xcrament

the life and photos of a shitbag

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STPR Rally Weekend

11 June, 2009 (09:29) | STPR Rally Weekend | No comments

This event…
One of the oldest rally races on the schedule, Susquehannock Trail Performance Rally (commonly known as STPR) began in 1977. It is not only the oldest, but it is also the fastest rally in North America. With roads consisting of clay and gravel, the course is slippery, fast and extremely dangerous. Drivers travel at speeds reaching 100 MPH through densely wooded roads. The speeds combined with the dangerous course ensure that this rally is not for the feint at heart.

Takes place not too far from my place in the mountains of north central PA. The right thing to do is round up a bunch of dudes, tons of food, guns, and disappear into the middle of nowhere for a weekend.

The early risers get to see the cars lined up in starting order in downtown Wellsboro

Starting 1st and who everyone wants to see. Ken Block

and 2nd. motorcross and xxxtreme sport legend Travis Pastrana

Travis

Ken Block. (the man behind the wheel in the following vid)

 

Dave Mirra (i think he is only famous for hosting Real World/ Road Rules challenge?)

The race consists of 15 timed stages on friday and 15 stages on saturday. all cars must be street legal because they drive public roads to and from each stage. this is the start in downtown Wellsboro

No shame in his photo game…Metal J right up in it

On our way to spectator area but following a racer who clearly lost his bumper on friday.

For those that dont know the stages are timed and the drivers  have never seen or driven these roads before. Stages vary in lentgh but can be up to 15 miles of gravel mtn. roads and they rely on instructions from a co-driver who is relaying information off a map. Therefore roll-overs, wrecks, collisions with trees/rocks/etc are very common.

The first spectator area we made it to was on stage 4. This is video I took of Ken Block.

Travis Pastrana

not positive but i think this guy was smuggling horseshit under his stupid hat

waiting at stage 9…The Dudes (L to R):  Barold, Metal J, Bagger, Papa Bear, Shitbag, Chuckles. (the last of the crew not pictured was the photographer)

Stage 9 was a tight 180deg. turn. Take notes on the following of how to properly handle the situation

Ken Block (note his rear bumper is missing which was attached in the previous vid of stage 4)

Travis kills it

this pic was captured during the above video of travis by mike and his $900,000,000 camera he borrowed from his employer.  Def the sickest shot he got. (peep the glowing red hot brake rotors)

this guy has apparently spent some time bouncing off rocks and trees

VW love

competitors are allowed only 15min. before the last stage for repairs. ken’s crew awaits his arrival.

back to the homestead to shoot shit

“PULL”

Grillin, Beer, Marshmellows…Man type shit

7 dudes, racing, guns, steak = Meatfest 09′

Sunday a.m….more guns

sunnin’ them titties

digging a 12gauge slug out of some lumber

found

its obvious why ladies find him “dreamy”

i found my new hat at a gun store in the middle of nowhere and it was the best find of the weekend

shotguns use shells, this guy uses silver bullets. tap the rockies

over 400 empty shells is evidence of why it sounded like World War III at my place.

great weekend. hoping it all goes down again next year

 

48 hours in Cali

3 June, 2009 (10:13) | California | No comments

a quick but action packed jaunt to the left coast.

Runyon canyon hike with my Bro…and our ho’s (not pictured)

the way we came up

in our hike we saw 1000 dogs having the time of their lives

chopper

my grandfather had one of these. and i drove it in highschool. and if it looked like kim’s neighbors i would still have it

a huge Royal ad on La Brea ave

i should have gone inside to confirm that Kat Von Dude pisses standing up

 

Griffith Observatory. cool as hell

do to clouds the telescope was closed

Hollywood at night

 

Hollywood at night in an earthquake (not really)

meet Harry

and Theo

teaching them bad habits

me being on east coast time and used to my normal daily routine, i was up early and took the rascals for a walk. in 45 min we covered half a city block

back to bed

another reason for my visit was to spend some on my sleeve

freehand decapatated diver

very dead diver

and a free hand shark. cant wait for the color on this thing

La Jolla seals

 

whiskers

out of nowhere it was like the start of a race and they all just woke up and bolted for the water

 

if my hand looked like the one in this sign i would rather have it bitten off by a seal

stopped by Washington st. on the way to the airport

home. 48 hours in cali and im goin back soon. need to hang with my crew and get some color in my arm

Chicago. our weekend in the breezy city

15 May, 2009 (10:22) | Chicago | No comments

My photos are slacking. but i finally had a reason to take a few. and honestly a fair share of these pics were lifted from other sites because there was just so much going on that i didnt really feel like carrying a camera with. (which is a good thing because my phone ended up getting crushed anyways).

4:30 a.m. wake up call for the airport. Who is with me?

check this guy for a pulse

our reasons for travel usually revolve around skateboarding obviously so when i heard about the two day Burning Fight book release/90’s hardcore reunion show in chicago i didnt even have to ask brett, i just assumed he was in. brett and i have this habit of rubbing elbows with celebs at airports. seat 13D brett, 13E myself, 13F jimmy “superfly”snuka. is there a better way to start a weekend

(L to R): Noneck, Shitbag, Snuka, Kid Rad

my camera sucks, maybe i should carried it and had it crushed

where is the Married with Children fountain?

 

self portrait. sears tower. big deal

some guy named Picasso designed this.

and apparently skateboarding here is a Federal Offense therefore the person in this photo shall remain nameless. (photo boosted from: www.morewasteddays.blogspot.com)

wallride everything

Big Ben

“love and marriage, love and marriage”

i fucking owned this Bundy 12 stair hubba (proof: morewasteddays.blogspot.com)

we pushed what felt like 20 miles to find the famous Sea Wall

i purposely didnt put a new board together for this trip because i assumed mine was gonna end up in the drink…and it didnt. figures

…all band photos and videos were boosted from other people. this was our other reason for going. great line-up, great venue, great crowd.

Damnation ad.

RINGWORM

108

Underdog

this is the most talked about photo off the weekend as far as capturing the moment…xtrialx

UNBROKEN. this is my reason for going. this band hasnt played together in years. they just got back together for this book release and two other west coast book release shows. one of my all time fav’s who i only got to see once in the 90’s.

this park was a mere 5min train ride from the show. we hit it on sunday afternoon and it was standing room only. this was monday morning. much better

i got home late monday night after being gone 3 days. apparnetly the next best thing to sleeping with me is draggin out my dirty laundry and sleeping with that

 

kids are trying for another event like this next year. im there. i will get brett a ticket right away. tons of laughs with noneck as usual. if you slept on it, you fucked up. if you were supposed to go and then didnt. you really fucked up. we really wanted ray to come because he would got swine flu for sure.

 

 

Its March why was this not posted in December? Colorado revisited

5 March, 2009 (11:31) | Colorado | No comments

It was brought to my attention that I never finished the write-up of my trip to visit some old friends in Colorado. Good thing it still seems like it was yesterday

snowshoeing to the hot springs..im laced

nobody home

3 miles later

first to greet me was a rare wirehaired wieramer youngster named Chieftan

i got Chieftan a lil rowdy

always hydrating

 

 

this place was amazing

the next morning we rode backcountry at Loveland Pass. drive to the top. get dropped off, and then meet your ride at the bottom

 

 

too much rehydrating=lots of dehydrating…remeber that next time you tap the rockies

 

my proposed line in the gulley

sun tried to break through on jer’s strap in

bottom road is where peeps line up to catch a ride back to the summit. it is only a matter of minutes till a local goes by with a pick-up.

after riding loveland for 8 straight hours we headed back to Denver where it just happened to be 60 degrees so we headed to the free park downtown.

 

 

 

 

 

this place is huge, and fucking awesome. after 2 hours of that on top of 8 hours at loveland we were spent.

the next day we took a day off and drove to Rocky Mtn National park to find the haunted Stanley Hotel (where stephen king stayed and inspired “the Shining”, and  parts of Dumb and Dumber were filmed)

 

off to the park in search of animals

 

we managed to get really really close to these huge elk. this isnt zoomed. he wasnt as happy to see me as i was him

him and his pals split

 

on our last morning we got up early to go get a few more lines in at Loveland. temps were cold and that didnt include the wind chill.  mount up

 

 

 

cobra commander

Jeremy shot our hike/line from a parking lot

 

brett pics his photo angle and i pic drop off

stolen from http://morewasteddays.blogspot.com/

dropping

 

 

 

 

the locals would drop into the woods and let their dogs follow through the deep snow. it looked awesome. made me want to bring my boys out. it was this lil guys first time out.

 

i wasnt getting on a fucking plane till i saw another Bighorn Sheep

done

Colorado pre-season pre-game

19 December, 2008 (10:16) | Colorado | No comments

so i had some vacation time to burn and as usual Brett is down for anything at anytime so why not go visit some old dear friends that just happen to live in Denver. Snowboards and skateboards packed and we are off

on the road early

what a view of the back bowls

dudes

we pretty much at the place to ourselves

in the tress snow conditions were perfect. deep and untracked

again. i suck at action photography. my timing blows

clouds lifted towards the end of the day

VAIL

left Vail and headed straight to Steamboat on one of those roads where there is nothing for like 75 miles

full moon and snow made for a great ride

day 3…my new set up gives off this lightsaber like glow

where else would “mr. excitement” go

empty

Stolen from:  morewasteddays.blogspot.com

brett nearly found this creek the hard way

this line was steep. as you can see im sitting but basically standin…

 

steeps

all day long

i slalomed

our host

in order to get to the good stuff, every run began with a hike at steamboat.

the good stuff

boundries? for what

 leaving our mark

our hostess

our host Jeremy with a flawless “Stale”. probably gonna make the cover of Steamboats Brochure next year with this pic.

coming soon will be the rest of our trip…more snow, snowshoes, hotsprings, and big horn sheep. thats right, i said Big Horn Sheep

 

Too Fat To Fish

26 November, 2008 (10:14) | Artie Lange | 1 comment

Due to minor technical difficulties with my digi cam and a lack of anything truly interesting going on in my life, my site has been slacking. But with both those aspects being corrected its time for an update.  As many of you may or may not know I have been a more than loyal listener to the Howard Stern Show for over 20 years. Every morning getting every minute of it I. In recent years passed he added a new side kick named Artie Lange to replace Jackie the Jokeman.  It wasnt long before Artie became one of the best things that ever happened to the show. You know the old ” if there was one person in the world i could have dinner with…” Obama? nah… Abe Lincoln? nah…Jeff the Drunk?…maybe.  It would definitely be none other than the overweight heroin junkie, former cocaine addict, alcoholic with a terrible gambling habit and a love for prostitutes, Arthur Lange. He was signing copies of his new book “Too Fat To Fish”which is full of entertaining and hilarious stories of all his good qualities I mentioned above. Off to the Barnes and Noble on Rittenhouse Sq. in center city Philly. *****Disclaimer***** Clearly i had my camera set on: Take the Shittiest Picture Possible setting all night. forgive me

I work and Brett lives in South Philly. Fastest commute and best parking is guaranteed on two wheels

front row parking

i stopped in earlier and got bracelets so we wouldnt have to wait in line with the thousands. they were calling people by letter. 50 people for each letter.  lucky for me i was 5th in line for a bracelet earlier

the place was mobbed. brett and i were not together but close. we had a text conversation to try and figure out exactly how far apart we were. the guy behind me had a serious goatee. toatlly serious goat. dont just take my word for it

told ya

and then there was this guy..i got a pic but it was awful.

security was tight. including Howards head of security…Ronnie “the limo driver” Mund

Whack Packers in attendance: seated  Awesome Angelo (left) and High Pitch Eric (right)

My turn. A simple handshake and a comment on my Philly’s hat= Best 5 sec of my life.

I was probably 15th out of a thousand. it worked out well. didnt hardly have to wait

Brett was about 20 heads behind me

New Jerseys finest were out by the masses and done up like it was a New Years eve party. This is an actual conversation word for word that I heard while they reviewed pics next to me as i waited for Brett.

Awful Jersey Girl on the Right: “Did you hear him comment on my tits”

Her Friend who is equally a mess on the left: “Thats what we show cleavage for”

Back to the open road

New York Times Best seller. (not even joking)

and clearly another one in the works…

cant wait. hope he lives long enough to finish it

Dix Mtn. weekend

6 October, 2008 (21:41) | Adirondacks | 1 comment

I have only THREE friends who I would consider going on this trip with. And its the Three I have been doing it with for close to 10 years. We spent the last few days in the Adirondack Wilderness area near Lake Placid, New York. We are not strangers to the area and make a good attempt to visit annually if not more than that. It was the first time however for my youngest boy Harley and Brian’s boy Hawkeye. For me it made the trip that much better and though he could barely keep his head up after our days activities I am sure he enjoyed it. We arrived at the trail head Friday morning around 3 a.m. to a light rain. Using headlamps we hiked in a mile or so and set up camp. Bedding down around 4:30 it seemed only an hour went by till i was woken by downpour and my small one man survival tent taking on water. Pissed and totally soaked after breakfast we took off on a 7 mile trek to the summit of Mt Dix.

(stolen from Brett’s Blog) 3:30 a.m and a rain/snow mix. off we go. Harleys reflective leash looks cool

 

our camp was on the edge of Round Pond

Harley would run ahead. then stop just to make sure i was coming. every 20 ft. without fail.

Meet Hawkeye. He rules

Hawkeye does not care for water obstacles

take 5 at Boquet Lean-To

This dog is part coyote. He is a thief and a scavenger

Hardly as innocent as he looks

Crossed Blogs

5 miles in till we first get a look at our snow covered destination. All the rain we had overnight was snow at higher elevations.

Story of this hike include that the last few miles are basically vertical and start at the base of some rock slides

First snowball toss of the season

Def further and steeper than it looks

First yellow snow of the season

I think this is where i told Brian we were “almost there” but i had no idea and was def wrong

still on the right path

almost there

High winds, blowing snow and bright sun…coulda used some Thermonuclear Protection

Windchill factor was prob in the teens on the summit of Dix. elevation 4785 ft.

Note the blood on Harleys front paw leaking all over Bretts stuff

This tired little hiker was looking for anything soft to lay on. Little did we know we still had 5 miles left back to camp

Tired? still got 2 miles to go

baby Deer pose

Tired?

follow his lead

 

One man tent, one sleeping bag. it was an oven in that lil thing. Guess who was the first one in and last to leave…

8′x3′x2′=home sweet home

Round Pond is nicer to wake up next to when the sun is shining

Parking lot watch dogs

Next part of our adventure was was to hit the open water. Neither dog had ever been on a boat, let alone a 16′ canoe. wasnt really sure how well it would go over.

we had one curious sailor on our boat

Sit where you feel safe

This happens to be the moment when we shoulda gone the other way i think. All blame was placed on the guy who gave us the map. He obviously has no idea where we were going since he only grew up on the lake.

MAN DOWN…This lil sailor was over the sight seeing at this point

Reclaiming my land legs on the Dock in Saranac Lake

Another Fall in the Adirondacks…many more to come

OHIO

29 July, 2008 (15:02) | Ohio | 1 comment

Leave philly at 10p.m. friday. get to bed at 5:30a.m. saturday on a floor with a towel for a blanket. 8:30 we are up and skating. Tons of Dudes, lots of cameras, too many laughs to count.

long car ride made easier with a good ol’ etch-a-sketch

it quickly turned into a game of “here, hold this for a picture, but you cant read it”

ray has a great sense of humor (sometimes). he can laugh at a name created out of a serious situation. (if you dont know what the nickname “speed bag” came from you dont know ray)

classic

early a.m. first stop

dont just assume cuz it wasnt me

next stop…and it was a short one

a real short stop for obvious reasons

4″ high approach, tons of concrete and steel…CONGRATULATIONS…you built the only pile of shit that will withstand the next terrorist attack

this place fucking rules

one look at this 8 yr old kids grip tape and i realized the little fucker was calling me out…

the parking lot for this park is also shared by a huge pool with a water slide and high dive. the locals call it their pool, i would call it a toilet and shower for a bunch of out of town sweaty skaters

on the road again

this place fucking rules and is 20 min away from the last.

after about an hour a tsunami hit

rep your colors

more of “here hold this”

this is what happens when you leave your camera in the car while going into the gas station for a drink

a “textbook” body

hate to break it to ya but peep the ring on his finger…..he is taken

sunday a.m.

8 feet wide… 5 feet deep…steep as fuck..this little waste of space is tighter than your 10yr old girlfriend

Park Builder #1: “hey, the park is all finished, whats in this box?”

Park Builder #2: “oh yeah, the handrail we ordered”

Total piece of junk, steeper than most ladders. next time, just forget it

NEXT

huge bowls, a cradle and a place tie your horse

some call it vandalism, some call it art, either way whoever drew this masterpiece i will call “pure genius”

crunches

birdseye burtleman

to the builders of this park…next time take your leftover concrete with you or just make statue of a pile of crap

still reppin

on the way home…from the highway you can see this place

ironically i slammed in the bowl directly on my ipod and broke my headphones during this…

double shaka

“here hold this” on the way home

pic is too dark but it was only the beginning. i wish you could see the sweat on his forehead. stuck in dead stopped traffic on a major highway his asshole was puckering

all lanes stopped means entertainment for everyone. (video documented)

look at that sigh of relief?….roadside blowouts is why god made socks

all this in 2 days. great crew, great times. all parks were free and pretty much within 20 min of each other. leave your helmets at home.

 

Tried something new

23 July, 2008 (09:46) | Uncategorized | 1 comment

If it has 2 wheels and a motor i want to ride it. if it had 2 wheels and a motor i will race it. a good friend races flat track motorcycles on a national level. i always kid around about taking one of beasts for a ride figuring i would spin a few laps on a practice track. nope. next thing i know im entered in an amateur race class with a some simple instruction and thrown to the wolves on his race bike. he was riding in two other classes that day so i really didnt want to crash his bike. kipper came along and rode another bike of his aswell and will verify that this shit is not nearly as easy as it looks. (note: all coaching and instruction goes right out the window as soon as you are on the starting line)

pitcrew

coach said i had the fastest most unforgiving bike on the track. great

“there is no front brake, put it in 2nd gear and EASY on the throttle” its that simple

this is my new pal ralph. Track photographer and easily the best guy ever.

this is his business card. with his “wife” he says

how its done

spread out…here come the idiots

dark and blurry i know

me and kipper on the final turn to the checkered flag. it was a photo finish.

easily a very addictive hobby. ready to go again. the amount of improvement from our first practice laps to our last race of the night was huge. i only came close to hitting a wall once. no broken bones. no broken bikes. thanks mark. where we racing this weekend?

 

Fuck your lousy sparklers and bang-snaps

7 July, 2008 (14:14) | Uncategorized | No comments

yeah i know…its been awhile. considering my last post had snowboarding, i guess i have just been busy. well im blowing the dust off this blog by showing you how we celebrated america’s birthday with “real” fireworks not this bullshit everyone is pedaling on the roadsides. if you cant lose a limb, its a glorified sparkler.

every year a friend of mine has a huge get together on a farm down near quakertown, his father-in-law blows thousands on the “entertainment”

start them young…(note:all spectators were 75yrds away, only a select few are involved in the lighting)

Defusing

i always get the job of reloading the mortars cuz im always the only sober one. it sucks. fingers are numb for hours afterwards. this year we were short a guy so kipper was helped reload as i loaded and lit fuses

1 0f 2 tables full of small cakes, with plenty supplies to reload

mortar crew, waiting for dark

fire in the hole

 

click here for a firsthand 20 sec clip of us turning Q-town into Baghdad. (our view)

 

 

 

and a cell phone video from the spectators view

no severe burns, nobody hurt, god bless the U S of A

 

 

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