Tuesday, December 7

Rolling Stoners Debut

This past Friday, Guns N Rollers Awnry O'Hulligan, Bella Massacre, Dirty Ann Rotten, Harajuke A Girl, Harriet The Sly, Havana Good Time, and Micro Bruiser hooked up with a fistful of High Rollers at the hangar to meet Cherry City's 8-Wheel Assassins on the track.

Their meeting came off a lot like a meeting between a Starbucks window and a protester at a G20 summitG20 summitG20 summit, and it was a great example of how bouts are decided by the pack not by jammers. It's not uncommon to hear jammers described as the "quarterbacks" of derby, and while jammers often do, like football quarterbacks, determine how their team will try to score points, they're always also the ball. The jammer may initiate some plays and determine her own action, but just as much as she does that, she's also the object that the rest of her team moves around the track to score points by opening holes and lanes that allow her to pass opposing blockers.

Control of the pack was what allowed Cherry City to keep putting up points while denying points to the Stoners. The Stoners were a party-mix of new Rose City skaters who had a hard time communicating with each other and responding to each other's moves within the pack and who often found themselves reacting individually to Cherry City skaters. Cherry City, by contrast, were all more experienced skaters who knew much better what to expect of each other and who could better manipulate the Stoners into weaker positions and give their own jammers easy scoring passes.


Despite being smashed to bits under Cherry City's skates, there were a lot of individual bright spots on the track for GnR fans.

Micro Bruiser delivered macro bruises to several surprised Cherry City skaters. I kept thinking of that smarmy green oven-mitt thing in The Empire Strikes Back: "Judge me by my size do you? Hmm?"


Havana Good Time had some trouble staying upright in Turn 2 (she blames her new wheels—whatever), but she showed great speed and strong footwork. SheHavana Good Time

Havana Good Time lays a solid hit on Squid Vicious.

She and teammate Bella MassacreBella Massacre and Curry Fury

Elbow tight, all shoulder into Curry Fury: Bella Massacre has great hits!

Bella Massacre delivered solid hits with textbook form—Harajuke A GirlHarajuke A Girl

I think that's Curry Fury getting an introduction to Harajuke A Girl's street style.

Harajuke A Girl too.


Dirty Ann Rotten showed how skaters can easily rack up three consecutive minutes in the penalty box.

On her way to the box, she picked up a second minute (probably for clicking her mouth guard out before she was seated in the box).

Then before she could even re-enter play, she was sent back to the box for another minute (likely for failing to put her mouth guard back in or for leaving the box before the penalty timer actually released her). Oops. :/


Something should also be said, I think, about Awnry O'Hulligan.

I have no idea what Awnry could possibly be doing to Cherry City's Squeeze Box there, nor do I remember seeing it happen (because I averted my innocent eyes), but Squeeze Box seems to be as, um, surprised as I am.

I'm sure we'd all appreciate any light that could be shed on this. Thank you!

(Also, Awnry appears to have tried something similar with her fellow Rolling Stoner Tits N Assphault hereAwnry O'Hulligan and Tits N Assphault

Why is everyone laughing? TNA looks like she's about to cry.

here.)


Finally, I would like to congratulate Smack Ya Sideways for making it through an entire bout without even a minor penalty.

Yes, I know she was coaching the 8-Wheel Assassins, but she's been sent out for lesser things before.

I kept expecting her to get a major for being on the track without proper safety equipment at least.

Or running clockwise to pull extra skaters out of the line up.


One more thing: If you aren't at the GnR Ugly Christmas Sweater Party this Saturday, PunchkinPunchkinPunchkin will have words with you.


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Monday, November 29

Ugly Christmas Sweater Party

The Guns N Rollers are throwing an Ugly Christmas Sweater party!


It doesn't matter if you don't celebrate Christmas: if you've hung around with the GnR over a holiday or two, you probably already know that the GnRs' winter holiday of choice is EZmas, which also happens to fall on December 25.

Unfortunately, there are no ugly EZmas sweaters. And while there may be other Ugly Sweaters, Christmas provides a black hole to which Ugly Sweaters are drawn.

Christmas is an ultimate convergence of synthetic fibers into tasteless patterns.

It is a great woolly conjunction of 8-bit graphics Santas. A Sturm und Drang of tacky snowmen. A noxious, fumy cauldron of decorated fir trees. It is a knitted R'lyeh where sleeps a red-and-white-striped Cthulhu hemmed with tiny jingle bells.

It is a yarny apocalypse of dancing reindeer.


And you are invited to celebrate the horror that is Ugly Christmas Sweaters on Saturday 11 December with dancing to bitchin' 80s pop at the Water Heater at 750 N. Fremont in Portland.

$7 cash gets you in the door. Or $5 and a can of food. (No beets.)


Ugly Christmas Sweaters are not required. But really, what's the effing point of celebrating the Ugly Christmas Sweater if you aren't going to wear one?


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The Hiatus Is Still Over

Weeeeeeee're back!

Yes, it's been a few years months since I last posted anything here but I am not (yet) dead.

It was a busy off-season: I'd only just recovered from chanting "We're Number Three!" over and over again after the Guns N Rollers' glorious 3rd-place victory back in June, when it was time to cheer on the Wheels of Justice at the Hometown Throwdown. And as soon as that hangover wore off, it was time to head to Sacramento for the WFTDA Western Region tournament.

(I'd like to thank the Sacred City Derby Girls for choosing a venue where no one cared what you brought in with you. Why bother with a tiny little flask when you can fill your bag with whole bottles of liquor? Which you could conveniently purchase at the CVS two blocks away.)

There was also my broken leg.


But now we've all enjoyed our little break, we've celebrated Thanksgiving ("Thank you for the very nice land we'll take from you now," or "Thank you for the blankets and the small pox," depending on your ancestry) with turkey (or a cruelty-free susbstitute), and it's time to get ready for a new season of Rose City Rollers hometown derby.

We've lost some GnRs along the way:

  • Boxcar Bethy moved to Ontario (for someone who insists she's not Canadian, she sure lives in Canada a lot)
  • Evilia D. Stroiu moved to Hawaii
  • Suki Hana became pregnant, then a mother
  • Mercyful Kate smashed up her tibia and fibula, moved back up to Olympia, and broke her tib again, and
  • Hard Knox and Fist O'Fury have chosen "real" life over derby

And we've picked up some new GnRs during the off-season:
  • Dirty Ann Rotten
  • Harajuke A Girl
  • Havana Good Time and
  • Awnry O'Hulligan

You can see all of them plus some other newer GnRs skate this Friday against Cherry City at the hangar at Oaks Park. (General admission tix are still available here.)


Finally, the GnR have chosen new captains to lead them through the 2011 season: PunchkinPunchkin

Punchkin: New GnR Captain
(Only publicly available image.)

Punchkin and Sugar & ViceSugar & Vice

New GnR Captain: Sugar & Vice
(Only publicly available image.)

Sugar & Vice, who will tell me nothing about how they spent the off-season.


So get ready to shred some furious licks, wail on your axes, and throw some horns!

(You do have season tickets, right?)


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