Wheels

I am getting new derby wheels! These ones from RollerBones :)

See when I went to watch Western Regionals with Reckless RollerBones had a booth, and Reckless got wheels and I was jealous. So I found them, and I’m getting them (I love online shopping!) I can’t wait!

Buying Derby gear is a new thing for me, I haven’t been previously financially stable enough to even think about new wheels. I have never had wheels that didn’t come with my skates. I am a big believer in reuse until dead simply out of necessity, sometimes I think I get so caught up in my reuse belief that guilt for new items gets in the way. Part of it is probably being a mom to, I feel like if there’s the money to buy it for myself than there has to be something Aiden needs more. It’s a vicious cycle. Thankfully, Aiden’s birthday and Christmas are coming up, the cupboards are full of food and my boyfriend got more hours, hence the miracle of new wheels. What’s next? Perhaps some wrist guards that don’t have deteriorating Velcro……

Derby Outfit

tonights outfit for practice :) a close up of the shorts too as they are my newest creation!

ignore my slightly messy room

ruffle shorts!

Rose City Rollers I love thee!

I really love Portland. I day dream about moving there and know ridiculous amounts of useless information regarding the place. One of my favorite things to do in Portland is watch roller derby, the Rose City Rollers are the bomb.

and so are their fans....

The one standing on the stairs in the pegacorn vest was entertaining as hell! The thing I liked the most about the Rose City Fans is that they were generally positive, all their regular cheers are in suport of their team and there was only one (hilarious) instance of a unified cheer directed at the other team. They really were a ton of fun to sity with, especially after sitting below the drunken shit talker earlier in the day. Kinda got me thinking about the difference fans can make, sitting with Rose Citys cheering section was fun, and even though I already wanted them to win I certainly was more vocal about it.  When I was sitting below the terrible B.A.D fan for their game against Denver I started out unsure of who to cheer for and then felt like cheering for Denver just because of how terrible she was.

Rose City won against Rat City and will be going to Nationals! You should have heard the fans when that happened...

Saturday at Western Regionals!

Disclaimer: these are just my opinions and observations; for super awesome recaps (if you couldn't watch) visit www.derbynewsnetwork.com

First game yesterday was Angel City vs Bay Area, we slept in a little bit and got there about half through so the only observation I really have is man did I feel for those Angel City girls. Final score 227-70 in Bay Area's favor. Ouch. And the ouch just kept on coming with the next game, Tuscon vs Denver final score 387 - 18 in Denver's favor. Watching the skating here is amazing, just the scores don't do it justice, the teams with those high scores are still working pretty hard for those high scores. Though that game was the biggest blow out of the day.

The next game, while the next game is probably going to be the majority of my post here because I still really don't know what to think. Rat City vs Rocky Mountain promised to be a good and intense game, and it was on a whole different level.

Right away Rat City used an......interesting strategy. Lining up stacked right up against the jam line and not moving. This does several things, first it forced Rocky Mountain to play their game because if Rocky skated forward to get the game moving they broke pack, jammers jumped off the line and the Rocky jammer is stuck and Rocky can't block the Rat City jammer while they are out of play. Again, if Rocky takes a knee to break pack then the other team is standing and has that first defense. It was crazy, because Rocky didn't want to give up any advantage and there were (i think) two jams were everyone stood still on the track for the whole two minutes. When you get the crowd chanting skate in unison its pretty bad.

My opinion of Rat City did not improve as things continued. One jam stood still for 2 minutes and all Rat City did was take one girl of the line and put a new one in her spot. So the next jam stood everyone on the jam line  for about a minute 15 seconds, then people were skating and the jam ended again before any points were scored. A rather upset fan behind me "F*** you Rat City!! Great strategy, you can't lose if you dont skate!!!"  which was about how everyone felt, except that Rat City was losing. They were down 20-30 points and while they were preventing Rocky Mountain from scoring anything they were killing their scoring chances as well.  During one of the two minute stand stills a skater from Rocky Mountain skated forward and started figure skating.

The sad part is that when the two teams were skating it was amazing derby! I have a new derby crush, #21 from Rocky Mountain who held the jammer over halfway around the track on her own and then delivered huge hit resulting in a jammer on her ass out of bounds scenario. We sat with Nik Yo Face and she was in love with Rocky Mountains # 27 and I cant say that I blame, the girls skeleton leggings were enough to make me love her, but she was an amazing jammer as well. Ending score was 117-107 to Rocky Mountain.

Next game was Bay Area vs Jet City (oh my god can you imagine skating twice in a day?!?!). This moved at a faster pace, and shocker they lined up on the pivot line! Though I still saw more moving backwards as a pack then I have ever seen before. This was another one of those oh I gosh I feel for you girls bouts with the final score being 302 - 55 in Bay Area's favor.

At this point Reckless and I got back on the MAX and went downtown to find some lunch. We ended up finding this amazing little restaurant called Pastini's where I had the most amazing stuffed manicotti for like 10 bucks. We finished it off by splitting the equivalent of chocolate lava cake with whipped cream, needless to say I didn't eat the rest of the day.

Not gonna lie, I didn't pay too much attention to the 5:30 game, I was way to full and enjoying some stimulating conversation about strategy, boyfriends, and derby butt cheeks. I was also trying to figure out how many beers Reckless had had. Sacred City vs Denver ended 220-59 in Denver's favor.

The final game of the day was absolutely amazing, the crowd was huge and I'm not sure anyone expected Oly to have to fight that hard. Oly vs Rose City was definitely the game of the day and I'm so incredibly happy I was there. That was Derby. Rose City did an amazing job of holding Oly and at the half the score was something along the lines of 68 - 65 Oly. It was incredible. Rose City's Fans are the most awesome people, I saw people dress up as I think unicorns/pegasus all over the place, and talk about a sea of purple I wish I had remembered my camera. There's so many things to say about that game that I'm going to write a seperate post, in case I have you wondering though Oly won 161 - 132.

Now I'm off to day 2 of my grand derby adventure!

Western Regionals!

I'm so incredibly excited to be heading out to Portland today after work to watch the Western Regional’s in person on Saturday and Sunday! Reckless and I will be right there immersing our selves in Derby amazing, seeing more games and action at one time then ever before! Overload? Maybe. I figure it’s like thanksgiving, eating too much and being perfectly happy with it.

I'm practically shaking with excitement at the idea of watching teams like the Oly Rollers, Denver Roller Dolls, Rose City Rollers and Bay Area Derby Girls, too name a few. Its going to be amazing, and if your new to watching and would like to learn all you can you should definitely spend a few minutes (hours) perusing www.derbynewsnetwork.com the site is awesome and I always learn something new. Their Western Regionals Preveiw was extremely enlightening this year and did nothing but make me wish even harder that I had more paid time off.

Right now I am indulging in watching the first game between Jet City and Tucson, want to watch too? Go here http://derbynewsnetwork.com/live/bouts/2011/09/game_1_tucson_v_jet_city you can watch the games live for free all weekend! I know there’s at least one viewing party in lovely Walla Walla, got any scheduled for your area?

The Kid Rules

This is the kid, shes four and I love her very much! It happened before I was expecting but I love being a mom. Sometimes though, sometimes its inconvienent. Like this week, this week the kid over rules derby.

I missed practice last night, and I am going to miss practice on thursday. Last night was a combination of errors, ultimatley resulting in a very upset clung to mom child. I was already late and at some point decided F*** It. Im going to sit on the couch and snuggle.

Thursday is special needs preschool orientation at the same time as you guessed it, derby practice. Good thing we have sunday practices, if i dont get some derby soon nobody is going to be happy. Oh, and thank God for my sewing machine! Because when there isnt practice theres always shorts to make.....

Pause

It’s been a while since I posted anything, I’m sorry. Usually Derby and I have a very strong relationship, I love it, don’t want to miss practice, can’t wait for the next derby event. Last week didn’t work out that way, the week before wasn’t so hot either. First, my little family experienced some medical issues, these were frustrating and took our attention away from everything else. That was the first week that I didn’t attend practice.

The next week I just felt a little uninspired. The honeymoon phase for me and roller derby has been over for a long time, someone hipped checked those rose colored glasses right off. I still loved it though, even more whole heartedly than before, “See me?? I see these flaws and I LOVE them!!” I’m past that now. Right now the theme seems to be “damn, shit just got serious.”  

Derby complicates things. It takes a lot of time, energy, patience, money, etc. The ratio of reward to stress that I have at this time is probably about 60:40. I figure that if stress ever trumps reward than I need to quit, what’s scary is how real of a possibility that happens to be. Roller Derby started as a lark, and turned into my savior. Being at practice was an escape from being a young mom, having an uncertain relationship, caring for a disabled child, worrying about my siblings, not going to school, working full time, you name it I was forgetting about it at derby practice. Then, derby turned into one of those things to worry about. Now my excitement is tentative, my love flowing a little less freely. I see issues I want to help fix, but I worry about the expense, the toll derby could be taking. The fear is, how much is this worth?

A month or so ago someone told me that I had reached an evaluating stage in life. Whatever, it goes like this; someone turned the overthink switch to ‘on’ and forgot to tell me how to turn it off.

Even with all this I’m excited to go to practice tonight, the off switch may be broken but at least I found the pause button. Here’s hoping I don’t break it.