Diary of a London Rollergirl

I'm really bummed Cyclone Bea left :( She really was the spirt of the whole league. She was always nice to everyone and encouraged everyone and it just sucks ass that she's not going to be there anymore. I was thinking maybe I want to do the ref thing. Well we gotta learn how to ref anyway so I guess I can decide later. I dunno...i'm just pretty sad that shit had to go down that way.

ugh not enough things to do at work so basically troll ebay and ended up buying new bearings, bearing cleaner, bearing lube (yea lube), and wheels. Yeah new bearings and wheels!! mine are sqweeky and tend to slip on that indoor surface. A couple of times while going around counter clockwise i felt my left leg slip out but, I didn't fall. Also I want my new knee pads to come in damn it!! Grrr fuckers take to long on the mail order. You'd think in a country less then the size of CA they could get shit to London within a couple of days. So yeah, sock hop yesterday. It didn't seem very full but maybe it's because the venue is so big. I spent most of the time chatting with my friend who I haven't seen in over two years in Tokyo so that was nice. Cyclone Bea and I had our pics take together because we were both wearing beehives. The bowlers next to us seemed to be impressed because they took our pictures too for some reason. I don't really want to see the pictures with me in it. Damn it why do people have to be such cam whores and want to put their pics out on the internet? Damn myspace/suicide girls/famous for nothing bullshit! grr!!! I was talking to one of the other girls in the group and we were thinking that once things get off the ground that we should do something for charity. Like a battered womans shelter or something. I think it would be good to use the publicity that roller girls will get for something useful other then self promotion, cam whoring bullshit.

Derby, derby, derby...it's about all I think about. Networking with derby girls in Nor cal so when I go home for the holidays I can hang out with them and practice. Going to crazy churches in Islington trying to find places. Old ladies in Greenwich park stopping their scooters to ask if i'm "ok" because I was laying on the ground in some weird stretching position. Bless that little old lady...I wonder if she would of given me a ride in the basket of her rascal. I feel so proactive yesterday by getting rid of all my flyers! fuck yeah go me! Greenwich has lots of great kitsh shops and retro clothing stores. I got my beehive at one which is super rad. I told Danielle about my beehive idea and she went out and bought a pink one off ebay. Oh and a derby ebay shopping spree of new bearings and knee pads. It was cool to have Moe from Rat City there yesterday. She was really helpful. I'm wondering how saturday is going to be with the texan guy there. I told my neighbor and two girls I met when I lived in Tokyo who live here about the party on sunday. One is for sure coming which is cool. She said something like " This Rollergirl thing sounds rather scary." I don't think she knows that I'm on the team. Bwhahahaha. Just call me Danger Woman! I've got to write one of those profile thingys. I'm stuck on a theme song...I was thinking either Bondage up yours! by x ray spex or maybe super rad by aquabats. I really like the ska-y-ness of aquabats and they make me happy but then again I kinda want to pick a strong female song too and X ray spex are just so good. lol not that it really matters really but hey, i guess it's going to represent my personality in someway so whatever.

I've had this fucker for a while and yet to post on it. Being an avid Anti-Myspace person I thought LJ would be the best place to air my thoughts and trails and tribulations about derby, London, Uk or whatever pops into my head.

So it all began when: I've known about derby for a while. I've seen some bouts and always thought it seemed fun but I was too chicken shit to try out (seeing as I didn't know how to skate and all.) Long story short I moved to London and last May I was walking near Green Park and I saw this girl on quads gliding through the crowd. That got me thinking "do they have roller derby here?!" So I got online and I'll be god damned that a leauge just started up. I emailed Cyclone Bea she assured me that people of all levels were welcome. So I got my nerve up and went down there to watch a practice(after getting horribly fucking lost in Whitechaple.) I was hooked so I bought a pair of quads off skate attack and went down to hyde park for my first ever practice. Oh yes that good idea on mypart. First off I haven't skated since I was oh...11 and then my skates have indoor wheels so every bump, rock, twig and other random crap made me fall and I was wearing this commicly huge rucksack that I had bought to store all my gear in. I was just falling all over the place. I remember Danielle being really nice and skating slowly next to me and trying to give me pointers as a drifted uncontrolably toward a pond. Yea so I didn't have the best first skating experience. So newbies, don't go out in Hyde park or whatever park is nearest to you without first changing to outdoor wheels and practicing a bit. Oh yeah there were also all the roller blade assholes, disco skaters and those people on the weird roller ski things out there...not to mention kids, dogs (have they ever heard of leash laws in this fucking country?), walkers etc to watch out for. I passed my skates on to Melissa after my first loop. I think one run through the humiliation gauntlet was enough for that day.

Since then things have improved somewhat. I'm still scared when I first start out at practices but once I get warmed up I feel better. I really need to work on cross overs, turns...well everything really but my first goal will be cross overs and turns. I envy the people who can skate backwards fast.

Oh yeah I'll have to post some of the pics I took at SLP Night last July and some pics I've taken just during practice. God I'm boring myself here. Oh well a semi-intresting story Sugar Kane, Nici and I were scouting out a location last night in a North London park and we totally got locked inside. Nice of them to tell us the park was closing Jesus! We squeezed out through a gap in the fence.