I'm rather proud of my family's Irish heritage. Most of you have likely seen the family shield tattoo I have on my left shoulder, and the motto it bears: Nunquam Non Paratus. It means "Never unprepared." I don't normally toot my own horn, but twice this weekend, I proved true to the motto, being ready with just the right things in a pinch.
Saturday: At the SCDC v. SIRG double header, Democracy Inaction (one of the refs) sheared off his kingpin in the middle of the first bout. For my non-derby people, that means he broke his skates in a manner not-easily repairable. As it turned out, I had the pair of skates that I attempted to learn how to skate on last Fall in the back of my truck. Not fabulous skates by any reckoning, but not the bottom of the barrel either. And, they fit him. So, I provided a ref with an emergency pair of skates so he could finish out the night. Granted, he replaced my wheels with his for the rest of the night, but that's ok. Stock wheels are really cheap to begin with.
Sunday: Scrimmage this Sunday was fairly painful: we had three injuries on the track. Fortunately, none were super serious. One person just had the wind knocked out of her really well, one had an old knee injury act up, and another turned her ankle (it seemed). For the latter two instances, yours truly helped each girl off the track by more-or-less picking her up and letting her trail one skate on the ground. (There are benefits to being a big guy...) But, that's not where the In-A-Pinch award for this instance came from. The last girl needed some help getting out to her car. Guess who had a walking stick ready to help her keep weight off the bad foot? We got my shillelagh from the car, and she was able to get about.
Yeah, I know, they're minor instances of providence, but still, it was neat that I was the guy who had just what was needed in a pinch.
Wednesday, May 1, 2013
*Insert Grouchy Snarl Here*
It wouldn't be the change of the seasons without me getting a sinus infection. Add to that a nice case of plantar fasciitis, and my day is just made. And so it is now that I am become a grouchy bear. I've got my antibiotics and am waiting for them to take effect. That said, today reminded me why I prefer to be active at night: I really don't like dealing with the general public.
Example 1: After getting my meds, I left HyVee and got into my car. As I was backing out (with Jim Chappelow in the space opposite me, by pure coincidence), some kid in a suit literally runs behind my car, stops, and makes a mad dash back as I slam on the brakes. Someone must not have explained to him what those funny white lights on the back of a vehicle mean...
Example 2: Right after nearly crushing a stupid child, I head to drop off my suit at the cleaners for my interview on Friday. Coming to a three-way stop, I stop. (Weird how that works, huh?) Some stupid blonde girl pulls up, slows down, and proceeds to cruise on through right as I start to go through the intersection, nearly taking off my front end. Fortunately, my mad braking skills saved me once again. She, of course, didn't let it faze her that she had nearly caused a serious accident through her own neglect.
Dear Lord, save me from humanity. Damn you kids, get off my lawn!
Example 1: After getting my meds, I left HyVee and got into my car. As I was backing out (with Jim Chappelow in the space opposite me, by pure coincidence), some kid in a suit literally runs behind my car, stops, and makes a mad dash back as I slam on the brakes. Someone must not have explained to him what those funny white lights on the back of a vehicle mean...
Example 2: Right after nearly crushing a stupid child, I head to drop off my suit at the cleaners for my interview on Friday. Coming to a three-way stop, I stop. (Weird how that works, huh?) Some stupid blonde girl pulls up, slows down, and proceeds to cruise on through right as I start to go through the intersection, nearly taking off my front end. Fortunately, my mad braking skills saved me once again. She, of course, didn't let it faze her that she had nearly caused a serious accident through her own neglect.
Dear Lord, save me from humanity. Damn you kids, get off my lawn!
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
The Classes of Derby Participant
Roller Derby is a complex sport. Fun as hell to watch, but it can be a little confusing the first time. And, if you know a derby person, you will hear all kinds of jargon thrown about: soul crush, mohawk, zeeb, etc. When talking about the different roles derby people play, this is no exception. So, to clarify a little for the non-derby people I know, this is a guide to the jargon/nicknames I've encountered for the various classes of Derby Participants. These roles are not mutually exclusive, and I probably forgot someone or a different name they go by.
1. Skaters: This group is fairly straightforward. These are the players of the game. They're out on the track, busting ass and scoring points.
2. Coaches: People who are not skating, but rather advising the team on tactics as the game progresses. Most frequently seen yelling at or otherwise arguing with the Refs.
3. Referees: People on skates wearing black/white vertical striped shirts. These are the one calling score, looking for penalties, and ensuring safe gameplay occurs. There are normally three Outside Pack Refs (OPRs), two Inside Pack Refs (IPRs), two Jam Refs (JRs), and one from those who serves as the Head Ref. AKA: Refs, Zebras, Team Zeeb
4. Non-Skating Officials: These are the people on the track who take care of the paperwork associated with a game. Non-skating officials don't wear skates or safety gear. (Wild idea, huh?) They are tasked with assisting the Refs in the course of their duties, keeping track of score, time in the penalty box, penalties accrued, and other things like operating the scoreboard. Like the refs, there is also a Head NSO who is responsible for the bout paperwork. AKA: NSOs, Stat Rats, the Stat Pack
5. Committee and Board Members: These are the real magic behind the derby. Most skaters serve on some kind of committee or the executive board: marketing, events, equipment, coaching, and so on. These people are the ones who help get the bouts lined up to play, make sure the venues are rented, handle the money, and generally keep everything on track. But, most of the things they do are behind the scenes, and so they are very appropriately called Unicorns.
6. Derby Widows: This term is jokingly used to describe husbands of derby playing women. However, this is not necessarily true, as husbands will often become involved themselves, serving as coaches, referees, NSOs, or even participating in men's derby.
7. Derby Wives: Derby is all about teamwork, and, oftentimes, two skaters will develop a particularly strong friendship through the sport. They are then said to be "derby wives", and act as each others' confidants, accountability partners, and overall best friend. Note: While having a "derby husband" is technically possible among Widows, I have not heard of any such thing actually occurring. I did receive such a proposal once, but declined due to the intoxicated nature of the other party.
1. Skaters: This group is fairly straightforward. These are the players of the game. They're out on the track, busting ass and scoring points.
2. Coaches: People who are not skating, but rather advising the team on tactics as the game progresses. Most frequently seen yelling at or otherwise arguing with the Refs.
3. Referees: People on skates wearing black/white vertical striped shirts. These are the one calling score, looking for penalties, and ensuring safe gameplay occurs. There are normally three Outside Pack Refs (OPRs), two Inside Pack Refs (IPRs), two Jam Refs (JRs), and one from those who serves as the Head Ref. AKA: Refs, Zebras, Team Zeeb
4. Non-Skating Officials: These are the people on the track who take care of the paperwork associated with a game. Non-skating officials don't wear skates or safety gear. (Wild idea, huh?) They are tasked with assisting the Refs in the course of their duties, keeping track of score, time in the penalty box, penalties accrued, and other things like operating the scoreboard. Like the refs, there is also a Head NSO who is responsible for the bout paperwork. AKA: NSOs, Stat Rats, the Stat Pack
5. Committee and Board Members: These are the real magic behind the derby. Most skaters serve on some kind of committee or the executive board: marketing, events, equipment, coaching, and so on. These people are the ones who help get the bouts lined up to play, make sure the venues are rented, handle the money, and generally keep everything on track. But, most of the things they do are behind the scenes, and so they are very appropriately called Unicorns.
6. Derby Widows: This term is jokingly used to describe husbands of derby playing women. However, this is not necessarily true, as husbands will often become involved themselves, serving as coaches, referees, NSOs, or even participating in men's derby.
7. Derby Wives: Derby is all about teamwork, and, oftentimes, two skaters will develop a particularly strong friendship through the sport. They are then said to be "derby wives", and act as each others' confidants, accountability partners, and overall best friend. Note: While having a "derby husband" is technically possible among Widows, I have not heard of any such thing actually occurring. I did receive such a proposal once, but declined due to the intoxicated nature of the other party.
Tuesday, April 23, 2013
SRG and MWGF
This last weekend was full of all manner of awesomeness. It started Saturday morning (after a sleepless night) with Columbia's first comic convention, Midwest Geekfest. This took place at the Carfax building; so, we had really nice facilities. I got to throw dice in an RPG for the first time in ages. Granted, it was D&D 4.0 (aka World of Warcraft, Tabletop Edition), but I got to play. Then, I got to run one. They had some GMs cancel at the last minute, and I volunteered to help them out. I ran a Pathfinder module for 1st Level characters, and boy howdy, let me tell you how that went awry.
Oftentimes, stories of "Let me tell you about my fictional character's exploits" can be quite tedious. Lord knows, I've done it enough times. But, this bears repeating. It was your typical laundry list of things to do from the man in charge. One of the tasks was to secure a crate full of books and documents from an old, abandoned warehouse in a harbor district. The warehouse was at the end of a dock, elevated above the bay. The setup was fairly basic, with a simple trap on the case that would take some thinking to get around. They managed instead to crash the entire warehouse into the bay, completely losing the documents in question. Still, fun was had by all.
Fast forward through some schmoozing at the end of the day, and I end up at the home of my dear friend Squiggles, one of the Dames.* She, among others, kindly volunteered to help me with my makeup for the MWGF Costume Contest at the afterparty. I went as Clown/Violator from the 1997 movie Spawn, based on the Todd McFarlane comic series. In short, Squig did fantastic work, and, despite a few hitches with the latex baldcap**, the costume went off magnificently. I won the contest, which was graded by audience applause. Not to be immodest, but I think it was the life I added to it that made the whole thing work. I've already got the body type for the character, but I made a point of learning John Leguizamo's raspy voice for the character and the squat-legged walk he had to make the character shorter. So, I ended the night drinking with friends and pocketing a gift certificate to Valhalla's Gate.
The fun wasn't over yet, though. No sooner than I had gotten home and taken off one shoe (about 3:30am), I recieved an emergency phone call from a friend visiting from out of town. She was intoxicated and had been abandoned on the side of the road by a guy I thought was a friend. There's gonna be hell to pay on that one. So, shoe went back on, and I drove across town for a pickup. Took said friend back to my place where she slept it off in my guest bedroom.
Saw her off the next morning, and then caught a couple hours sleep before driving to Springfield to work the mock sanctioned bout between MoKan Roller Girlz and the Springfield Roller Girls. So, a three-hour drive saw me to Springfield. I got to see lots of awesome people that I hadn't seen since Beat Me Halfway last year. It was a double header, and I actually got to watch the first bout of the night. That almost never happens. But, I had fun watching, no less. Got up from sitting and watching the first bout to work the second, and my wonderful chair, my massive collapsible throne with a 1000-lb test weight (supposedly) broke. Needless to say, I was rather put out about that. But, I had to put that aside: I had a bout to jam time. Did my job, and went to the afterparty. Two afterparties in as many days... Man, I hadn't realized I had become such a social creature. Who knew? Regardless, the afterparty was a little awkward at first, since none of the teams were my home team: I knew few people there. Fortunately, the ones who did know me found me, and we ended the night on a smashing note. Derby love goes out to Thugz 'n' Kisses, Bellatrix Le Pain, and Russelmania.
Thus went one of the more eventful weekends in recent memory. Worst part about the whole thing was everything I had to give up during it: time was precious, and EVERYTHING was happening this last weekend. In addition to MWGF and SRG v. MoKan, there was a MRDA*** bout in St. Louis, a planned departmental trip to Nashville****, my friend coming in from out of town, a triple birthday party for some of the Dames, and several other items of note that escape me at this moment. I really need to look into this cloning thing: might make my social calendar more manageable and help with the dissertation. Are there any cloners in the audience? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Anyone?
*The CoMo Derby Dames, a wonderful team of athletic women who get their jollies by beating the stuffing out of one another on roller skates, guided by the rules of the Women's Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA).
**Clown is mostly bald, so I opted to get a baldcap and affix some fake hair to it by unrolling jumbo cotton balls and hosing them down with hair spray. Worked pretty well, actually. Next time, though, I think I'll just suck it up and shave my head. Those baldcaps are hot and sticky, and they creep up when you sweat, even when you use spirit gum to lock 'em down.
***Men's Roller Derby Association. Like WFTDA, but with dudes.
****The trip never actually materialized, but that's beside the point. It might have had it been on a different weekend.
Oftentimes, stories of "Let me tell you about my fictional character's exploits" can be quite tedious. Lord knows, I've done it enough times. But, this bears repeating. It was your typical laundry list of things to do from the man in charge. One of the tasks was to secure a crate full of books and documents from an old, abandoned warehouse in a harbor district. The warehouse was at the end of a dock, elevated above the bay. The setup was fairly basic, with a simple trap on the case that would take some thinking to get around. They managed instead to crash the entire warehouse into the bay, completely losing the documents in question. Still, fun was had by all.
Fast forward through some schmoozing at the end of the day, and I end up at the home of my dear friend Squiggles, one of the Dames.* She, among others, kindly volunteered to help me with my makeup for the MWGF Costume Contest at the afterparty. I went as Clown/Violator from the 1997 movie Spawn, based on the Todd McFarlane comic series. In short, Squig did fantastic work, and, despite a few hitches with the latex baldcap**, the costume went off magnificently. I won the contest, which was graded by audience applause. Not to be immodest, but I think it was the life I added to it that made the whole thing work. I've already got the body type for the character, but I made a point of learning John Leguizamo's raspy voice for the character and the squat-legged walk he had to make the character shorter. So, I ended the night drinking with friends and pocketing a gift certificate to Valhalla's Gate.
The fun wasn't over yet, though. No sooner than I had gotten home and taken off one shoe (about 3:30am), I recieved an emergency phone call from a friend visiting from out of town. She was intoxicated and had been abandoned on the side of the road by a guy I thought was a friend. There's gonna be hell to pay on that one. So, shoe went back on, and I drove across town for a pickup. Took said friend back to my place where she slept it off in my guest bedroom.
Saw her off the next morning, and then caught a couple hours sleep before driving to Springfield to work the mock sanctioned bout between MoKan Roller Girlz and the Springfield Roller Girls. So, a three-hour drive saw me to Springfield. I got to see lots of awesome people that I hadn't seen since Beat Me Halfway last year. It was a double header, and I actually got to watch the first bout of the night. That almost never happens. But, I had fun watching, no less. Got up from sitting and watching the first bout to work the second, and my wonderful chair, my massive collapsible throne with a 1000-lb test weight (supposedly) broke. Needless to say, I was rather put out about that. But, I had to put that aside: I had a bout to jam time. Did my job, and went to the afterparty. Two afterparties in as many days... Man, I hadn't realized I had become such a social creature. Who knew? Regardless, the afterparty was a little awkward at first, since none of the teams were my home team: I knew few people there. Fortunately, the ones who did know me found me, and we ended the night on a smashing note. Derby love goes out to Thugz 'n' Kisses, Bellatrix Le Pain, and Russelmania.
Thus went one of the more eventful weekends in recent memory. Worst part about the whole thing was everything I had to give up during it: time was precious, and EVERYTHING was happening this last weekend. In addition to MWGF and SRG v. MoKan, there was a MRDA*** bout in St. Louis, a planned departmental trip to Nashville****, my friend coming in from out of town, a triple birthday party for some of the Dames, and several other items of note that escape me at this moment. I really need to look into this cloning thing: might make my social calendar more manageable and help with the dissertation. Are there any cloners in the audience? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Anyone?
*The CoMo Derby Dames, a wonderful team of athletic women who get their jollies by beating the stuffing out of one another on roller skates, guided by the rules of the Women's Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA).
**Clown is mostly bald, so I opted to get a baldcap and affix some fake hair to it by unrolling jumbo cotton balls and hosing them down with hair spray. Worked pretty well, actually. Next time, though, I think I'll just suck it up and shave my head. Those baldcaps are hot and sticky, and they creep up when you sweat, even when you use spirit gum to lock 'em down.
***Men's Roller Derby Association. Like WFTDA, but with dudes.
****The trip never actually materialized, but that's beside the point. It might have had it been on a different weekend.
Monday, April 22, 2013
The Saga Begins...
I finally decided to start a blog. You may now cue the cheering heard at the news of Sir Robin's minstrels being eaten. There is all kinds of fun stuff that occurs in my life, and every now and again, I want to expound upon it in greater detail, for which Facebook and other social media is rather ill-suited. So, this will be infrequently updated, but the writings here will ostensibly be meatier than what you might find on Das Gesichtbuch. They will include rants, reflections, and sometimes simple regalings. Lord knows I love to tell a story. This will be serve as a public outlet and searchable repository of some of those tales.
D.
D.
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