is that? A: Very!) Then the action kicks into… well, low gear. These guys can barely stand up on damn thing! Also, look for their semi-embarassed “Engineering”battle cry. Catch the vid after the jump.

Tim Kulas is a man of few words. At least on the Interweb™ he is. He built a large wooden bowl (I’m sure he had help) in the back yard of a house he was renting in Orlando Florida, completely out of scrap wood. Renting, you say? Sure, why not. It’s the old fish pond argument we’ve seen before. A landlord would have to be very hands-off, absentee, or just plain naive to fall for that one. The bowl even has had some cement coping custom fitted (see pic above) and poured in long sections. Then there’s the save a tree ride. That’s Tim saving a tree in the shot above, left. There are a bunch of pictures and videos on the Bowl Surgeon blog. The only words you’ll find are the post titles, which are always to the point, as in “More Skateboarding in yard.” or “clicky dippy hippy fo viddy…” Don’t go looking for this spot because it’s already been torn down. Tim is moving to other parts of Florida and has already started documenting the next project. The tag line at the bottom of the page says it all: “Thanks for checkin’ it, now go find a…