Tuesday Nights: Derby

I went to the rec league practice tonight because it’s bout week and I can’t really practice with the home teams.

When I first tried out to join the rec league, there were about six of us who showed up that Saturday morning. Today was the first day of rec league tryouts for this session and there had to be at least thirty girls there. O: It’s so crazy! In a good way. (:

Anyway, one of the girls trying out got hurt somehow, I don’t know. I really have no idea what happened, but she was taken out on a stretcher, etc etc. These things probably scare the hell out of the other new girls and then they probably decide not to go through with it. Not probably; they do. There was this L1 or L2 girl wearing a UH shirt, so I went to her and said, “do you go to UH?” and she said yes. I told her about the insane injury in the rec league that happened a few months ago and said, “that was probably a bad first impression for the girls trying out that day” and she said, “yes! It was my first day! I was like O:” (she actually made that face).

Injuries aside, we played dodgeball…on skates (obviously)! LOLOLOL. That was unexpected. (:

Tuesday Nights: Derby

It’s been nearly a month now since I stopped writing TN:D on a regular basis (because I don’t skate on Tuesdays anymore). But I got to practice with the rec league tonight, so here’s this.

It was pretty good; a lot of the other fresh meat liked it. I did, too, but now I just feel eh…inadequate. Why? Because I weigh 100 pounds and I’m 5’1”. I know there are blockers in this very league who match my specs, but I don’t know how they do it! I’m excellent at positional blocking, though. Damn fine positional blocking. And I’m awesome at the whole tractor-trailer block, too (it’s fun). But I can’t seem to actually be able to knock someone off her feet. I barely managed to push TWO girls out of bounds today. It’s so hard for me because I’m such a featherweight minimumweight*. I hate making excuses. ):

What can I do to increase my offensive blocking? I need to become some kind of cannonball. Then maybe I can live up to my name, LOL. I hope I’m weaned onto jamming instead.

At least I was able to slip past Dutch Destroyer when she was gonna hit me. I heard her compliment me. (‘: I like being complimented. WHO DOESN’T AMIRITE?

Well, back to writing.

EDIT: *i’m not even a featherweight! what the hell! well, i’m not a man either, so there’s that.

Tuesday Nights: Derby

Dear Everyone Who Follows Me,

Tuesday Nights: Derby is coming to an end. ): I’m sorry that I never wrote a proper last TN:D (which would have been last Tuesdays’—the F&F bout), but last week was a tad hectic and I don’t know how I managed to stay sane throughout it all. Now that it’s been a week, I don’t think it would be right to go back and write about it, aha.

Moving on. Now that I’ve moved into a deeper end of the pool, I’m going to be practicing not once, not twice, but three times a week from now on. This is going to leave me with much less energy to write when I come home late at night, so it makes me sad as both a writer AND a reader (I read my own shit, too, you know).

This doesn’t mean I won’t update from time to time. Trust me; I love writing too much to give up my little column completely. (:

Love, B.A

HAY EVERYONE

Today was the last day of league fresh meat tryouts and I made it! :D !!! I’m so excited.

I often see a lot of girls around the internet talking about how they’re fresh meat, but they don’t really know how to do anything at all in regards to roller derby (sometimes they can’t even skate) and it may make my accomplishment seem less impressive, but you should know that fresh meat in the Houston Roller Derby is NO JOKE. You’re expected to know the basics/intermediates/(possibly advanced stuff too idk) and how to do them well. QUITE well. This ain’t no kiddie boot camp.

So yeah, I kicked ass, got rink rash on my ass for the first time, and felt the happiness spreading all inside me the whole time. Especially when Mistilla told me how much my rec league training showed. SO HAPPY. ( ‘:

Tuesday Nights: Derby

I tore more skin off my right foot tonight. I’m usually good at keeping my blisters in check, but we had an endurance practice tonight (we did 100 laps nonstop…plus other stuff) and I got a blister closer to the arch of my foot. I was like, “well, I’ll just…cushion it some more until practice ends” and I put more tape and stuff on it.

Nope. That shit kept tearing and I was thinking, “what the hell!” for the last hour or so of practice. I came home and whatever, it didn’t hurt or anything. But as soon as I got in the shower…*wince*. It stung so badlyyyyy. I took the tape off (I usually leave it on until I get out of the shower) and holy shit! Worst blister I’ve had so far. I put an actual bandage on it, but it’s not waterproof, obviously.

I had to shower with my foot elevated the entire time. Yay?

Well, back to practice. Endurance. Need I say more?

ps. then when I was leaving, I found a huge toad right outside of the doors of HIS. I watched it for a few seconds and then Misfits saw it and eventually, everyone who came out gathered ‘round, hahaha.

Tuesday Nights: Derby (yes it’s lengthy but it’s a pretty good read, I’d say)

Tonight was the greatest…

Well here’s the thing: after identifying my weakness[es] a while back, I decided that the best thing to do would be to not give up like a sissy girl. So I didn’t. I’ve been working my ass off for the past couple of months. Though not literally—that would be horrible. LOL. Anyway, I’ve been slowly but SURELY seeing my progress. Little by little, I’ve gotten faster, more agile, more attentive, more resilient; the results of which I’ve been observing in tiny increments during practices. As if all I deserved was a little pat on the back. From myself.

But put that all together in one night and it’s the bees knees. Months of pushing myself UGH it all just poured out on the track. JUST POURED ON THE TRACK.

We scrimmaged tonight. I happened to forget my white shirt at home, so I was on the black team. We had Grrrl Friday of the Bosses on our team. We also had Misfits, who’s a boss. I mean everything she does, she does it like a boss. She’s not a Boss, though. Get it…? Because one of our home teams is the Bosses? Well, whatever. We also had alterKATEion (she’s so sweet). With the addition of myself, we were pretty much unstoppable, aha. Sorry for the arrogance, but I think I’ve earned it. I jammed a few times. Maybe three. Not sure. What matters in this story, however, is that holy shit, I slid through those blockers. I even jumped the apex during a jam. I JUMPED THE MOTHERFUCKING APEX. I don’t think my non-derby enthusiast followers will understand what the hell I mean by that and why it’s so special, but trust me, it is.

After getting grand slams every jam I jammed for, I was kind of tired so I retreated back to blocking. Ha. The girls on my team were all, “way to go!” or “good job!” and such when I’d come back to the box. ( ‘: I’ve heard that before, but…it just means so much more these days. Even Rush, our trainer, told me I was doing great. This guy doesn’t just HAND out compliments, people. So happy…Maybe I’m doing so well because I’m playing against rookies, but it’s still something.

Then, finally, when we were all taking our gear off and such, I was waiting around for change (I bought two more tickets for the March 17 opener) and Grrrl Friday comes up and tells me that I did great, etc, etc and that…

…and that I’m gonna be a great jammer. I’m gonna be a jammer, guys. I’m one of the chosen ones.

Tuesday Nights: Derby (even though it’s friday)

I’ve gotten too lazy to keep writing these things on actual Tuesday nights. Well, probably not LAZY. More like…really wiped out. I don’t have much energy left on Tuesday nights, so I just scroll.

Anyway, wasn’t too eventful. Er…what did we do? Can’t…remember…in detail…

Well, the new L2s joined us L3s and the newbies practiced in their little end of the rink. One of them got hurt. Nothing too serious, but we had to wait it out for a few minutes before getting back to our races. Racing…it’s much more fun if you’re a master of crossovers like I am (so I win more often than not), LOL. Oh, and the toe stops. Those toe stops…

Tuesday Nights: Derby

We had new L1s today. YAY.

Everything was all fun and scrimmages until someone got hurt while jamming. .____. I feel really bad. She’s like, the SWEETEST lady I’ve met at HRD, by far. She’s so…I don’t know. But yeah, it was kind of bad. And I could feel the tears welling in my eyes when she was on the ground clutching her leg. Turns out it was a broken ankle? Something like that. I’ve never seen anyone break anything before (except like…in videos and shit) so it was kind of awkward and just…ugh.

I stayed until the ambulance came (we got to leave early because…yeah, we weren’t gonna keep skating). But then I felt kind of weird being one of the last ones there, so I left too. I don’t know…I started out with her. I feel like we’ve made this journey together. Her and me and Adrienne. It’s really sad. And then when I was coming home, I was like, “I jammed before she did—what if I had broken something?”

It’s all fun, yeah, but there’s always the little nagging voice that reminds you that you’re gonna get hurt sooner or later. >:

ps. now my parents are all, “this is dangerous, stop doing this omg!!”

pps. now my mom told my brother on the phone and he’s like, “that’s so dangerous you should stop”

Tuesday Nights: Derby (late thurdsay night edition)

I’ve been sort of busy since I’ve had three tests this week. But now that’s all over, so I suppose I should have probably gotten around to writing this! I know no one really cares or even reads these (because sometimes they are annoyingly long, I know), but I guess I write them for future references and such. Even though I could just literally write it down in a journal, but nah.

Not much to tell from this week, really. We had assessments and all, yeah. I mentioned my twenty five laps time. And I leveled up to L3! YAY. Errrrr I don’t think there was anything to really be excited about. Well, Bobbiejean was there, so that was nice! She’s awesome. She was one of the first girls who warmed up to me (and vice versa) when I first started out. I bought a ticket from her for the March 17th bouts. YISS.

What else? Nothing much! Oh, I got Em to take a picture of me since I don’t really…have any of me all “derbied” up. I made a new word. (:

Then I cheered for that L1 girl, Steph, when I noticed she was doing her laps. YAY!

Tuesday Nights: Derby

AHHHHH HI. I missed last Tuesday because something terrible came up and I had to skip everything for a few days. But I laced up yesterday, so yay! :D

Let’s see! Well, I mentioned a while back that I’m only practicing once a week instead of twice a week because I’m kind of swamped with school and stuff. It sucks, but as much as I love derby, I have to sort out my long term priorities like a responsible adult! ): So because of this, I don’t get to practice with the home teams. I’m not sure what the Machete Betties do there…but I’m assuming it’s much more badass than what we do on Tuesdays. I mention this because I’m guessing they scrimmage there…without me. )’:

Anyway, I’ve been hoping for a few weeks that we’d scrimmage on Tuesday nights, and yesterday we did just that. FINALLY! I mean, I didn’t pay my insurance to NOT scrimmage, you know? LOL. But yeah. It was fun and all that jazz. I jammed a few times. Made it through pretty easily the first time. Second time, I sort of slammed into the blockers in the back of the pack. My bad.

There was this one girl who didn’t really want to jam, but we were all so encouraging and got her to do it. I don’t think she was too happy about that in the end. ):

So yeah, it was rad. Oh, and before everything, I got my gear from Bunny, YAY! And she even knocked off ten bucks from my order! :D !!!

Oh, yeah, and during a scrimmage, I went down—no big deal—but then a ton of girls came raining down on me. Someone rolled on my right hand and now I have a bruise/rash-like thing on it. It’s alright. Doesn’t hurt! (:

Tuesday Nights: Derby

Yes, well I didn’t really get to make my usual little post on Tuesday or whatever. Uh let’s see…

Well, we finally got to play big sisters with the L1s, yay! So we were standing around and I rolled over to the closest one to me and said, “okay, I guess I’ll be your partner!” and she said, “hi! my name’s Stephanie!” and I said, “my real name is Tiffany!” and we both laughed. It wasn’t really that funny, but LOL anyway.

So yeah, she kept apologizing for everything even though I told her that saying sorry is frowned upon in derby. Oh well! She did pretty swell, I’d say. (: It was her first day in her new skates, so she was really worried and thus kept looking at her feet. AW.

After all that, we got back to our thing. After a few hitting drills, Kate told me that I’d make a good hitter, which is always good news. It’s not because I’m particularly good at throwing myself at other skaters, it’s because I’m short. That and my hips are pretty sharp, hahaha. So I can’t really line my hips next to the other girl’s hips—I line them up to her thigh. And THAT’S the advantage. I can be the thigh hitter! Ha.

In other awesome news, I was jumping the apex and landed on all fours, which is pretty good (as it’s one of the basic falls) and when I got up, I realized that my left knee didn’t feel like someone stabbed it repeatedly!!! I’m so happy. :D My ~patella~ bruise must be GOING AWAY FOREVER. YES YES YES YES YES. I thought this would never happen. It was always so embarrassing to fall on it slightly and nearly yelp in agony. Also, it was painful…obviously.

Then blah blah blah we had races at the end. The winners got to get off the track and prepare to leave and I won my race. So that was cool. The girl turned to me and said, “you’re probably gonna smoke me ): ” LOL, nothing like a good compliment to boost my confidence. :3

Tuesday Nights: Derby (oh hell i didn’t even realize how long this is)

AW SHIT. Today was aaaaawesome. Sometimes, it’s really hard to explain exactly how great things are, so I’ll just give you guys some bullet points and you can pretty much figure out how it made me feel, yes? (:

• the new girls were on the end of the rink again, doing whatever it is that they do. it’s interesting that i never even notice them when we’re doing shit. like, if i see them, i can’t figure out what they’re doing. i know they were working on turn around toe stops tonight, but only because one of them told me.
• after warm ups and shit, we split into three packs and did the whole, “break through the two other packs” thing. i’ve got a pretty solid play where i come in through the outside and—wait, i shouldn’t reveal my ~secret~. hahaha, who cares, i can’t use it forever.
• weaving. was praised for my speed, so that made me feel nice. yeah, i guess i’m pretty swift. and agile. fucking love being agile.
• interesting pushing/pulling exercise.
• “catch the bunny” game thingy. i never got to be the bunny. ): but at least i blocked the hell out of one. awwww yeah.
• finally, we did a game with props! one foam stick thingy. we got to use the ENTIRE floor for this (not just the track!), well, except for where the beginners were. anyway, the girl with the stick thing had to chase us around and hit us until there was no one left standing. GUESS WHO WON THE SECOND ROUND? ME. (:
• that was it! what really made me happy was that people have taken to calling me by my derby name and not just plain old Tiffany. :D when i was taking my skates and gear off later, this beginner girl who was sitting about six feet away told me, “it’s supposed to be napoleon, right??” and i was like, “YEAH, THAT’S IT” and she said she had been trying to figure out what it was supposed to mean and finally got it when she said it faster. of course, my derby name isn’t napoleon, hahaha. that would be crazy. if you know it, you’re awesome. if you don’t, you can wait. wink! …unless you’ve read my FYRG columns. then yeah, everyone who reads it knows.
• oh yeah, there’s this lady who always brings her son with her. i think it’s super adorable the way he’s always watching and yeah, it’s not creepy. even though he’s like seventeen. when we were having our water break, he came to ask her how her bearings were doing. AWWWWW.