wednesday
We awoke to steady rain that was hard at
times. Wichita has an indoor park so our
plans didn't need to change any, but the
drive to Wichita was rather interesting. The
Harrier was in much need of a new set of
tires, so the car would hydroplane at times.
This was especially scary when passing
semis. To add to the fear, Thad has a bad
habit of tailgating, and more than a few
times I looked up from the back seat to see
nothing but water and a semi's taillights. I
thought Dave was going to leave a perma-
nent grip on the door handle. The rest of us
tried to ignore the horrors of the road the
best we could.
The rain stopped about half an hour out-
side of Wichita so we went straight to
Edgemor park. Edgemor is a city park
where the outside walls of the sandboxes.
are concrete and transitioned. Those of you
who remember Sadlands know what I am
talking about. There was some sand, and
Dennis Busenitz couldn't wait to get to the new spot to skate the curved
again, so he just made one of his own. Crooked grind nollie transfer.
though we had forgotten a broom, most of
it could be avoided or kicked out of the way.
We skated there for about half an hour.
Thad made some nosegrab blunts on a
near-vert section with less than a three-foot
transition. Dirty Al was tearing the place up
with stalefishes, backside disaster reverts,
tailslides, and fast lines around the place.
Dave was practicing his ollies on the tennis
courts. He wanted to ollie this flat rail.
It started to rain a little and Dave said he
was ready to start trying to ollie the rail. I
set up some lights and Dave started ollieing
the rail. After a few tries my slaved light
died from getting wet, and the rain was
really starting to come down hard. Dave
made one and then it began to hail. Wanting
to insure a good shot, Dave kept trying the
ollie. By this time we were soaked and there
was lightning, hard rain, and hail coming
down. A few more tries and he had another
make.
We hightailed it to the car, running
through a foot-deep puddle in the parking
ledge
lot. Everything was soaked and none of
flashes were working. We decided to drive
straight to Boarderline where we would
decide what to do next. We were in need
dry clothes and no one had brought any.
We asked Eddie, the park owner, if ther
was a Laundromat nearby. The plan was t
get some clothes at the thrift store and pu
the wet stuff in a dryer. Eddie offered use
his dryer, so Thad and John went to the
Salvation Army down the street to get so
clothes to change into, and we put our w
clothes in the dryer. This was much bette
since no one was in the mood to sit in a
laundromat for the next hour or so. We
wanted to skate the park.
Dennis was waiting there for us, and he
hadn't skated Boarderline since he got ba
from the Tampa Am contest. It didn't sh
however. He had every line in the park
down, and his runs were absent of any
up tricks." Dennis' brother Mark was the
too, and the two of them would skate lik
cat and mouse yelling at each other in
German when at times they were dangerously
close on the ramps. Mark kept telling us he
wasn't any good, but we all knew better.
People who are not "any good" don't do
switch frontside rocks on a seven-foot quarter
with vert.
Greg Whisman stopped by the park and told
us about a show going on later that night
downtown. Local boys Split Lip Rayfield were
playing their rockin' hillbilly punk. They have
been a Wichita staple for the past three years
and judging by the crowd are a favorite with
the local punks and even some executive
types. That night the diverse crowd had at
least one thing in common: they were all
drunk-real drunk-and on a weeknight.
find a couch, floor, or in John's case a chair to
sleep on. There were some other people there
for after-hours when we arrived, and there
were rumors of a case of beer on the way.
Greg cooked up some of the greasiest eggs
and potatoes. This was a great surprise since
we were all very hungry and all-night diners
tend to be unpredictable. After listening to
Greg talk about what skating used to be in
Kansas, we were very happy to hear him say it
was time to crash.
After the show, we went to Greg's place to
Thursday
I awoke to Greg's phone ringing some sort
of football fight song. He didn't answer so this
repeated itself every 15 minutes or so until he
got up a couple of hours later.
I looked outside and there was a half-inch of
ice covering everything. I thought, "What the
fuck?" Over the past four days we had experi-
enced 70 degrees and sunshine, 50 degrees
and light rain, hard rain and hail, and now an
ice storm. The worst part about it was that we
had a four-hour drive with Thad at the wheel.
Well it turned out that the ringing phone was the guy with
the case of beer. Apparently he didn't get too far from the
liquor store when a large building jumped out in front of his
Gap to tailslide courtesy of Ol' Dirty Al.
truck. He was calling Greg so he could tow his truck off the building and
get it home before the impounders could get to it.
The ice storm was pretty much limited to the Wichita area, so after half
an hour on the turnpike, the roads were dry again and our drive back to
Lawrence went smoothly.
It's snow picnic living in the heartland.
John works at a microbrewery that has an excellent
kitchen, and he treated us to the best food we had all
trip along with half-price micros. You just can't get
grilled salmon and a stout at the Sonic drive-up. Al had
to rest before work so John, Dave, Thad, and I sat
around and had a few more beers. The little restaurant
centerpiece plastic thing that holds paper telling you
what the specials also had a piece of paper titled "Did
You Remember?" Several historical events in Kansas his-
tory that happened in Marches past were listed. One of
them stated, "March 17, 1899-Within a 24-hour period,
Harper, Kansas, reports a cyclone, a "serene" sunset,
lightning, rain, ice, sleet, and snow." One hundred and
one years later, Wichita, Kansas, experienced the same
minus the cyclone.
We never made it to the barbed wire museum, the
world's second largest ball of twine, or the six legged
cow, but we did see a lot of freaks of nature.
120 THRASHER
121