It's late, and I'm just typing....

[tabaqui]

I have watched, in the last couple of weeks, several different times (ESPN has been showing this, for some reason, nearly every day), a movie called 'Dogtown and Z-Boys'. It's a documentary about the Zephyr Skate team, a group of boys and one girl who were surfers-turned-skateboarders in 'Dog Town', California.

There's a lot of footage that was shot in the early seventies by other skaters, a lot of black and white images and man....

It's a really gorgeous film, really amazingly interesting and a little bitter-sweet.



This is a city that, at the time, at least, was a decaying, abandoned playground. The 'Coney Island' of the west coast that fell on hard times, and the surfers dodged collapsing boardwalks and fallen amusement park rides in search of the perfect wave.

The kids were from broken homes, poor homes, were 'troublemakers' in school, were 'thrown away' kids. They had a fierce sense of neighborhood and ownership. You did not surf if you did not belong, you did not skate if you were not part of the crowd. 'Like the mafia', 'like a street gant'. And - 'A z-boy was always with another z-boy'.

But the *images*.... The thin-muscled, beach-tan boys, with long hair and ripped jeans and Vans, curling into waves or over their own knees, hitting water and pavement with equal grace and fearlessness, 'skateboarding as stream of consciousness'.... And the lone girl who skated 'better than some of the boys' at a time when girls weren't *supposed* to be better....

Now i want fic, damnit. J2 Dogtown Z-boys, up at dawn to surf and sneaking into school playgrounds and backyards to skate empty pools all afternoon. With images like this, who could blame me?




In news that sucks, Chango-the-cat got out of the house two days ago, and we still can't find him. Damnit. It's over 100 degrees out there, and we walked around the neighborhood today calling him, hoping he was just lost and hiding but.... I really, really want my cranky old man cat to just come home.

Comments

[blueswan]

I hope Chango finds his way home safely. It's such an awful feeling when a cat goes missing like that. *hugs*

I'm delighted at your skater post. It's one of my personal micro-fandoms. I won't go on at you about it, but the RPF factor is high in skateboarding, especially for those who like their OTPs to be friendship based. In the name of broadening your experience, I give you Rodney Mullen, the man to whom current street skateboarding owes pretty much everything. Here he is, circa 1988, free-styling and shirtless.

(Ask me about my icon, go on, I dare you.)

P.S. There is some skateboarding fic out there, though not a ton. You should totally write some. *nod nod*

[yourlibrarian]

Aw, sorry about the kitty, hope he turns up soon :(

I recall there was a J2 fic I read about how Jensen was a skateboarder? Maybe I'm confusing it with the long series where Jared's a tattoo artist and they end up with a semi-adopted teen. And I recall there was also a fic where one of them was a surfer, again Jensen I think and Jared may have been part of a group that came to stay at a beach house and that's how they met.

[de-nugis.livejournal.com]

I hope he comes home safe. A trick that some people say often works is scattering used kitty litter in the yard, if you have some you haven't changed. It's gross, but it's a strong territorial scent for them.

[baudown.livejournal.com]

It's a fantastic documentary. Don't know of any fic, but there's a fictional movie version called Lords of Dogtown. Not nearly as good as the documentary, but it does have the benefit of starring a young Heath Ledger.

[timeofchange.livejournal.com]

Wow, for some reason that photo hit me hard enough to get me tearing up.

I miss SoCal so much, but is it even there anymore? And, really, was it even there in the first place or is it a fantasy memory I've built up over the long years of miserable winters and standoffish Northeasterners and summers too hot and humid to even enjoy and so-called beaches that are nothing more than rocky strips of land on the edge of the Long Island Sound?

[roxymissrose.livejournal.com]

*HUGS*
I know how upsetting it is when a pet is lost. Hope everything will be okay.

This J2 idea sounds so perfect, it's crazy. I wish you would write it, it's just the kind of thing that you'd take and turn into an amazing, beautiful, break-my-heart-because-it's-so-damn-good kind of story.

[riani1.livejournal.com]

Silly old cranky cats.

[entrenous88.livejournal.com]

I hope kitty makes his way home okay! *hugs*

I loved that documentary when I saw it. Did you have a chance to check out the Heath Ledger film based (not sure how loosely) on that group? I haven't seen it myself but I wondered how it had turned out.

[mustangsally78.livejournal.com]

Hope he comes home. I used to have a cat who would hide about 5 feet away from the house and we'd NEVER find her until she was good and ready. Let's hope he's just having adventures.

Fingers and paws are crossed.

[lunabee34.livejournal.com]

I hope the cat comes home soon!

[mclittlebitch.livejournal.com]

Hi, um, total random, but if you want more Z Boys stuff there's a TV documentary from 1978 about skateboarding/skate culture that features some of them (and a hilarious narration that makes them sound like lions on the Serengeti or something) here: http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL877D1658EC7C75BE

[katbcoll.livejournal.com]

I hope he comes home soon! *hugs*

[lostakasha.livejournal.com]

Now that I'm in Cali, anything J2 in Cali makes my mouth water!

Sending lots of 'get back home' vibes to Chango, sweetie.