Entries this day: thanksgiving_day_skate

thanksgiving day skate

Thursday 27 November 1997

Happy Thanksgiving!!

I just got back from skating all around the Thanksgiving Day Parade in downtown Houston. I started at a lazy 10:00 in the am, strapped on skates and skated all the way down Dallas Street toward downtown. As I approached, a small fragmented crowd of parents and kids and baby strollers dispersed away from where I knew the parade must be. Was it over already??

I was certain it was certainly not, so I continued until I found that half the parade had ended, and the other half was slowly catching up. I skated upstream along the sidewalk behind the crowd, watching the marchers, twirlers, dancers, floats, giant balloons, clowns, more marchers, a guy on one of those old timey big wheel bicycles, and to end it all, some low rider cars and trucks with hydraulics, neon lights, chrome, plush velvet interiors and bumpin' bass for the whole crowd to enjoy.

I had missed the skaters... sigh..

As the crowd flooded the street behind the cop cars behind the low riders, I scooted to the other side of the parade to skate upstream till I caught up with the end of the route. One band was playing that Dr Who song: "Dr Whooooo... (YEAH!) Dr Who. Dr Whoooo... (YEAH!) Dr Who" and on and on. I joined the crowd cheering the (YEAH!) part.

Once I reached the front-most part of the parade at the end of the route, I skated around to get a closer look (in daylight this time) at the floats Jim and I had seen last night. They were pretty cool, especially since I could see the hinges, cables, rods, and all the technology behind the magic.

I went over the check out the big balloons that were being deflated. At one balloon were some guys grouped around a vent, breathing the helium and talking in chipmunk voices. That was pretty funny, especially when one squeaked, "it's-a-dream-come-true!" I chose not to inhale such a percentage of helium (though I'm not sure the prevailing ingredients in Houston air are much better), especially when the guys started going, "oh.. whoah.. that's enough of that..."

I followed my nose toward Sam Houston Park and found the Urban Animals! They are the local big skate group, and the ones that skated in the parade. I said HI to John M, who owns the Montrose Skate Shop from which I purchase all my skating stuff, and he grabbed my frisbee and we started playing! The crazy thing was that all the Urban Animal dudes and dudettes played frisbee wearing their skates in the grass, making for clumsy (although sometimes impressive) catches, and a few spills. I played barefoot of course, despite Greg hollering, "Hey!! you gotta wear skates!" I hollered, "no way, man!!" and mentally hollered "gimme my frisbee back!"

We played for like 20 minutes until they all got tired and I played with the younger kids who were there. One girl looked about 6 years old and she could catch and throw pretty consistently well! I was impressed. Finally they all left and I put on my skates and just bummed around a bit to see what I could see.

I saw basically nothin' so I zooomed at super top full speed ahead down the hill leading to Allen Parkway. That was pretty fun so I did it again after catching my breath.

The second time I kept skating down Allen Parkway toward home. Once I got to the intersection at Taft, where I needed to turn left across Allen Parkway, I was zip zip zipping in a large left turn and almost slipped crunch as a car was approaching with a more rapid pace than I would really enjoy being hit by a car. With that incentive, I did *not* fall, and scurried the rest of the way across to safety.

The rest of the journey home I spent in slow deliberate contemplation about the virtues of skating safely.