I grew up skateboarding it was fun. I didn't think about money I didn't know how much professional skateboarders made. I just knew that if I became a professional skateboarder I would achieve a lot and get to travel and do these great things.

I studied with a blind teacher from about 5 until I was 16 at two different schools. From the age of 12 until 16 I was in a boarding school-which I believe at that time was compulsory for blind children.

Growing up in Huntington Beach you were either a traditional sports athlete a skateboarder or a surfer. I got my first skateboard when I was five and skated off and on over the years did a little BMX racing as a kid and then in my freshman or sophomore year I started getting a little bit more into skateboarding.

I'm a big sports guy - golf tennis baseball basketball snowboarding - and I love games.

The last few years I became a lot more into sports. Growing up the sports I liked were independent sports like skateboarding. I was really into skateboarding and not necessarily team televised sports.

I love extreme sports I like snowboarding and motorcross and rollerblading and hockey.

The two things I was positive about in life were that I was going to be a teacher at a boarding school or an operative with the CIA posted abroad. I could write a book about all the things I was sure about.

Unless you have been to boarding-school when you are very young it is absolutely impossible to appreciate the delights of living at home.

Snowboarding's tough because you've got to go to the mountains. For me I love the skateboard season because I get to hangout at home and still be skating. I don't have to travel to Norway or Japan or these crazy places to be snowboarding.

I wanted to be a great white hunter a prospector for gold or a slave trader. But then when I was eight my parents sent me to a boarding school in South Africa. It was the equivalent of a British public school with cold showers beatings and rotten food. But what it also had was a library full of books.