Well, the frozen time of year we all call home, when we can focus our efforts on skipping work/school/cult meetings to go ride two stupid skis, fall over a lot, and land two tricks we didn’t land the season before is over. That glorious season called winter has been replaced by its humid evil twin, summer, which leaves us feeling inept, pasty, and bored without an activity to dedicate every waking moment to.

But fret not fading young athletes, as summer brings its own opportunities to mill around in the parking lot, drink, complain, host safety meetings and otherwise avoid the activity of focus just like skiing does. Here’s a quick guide to pretending to do other action sports this summer:

Wakeboarding

A cool boat, some loose women, and a few of those weird snowboards on a rack.

Wakeboarding, with its need to be constantly pulled by a rope and without any of its own natural momentum, leaves many skiers and snowboarders aghast as to how to proceed. Thankfully, most cool wakeboarding involves a boat, which means that you should be drinking. Remember, if someone tries to shove you that stupid tiny snowboard with the boots left in the bindings, just tell them no thanks, I’m already participating in two activities: drinking and sitting in a boat. Now get back in the water so I can hit on your girlfriend while you catch your toeside edge on the wake.

Surfing

Another watersport, which means all hope of relating it to skiing is lost. Luckily, no one can pick you out from the dozens of other black wetsuit-clad idiots in the water, so the beachside beezies won’t have a clue it was you eating sand all day on your rental longboard while almost decapitating the Quebexicans drowning in the shorebreak.
Better even than surfing itself is engaging in “The Ritual.” This gentlemen’s sport involves getting up at dawn, driving to the ocean with your board strapped to your roof, standing on the beach drinking your coffee and staring mockingly at the waves no matter how good they are, leaving to drive to the next break, stopping, lighting a cigarette, complain about that break, and so on until you get to the last possible surf break. Then, what do you know? The tide’s changed and you have a brand-new excuse to roam the coastline without ever having to get in the water and blow your cover!

Skateboarding

Get radical! (until it’s too hot)

Damn. There’s no water, there’s solid ground underneath your feet, and even wheels to keep you going straight; you must be able to pull this one off. Thankfully, all the aging talentless ski bum needs to engage in this pastime is to roll up to the skatepark with some tight jeans and a gallon jug of water, smoke some butts, do some manuals around the park, and voila – it’s too fucking hot to skate and you can go hide under a tree, drink your water, and continue to smoke butts. The little kids who actually skate will be terrified of you, and that’s all you really wanted anyway.

Hiking

The Trailhead: Drinking’s Next Victim?

People have managed to tailgate just about everything – football games, concerts, even days skiing at a resort – but has anyone every tailgated a hiking trail? This untracked territory would only require you to show up to the trailhead, walk a quarter mile or so (with beers), yell at a deer and then return to the parking lot to set up the grille, cook burgers, crush cocktails and beers, and wait to see how nervous the bevy of actually-hiking nerds are when they return to their Priuses to find the trailhead awash in empties and people humping each other in the bushes.