Promo video for the Lafayette Brawlin' Dolls

I'm quick off the mark for choosing my part in group projects - I do not want to be the sucker stuck writing the five-page supporting essay. Happily, I got to make the video to go along with the rest of our marketing project for LBD, and here is the result! The quality looks really shoddy on youtube; I don't know why but it makes me very sad.

And the knitting spree continues

This has to be the most labour-intensive and most difficult project I've ever actually finished. The number of four-inch-long, never-to-be-legwarmers knitted panels I have lying around is astounding, so I'm probably prouder of myself than I should be for finishing this hat. I used a pattern from ravelry.com called Intuitive, although I used bigger needles and yarn than the designer did, and didn't adjust the number of stitches to cast on - I've always been of the belief that I have this unfathomably huge head, but it appears this isn't the case. So the hat is kind of big; I think I'll have to put some elastic in the ribbed part so it stays on my unfortunately-normal-sized head.

The BF is in Japan for the week, and as such missed out on the second annual Dannygiving (which also happened to be my first proper Thanksgiving celebration), during which I drank no less than half a gallon of Grown Up Eggnog (I made it myself, and, I don't mean to brag, it tasted like it was made by the gods themselves) and ate my weight in turkey, candied yams (henceforth known as "yammy pudding") potatoes, green bean casserole, and many, many pies. Thus far Thanksgiving is my favourite American holiday, by a mile. It is the one time a year that you're actually encouraged to not hide the fact that you're a fat-ass glutton. Obviously, this sits well with me.

When I was 22

First ever F-Off huge pumpkin at a pumpkin patch in Lafayette, IN

At the age of 22, I:

-       moved overseas

-       spent time in three countries

-       Visited more than twenty cities, in more than 15 different states.

-       Lived in a college dorm (FML)

-       Navigated my way through NYC, Toronto and Ottawa, as well as countless airports all by myself.

-       Studied abroad for a year

-       Was accepted to complete my degree overseas

-       Joined a roller derby team

-       Overcame my crippling social retardation and can now almost function in most social situations

-       Saw Spoon in concert

-       Lived without a car for one year, for the first time since I was 17

-       Lost 15 lbs

-       Met more incredible people than I could even possibly count

-       Learned to really appreciate good beer

-       Didn’t die

When I was 22, I

-       saw snow

-       ate pulled pork

-       ate smores

-       experienced Thanksgiving

-       experienced Halloween

-       experienced Fall

-       got stitches

-       played dodgeball

-       got an A at university

-       competed in an actual team sport

-       saw a huge pumpkin

-       went to Homecoming

-       went to an apple orchard

-       went to Canada

-       sang karaoke

for the very first time in my life.

My favourite bands when I was 22 were The Smiths, The Cure, Beck, Spoon, They Might Be Giants, Ben Folds, The Hives.

My heroes when I was 22 were David Sedaris, Suzy Hotrod, Eddie Izzard, Bonnie Thunders, Michael Cera, Quadzilla, Kristen Wiig, C. D. Payne, and your mum. 

My favourite foods when I was 22 were pulled pork sandwiches, French fries, bacon, and beer. Ha ha! Thanks, America, you sonofabitch. I’m confident that when the novelty wears off, I’ll go back to normal food again. I have this strange thing with eating food that isn’t normally available to me, even if it’s really bad. For instance, I really don’t like stuff that’s pumpkin flavoured, but I’ll buy it every chance I get and choke it down, just because I never had the option before. Same goes for root beer. Jon says he won’t be allowing me to buy either of these things anymore, now that he knows the truth.

I feel as thought the enormity of the last year makes up for the mediocrity of the previous 21. One of my friends who is quite a bit younger than me told me how I had done and seen so much more than she had, but I reminded her that this is literally more than I did in the first twenty one years of my life put together. 

In any case, I'm kicking myself and trying to figure out why I didn't decide to do the 365 project, because this has been an effing amazing 365 days.

Well, I guess there's always next year.

Feelin' Knitty

I have been feeling knitty over the last couple of weeks. I think it's because I find the repetition and the act of physically making something soothing, when I'm constantly up researching and writing papers and reading exorbitant amounts of fiction for the literature classes I over-ambitiously chose three months ago. Or, maybe it's because it's cold as shit and I'm too poor to buy clothes. Either way, I'm really enjoying it. I just finished this divinely chunky scarf with a wooden button, a pattern by Jane Richmond, who I now officially have a craft crush on. 

I'm currently knitty a slouchy beanie; my first foray into circular needles thus far looking promising. I'll upload a photo and a link to the pattern once I'm done! I don't want to show you what I'm aiming for yet, because if and when my hat turns into a tangled clump of wool resembling a soggy pancake, I don't want people ridiculing me and making my immense shame any worse.

As I sat on the bus last week on my way to have coffee with my super cool new friends, knitting my scarf and listening to Pomplamoose covering Mrs Robinson, excited to see Jon and full of butterflies for that weekend's bout, I realised something important: my life is awesome. And, surprisingly, it wasn't the huge deal of living overseas that made me realise that - it was silly little things, like laughing and drinking coffee and fawning over my half-scarf. 

Speaking of being overjoyed, it's my birthday tomorrow - look at the present I got from the sweetest girl in the world. Literally, Steph is the sweetest girl in the world - and I can say that now, because I've been to the world. I'm going to take my new Diana camera to Chicago with and me and buy some 120 film so I can get some great photos of the WFTDA roller derby Championships, and of Jon, my friends and I buffooning around the city. 

How not to holiday

Ottawa, ON

August 2010

I am a spectacularly crap tourist. Once upon a time, when planning holidays, I would spend the month leading up to my trip researching my destination to within an inch of its life. How do I get downtown from the airport? Where is the airport? Where should I stay? What should I do? Where do the locals eat? Where can I see a band? Do they have a good art gallery? Where can I get a crème brulee? Should I bring thermal underwear? And, speaking of underwear, is there a laundromat close enough that I won’t have to resort to the ol’ 'inside out 'n' back to front'?

For my first overseas trip, I constructed an enormous Word document featuring a hideously detailed itinerary, a backup itinerary in case anything on my real itinerary turned out to be lame or a scam, and contact details for any and all airports, hotels, and car rental companies I might come into contact with. I researched public transport options from the airport to downtown, then put together a walking map from the drop-off point to my hotel. I then printed the whole thing out and had it bound together - I was basically a fanny pack and a sun visor away from being a 50-year-old Floridian woman.

These days, however, my forward planning involves booking a flight, and, if I’m lucky, finding somewhere to put my stuff and sleep for the week. The situation deteriorates even more so, should I find myself travelling alone. I arrive in the airport at my destination, excited but largely disorientated and confused, and head directly towards the giant wall of brochures that every plane station invariably features. I make sure to grab a good city map, and then proceed to furiously molest the display, rabidly snatching up every brochure I can see - these will constitute my itinerary for the trip. After tracking down some sort of transportation from the airport to my hotel, I use the drive downtown, not to look at my surroundings, but to sift through my hefty brochure loot. It's at this point I normally realize that I have three copies of most things, and that half of them are advertising elderly walking tours and scenic helicopter rides – i.e. largely unappealing, and/or for millionaires only. After whittling out the lemons, I’m usually left with maybe two ideas for things to do, which might keep me going for about one afternoon.

For some reason, the idea of being alone for an extended period of time is generally accompanied by that paralyzing fear we all know and love, regardless of the situation. Whether I've gotten lost in a Super Target for days and haven't been able to find a single staff member, or if I'm travelling in a beautiful and fascinating city, the ominous feeling of my impending loneliness is always the same. I become overwhelmed by the prospect of having to find enough activities to occupy myself for the whole time, and invariably end up running errands for the duration of my holiday. Suddenly I realise that replacing the screen protector on my iPod Touch is my first and only priority. I mean, the corners of my current one are peeling up, they're losing their stickiness - we're talking life and death. I can't fathom how I didn't recognize the severity of the situation until just now - and what luck, that I should have this week away from all my responsibilities to devote 100% of my focus to the task of acquiring a new one. And this is a recurring phenomenon - when I was in Ottawa last month, I visited six different Shoppers Drug Marts one day trying to find a Neutrogena cleanser I had seen in SELF magazine on my flight up there and realized I couldn't live without. 

So if you ever find yourself traveling somewhere with me, I apologize - but you have to realize that if I don't find a place to get a haircut immediately, we're both going to be in trouble. 

Reasons I am an Idiot, #481

What I meant to say at the beginning of the whip/plow drill: 
"Do you want to whip first, or do you want to be whipped?"

What I actually said at the beginning of the whip/plow drill:
"Do you want to plow first, or do you want to be plowed?"

I'm extremely fortunate, in that my teammates don't seem to mind the fact that I am an imbecile. Or, perhaps they think that it's because I'm foreign, and I might be normal in my own country.

Either way, I think we can all agree that I should never operate heavy machinery, or give directions to anyone.

I heart Verhoeven

I hope you won't judge me when I tell you how hilarious I find this tweet.

Reasons why September will be awesome

Summer in America was a strange time for me. It felt a lot like what I imagine living in a black hole would be like, with a touch of Groundhog Day thrown in for good measure. In my various eavesdroppings around the coffee shop in which I may as well live for the amount of time I spend here, I've heard people complaining about how fast the summer went. It had the complete opposite feeling for me - I had nothing to do all day for about three months except go to roller derby practice, clean the house, and muck around with my friends. I had a ridiculous sleeping pattern, normally sleeping from 2am until midday, then waking up feeling completely disoriented and...blank, somehow. It felt like I was living in a bizarre alternate universe, where school or employment didn't exist.

I find it really hard to be productive in any way, shape or form when I have no regular routine or daily schedule - and, as a result, I wrote a grand total of nothing for the whole summer. Inexplicably, now that I'm incredibly busy again, I'm feeling inspired to write again and have started writing three different pieces. I'm hoping I'll get them finished, edited and tidied up in the next couple of weeks, because I'm feeling incredibly guilty for ignoring my poor blog this whole time (does anybody else feel like an absolute wanker using the word 'blog'? I feel like a pretentious turd when I say it. I shall henceforth call this site my digital portfolio. No, wait, that's almost worse).

In any case, I thought I'd kick start the semester slash month of September with an exercise in gratitude! Think of me as a poor, white Oprah, passing on my favourite things to all and sundry. Without further ado, I present to you: Reasons why September will be Awesome.

***

The new season of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. I can't even explain to you all the ways in which I love this show. It's a pretty incredible story: a bunch of friends wanted to make a TV show, so they did. They filmed their pilot for less than $100, presented it to a bunch of networks, and one of them picked it up. The end. This tumblr is incredible, by the by. Here are some of my favourites from it:

***

Three day weekend in t minus two days!

***

Indy's Irish Festival in downtown Indianapolis. The manfriend and I have three day passes - I'm going to drink a ton of beer and pet a leprechaun. 

***

Easy A comes out. I'm all about Emma Stone, and by golly, if Easy A doesn't look freaking awesome. When I first happened upon this video, I watched it about forty times consecutively. 

***

One of my derby heroes, Suzy Hotrod of Gotham City 

A month of intensive derby conditioning. After a crazy couple of months for the Lafayette Brawlin' Dolls (three bouts in seven days! Two five-hour road trips to away bouts in as many weeks!) we finally have a month off. That in no way means we have a month off, however, as we're changing up practices, implementing new drills, and skating more than ever. I'm skating about four days a week now and kicking my ass at practice - I really want to work on my endurance, and getting my five lap time down to 45 seconds. 

***

It's no longer so warm I get heat stroke on a daily basis. Up until about two weeks ago, it was so hot here every day and night that there was little else I could do beside sit on the floor in my bedroom (because that's where my window-mounted fan points) and watch TV on my laptop while not moving. It was starting to get really old.

***

The leaves start to turn. This is officially my first Fall ever, what what! We went to the Fort Harrison State Park last week and walked through the foresty bit, where I got to step on many a crunchy leaf! I can't tell you how excited I am for the whole place to look like this:

***

Getting to spend a heap of time with this guy:

I know, right? Go me.


***

This so closely resembles my own life that it's not even funny. 
 

New 30 Rock! Oh, Liz Lemon, you've come back for me! 

***

Finding a ton of sweet new music to listen to:

I love this 80s-sounding version even more than the one I have. Swoon!

You, my dears, are welcome.

All I Want Is You

This song by Barry Louis Polisar was (obviously) featured in the movie Juno. It is also totally going to feature very prominently in my wedding. To me, it sounds like lying in the grass in the sunshine, ankles intertwined with those of someone special, eating coconut ice and taking Polaroid photographs. For some reason, I think there are helium balloons there, too. 

A love affair with Mr Moran

I never, ever, ever, ever tire of listening to the comedy of Dylan Moran. My love for other comedians always seems to bloom really suddenly, but then wane just as briskly.

Other loves of mine include:

Mitch Hedberg

Lano and Woodley

This exact performance was the first time I ever heard of Flight of the Conchords, a few years ago. Look at Bret's hair!

What about you, do you too love stand up a scary amount? Who are your favourite comedians? I need to know!

Mitchell Mitchell, part 1

Awhile ago, I did a creative writing class, for which I had to write a short story. I posted it on my old blog, but have since edited it to within an inch of its life, so I thought I'd post it here, too. It's long as hell, as far as blog posts go, so I'm posting it one half at a time.

 Mitchell Mitchell

Mitchell Pace slams his bedroom door and collapses on top of the mound of crumpled sheets on his bed. He buries his face in a pillow, his broken arm splayed out beside him, as his mother bellows something in the direction of his bedroom from the bottom of the stairs. He doesn’t want to know what she’s carrying on about; it’s no doubt a continuation of her earlier tirade about what a waste of a gestation period he was. He hears a knock on his door, followed by the voice of his half-sister Dee.

“Mitch?”

“Piss off,” he says, his voice muffled by his pillow.

“It’s important.”

“Shit, Deanne, piss off! I don’t care.”

Uncool, Mitch, he scolds himself. Dee isn’t the one he’s pissed off with; it’s his raging wildebeest of a mother he should be yelling at. He rolls over onto his back and throws his good arm over his eyes, wishing he hadn’t just verbally abused the only family member he isn’t currently furious with. Mitchell’s mother had Dee 18 years ago with her first husband, who had been MIA for at 17 of those years. It has long been Mitchell’s theory that both he and Dee are adopted—he refuses to believe either of them could be related to their mother by blood. He could maybe see his father’s laidback-to-a-fault attitude in himself, but it would take every DNA test available to convince him of his relation to his mother, Ruth Pace nee Brock nee Samson.

At 6 feet and 3 inches, he is taller than his bed allows for, which leaves his black Chuck Taylors hanging off the end of it. This is probably for the best, since his shoes are filthy and falling apart—he doesn’t want to wipe six years’ worth of dirt all over his sheets. His stringy brown hair is almost at exactly the right length to cover his eyes, which would probably be churning out tears en masse right now if a boy could cry without being deemed a fag for the rest of his high school career. He wears the same pair of glasses he has worn since he was eleven years old – a thick, horn-rimmed pair his mother forced upon him back when only old men and poor kids wore them. He attributes their comeback in popular culture to a shared effort by himself and Woody Allen.

Mitchell’s sixteenth year of life could very well be described as nothing more than a series of unfortunate events. Somehow the world always gets his hopes up, only to dash them in a spectacular display of how God has the ultimate power to fuck one’s shit up, no matter how well one’s shit may be going. Mitchell could pinpoint exactly when disaster first struck: a seemingly innocuous Friday morning almost two months ago.

At 8:37 that morning, a departure time that would almost certainly make him late for school, Mitchell had dragged his bike out around the side of his house. And, much like every other morning, the barren branches of the dead trees that shrouded his house scratched his arm so deep it bled. He kicked an assortment of dirt and rocks at the offending tree, before setting off on the same route he took every day. While riding past a nondescript house that normally wouldn’t garner a second glance, something in its front window caught his eye—skin, and a lot of it. Mitchell’s eyes snapped into focus. There was a topless girl ironing in her living room! He was getting an eyeful of cans and it wasn’t even 9:00am yet! He smiled to himself as he mentally high fived the heavens.

He slowed to a near stop as he passed the house, craning his neck to make the most of this magnificent opportunity. From the corner of his eye, he suddenly saw something small and brown hurtling in his direction. He whipped his head around just in time to see the dachshund puppy running directly into his path. He instinctively jerked the handlebars of his bike to the left, plowing straight into the back of an old orange Corolla. The back of the car stopped his bike very effectively, but unfortunately Mitchell kept going—he flew straight over his handlebars, impulsively throwing his hands out in front of himself as the ground sped towards him.

His palms skidded along the hot, rough asphalt, and the rest of his body came hurtling after, eventually coming to a stop in a crumpled heap. Pain receptors instantly exploded all over his right side, as the throbbing tore up and down his body. The skin on his bare arms and legs burned with gravel rash as he rolled over to lie on his back. It was only now that he realized his right arm was hanging limply from the point where it had snapped, halfway down his humerus bone.

As Mitchell lay on the ground howling and firing off curse words in quick succession, the devil woman who distracted him with her enchanting boobies rushed out her front door towards him. She had pulled on the shirt she was ironing back-to-front, leaving the buttons open down her back.

“Oh, god,” she faltered as she got close enough to see Mitchell’s arm, already dialing the number for an ambulance on her phone. After relaying the details to the operator, she helped Mitchell stand and move off the road onto the footpath. He tried to apologize to Mrs. Boobies for the sizeable dent he had left in the back of her already shitty car, but the searing pain in his arm meant that speaking unnecessarily was not an option.  As he waited for the ambulance to arrive, Mitchell sat on the curb, nursing his lifeless arm and restlessly tapping his foot against his newfound enemy.

II

Mitchell stayed home from school for four days after his accident. One might think that the time off school was worth the eight weeks of immobility - his arm was in a full plaster cast from his knuckles to his armpit – but for Mitchell, it was torturous. When the doctor told Mitchell’s mother that he would need time of school, Mitchell swore he saw her eyes light up at the opportunity to torment him for the foreseeable future. And so, he spent the next several days listening to her ranting about whatever claptrap middle-aged women are interested in, and helping sort through old clothes to give to the Salvation Army. Unable to utilize his arm even for masturbatory purposes the whole time he was at home, Mitchell’s foul mood became even more so with each minute he spent listening to his mother’s ranting about the dangers of loud music and the virtues of lentils.

The day after his accident, Ruth had insisted Mitchell accompany her to buy groceries, citing her skepticism of his ability to look after himself at home alone. Mitchell’s mother, being a middle-aged woman with little to no modesty, embarrassed him on the vast majority of their outings together. She was, at one point, an attractive woman, who had simply failed to notice that this was no longer the case. Unfortunately for her, the sun damage, her stressful first marriage and years of smoking had exponentially sped up the aging process. Taking no heed of any of this, she continued to dress like a twenty year old and flirt mercilessly with every man who came within a 10-foot radius.

As Mitchell and his mother approached the cash registers with their groceries, Ruth made a beeline for the cashier who was about to take his current customer’s money. Ruth was a decidedly defensive shopper, whose no-holds-barred approach to buying groceries was the reason Mitchell vehemently refused to shop with her. It was not unheard of for Ruth to get into a loud and highly inappropriate verbal altercation with any person who challenged her position in line. Dee has been trying for years to convince Mitchell that their mother actually slapped a woman who cut in front of her once. When he asked his mother about it, she had just laughed, which always made him cringe. He had once made the observation to his sister that their mother’s laugh sounded like donkeys raping each other, and neither could help but think that ever since.  

“Start putting the stuff up, Mitchie, I forgot to get soap,” Ruth told Mitchell.

“No, let’s just go and get it and come back up.”

“That’s stupid; we’re right at the front of the line. I’ll be quick.”

“Mum, I don’t want to hold the guy up. You won’t be back in time.” Mitchell’s cheeks burned, as the teenaged checkout operator stared blankly at him, not yet swiping their purchases. Ruth switched into what Mitchell called Bitch Mod—her teeth clenched and her eyes narrowed; Mitchell was sure he actually saw the right one twitch.

“Mitchell. Stand there, and put the groceries on the frigging checkout,” she told him, before walking away. It was for this very reason that Mitchell so detested going out with his mother – the inadvertent public shamings she bestowed upon him every time without fail. She was completely oblivious to any nearby people, and wasn’t bashful about what she said in front of them

Mitchell began loading their groceries onto the checkout, halfheartedly fishing things out of the shopping trolley and tossing them towards the operator.

“What happened to your arm?” the checkout operator asked as he started scanning items more slowly than Mitchell had seen any human being move before. Mitchell eyed the nosy kid, whose red hair perfectly offset his scarlet-flushed, acne-riddled cheeks.

“Broke it.” Mitchell’s morose tone should have indicated to the operator that he had no interest in chatting, but the prying boy forged on.

“Yeah, but how? I broke my arm last year, ‘cause— ”

“Mitchell!” his mother’s voice rang out from the end of the personal care aisle, at least five metres away. Mitchell looked up to see his mother, who had her arms full of liquid soap pumps and refills, but was still not coming over to finish their transaction. He held out his open palms as if to ask what she was doing, wishing more than anything that she would stop yelling across the supermarket. Did other kids have to deal with this kind of behaviour? Waving his hand at her frantically, he motioned for her to hurry back.

“These are on sale so I grabbed a heap of them,” she nodded at the soap in her arms as she continued to call over shoppers’ heads, “can you see if I put tampons in the trolley? I don’t remember if I got them or not.”

Mitchell shut his eyes, praying to whoever would listen that no one he knew was here to witness this. He looked in the trolley and nodded solemnly to his mother that she had, in fact picked up tampons. He glanced at the checkout operator, unable to tell if the boy looked nauseous or terrified, both of which Mitchell thought were appropriate reactions to his mother.

Mitchell’s father Don was home from work by the time they returned from the grocery store. Mitchell found his father watching TV in his recliner, and wearing a t-shirt Mitchell had made him for Christmas in pre-school. He had painted a scene which featured the two of them decorating a Christmas tree, only neither of them had torsos – they both had only large heads with limbs attached to them.

“I like your shirt, Dad,” Mitchell said, the sarcasm oozing from his every word, “I wish I had one like it.”

“Oh, thanks,” his father said, examining Mitchell's six-year-old artistic skills, “I just found it in the top of my wardrobe before.” He looked up at Mitchell and grinned, “I could probably find the one you made for your mother if you really want to wear one.”

Mitchell calls his father’s look “Robert Goulet: The Golden Years”, and says that Don’s “glorious moustache” has set the bar for what he’d like to achieve by the time he is a father himself. Mitchell failed to see how someone as normal and likeable as his father could have tolerated Ruth for nearly two decades. He patted his father’s shoulder before lying on the ground next to the recliner. The pair had developed a ritual of watching Curb Your Enthusiasm together on Friday nights, and as the show began, Mitchell could not have been more grateful for the distraction from his overabundant woes. 

Lafayette Brawlin' Dolls vs. So Ill Roller Girls

As you can tell by this poster, the So Ill Roller Girls know some very talented people. We will be bouting the team from Marion, IL on July 17th, so if you're in the area you should mos def come along. With a name like "Smack to the Future"AND two games for the price of one, you know you're getting a sweet deal -  because when we hit 88mph, things are going to get heavy. Brown Paper Tickets has all the details, so do it up!

You heard the man

I made you a mix tape

There is little I can do in this hazy, cough-syrup-induced stupor. As such, over the past 72 hours my daily activities have included frequently napping whilst sweating profusely, watching TV, lying motionless on the couch, and coughing incessantly.

I was tired of feeling completely useless, so I wanted to do something mildly constructive that wouldn't prove too taxing on my currently feeble brain. And so, I present to you this extremely excellent Summer Mix Tape! I've included all of the songs I can't keep out of my head lately. I'd love to hear your recommendations, too!



I believe it will shuffle the songs, but these are the tracks I included:

Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal

Islands - Vapours

The Kooks - Always Where I Need To Be

The White Stripes - Hotel Yorba

Landon Pigg - High Times

At the Drive In - Pattern Against User

Beck - Sexx Laws

Ok Go - Bye Bye Baby

Spoon - You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb

Beck - Devil's Haircut

The Strokes - Reptilia

The Vines - Nothin's Comin'

He sure got Meyer's number

Admittedly, I'm verging on deliriously tired right now, but I was laughing so hysterically as I tried to read this to my friend that I could hardly breathe and had tears streaming down my face. It is even more hilarious if you have read the Twilight books (I'm not saying I have. Don't look at me like that! I'M A MONSTER!!!) and understand what this legitimate book reviewer is hinting at. Is it really as amazing as I thought, or was that the sleep deprivation talking?


my name is bella. bella swan. here's what stephenie didn't tell you. it's super-duper-important.

on the morning after it rained, it was rainy outside and i frowned at it being so rainy all the time. i chuckled to myself, darn weather! i stared at the rain outside, which is where they usually keep the rain. there was never any rain in phoenix. i love phoenix. i hate rain.

i tripped over a large air pocket on my bedroom floor and bashed my skull into the corner of my bookcase, which had three shelves and was faux wood veneer. after i applied cold compresses and stanched most of the bleeding, i drove to school, but they must have moved the school building across town. i chuckled to myself, darn school moving people!

after i drove around for a few hours looking for where they put the building, edward cullen pulled up alongside me in his shiny, silver volvo, which was silver and a saab, i think. his well-muscled chest was riding shotgun, wearing a blue-gray waffle knit long-sleeved t-shirt, relaxed fit jeans with contrast stitching in a lightly distressed wash, and an ivory-colored jacket made from the dyed skins of clubbed baby seals. he dressed very well, like someone who wears nice clothes.

his well-muscled chest waved to me like an old friend, but edward glowered at me from the driver's seat. his eyes were black. i think he came down with glaucoma.

even though he glared at me and gave me the finger, he smiled and told me to follow him to school. he knew where they kept it. i wonder how he found out. but just then, i nearly tripped over my gas pedal and fell through the windshield. i am so clumsy. when we got to school, edward's well-muscled chest walked me to english class.

"try to be careful in there," the chest giggled while at the same time giving me a sinister sideward glance that made the blood in the veins under my skin in my body feel ice-cold.

"haha," i giggled, tapping the chest on its rippling pectorals. "very funny," i then said running my finger around his kennedy-half-dollar sized nipples. "i'll try to be careful," i joked, alarmed at the unearthly chill emitted by his taut obliques.

everyone stared at us in the hallway, which was a long interior space allowing access to various doors. the students were wearing clothes and talking and carrying books. through the windows of the classroom which looked onto the out-of-doors, i could see the rain was still raining outside. then i tripped over my clitoris and fell into a galvanized steel av cart on casters. three people were seriously injured.

i chuckled and turn bright red. how embarrassing.

at the end of the school day edward cullen came to walk me to my car. his chest was nowhere to be seen. probably at banana republic or out hunting mountain lions again. i chuckled to myself, darn chest!

"where's my car?" i giggled after chuckling for a while.

"don't you remember that you totaled it this morning when you drove into the orphan's hospital?" he said. he was looking at me with his eyes. he gave me his ivory jacket to keep me dry from the rain, which is usually very wet. then he looked at me again, smiling with the right half of his mouth but frowning with the left half of his mouth and oddly expressionless in the middle part of his mouth.

"you know," i said, falling over a parking bumper into a rack of bicycles, "rain isn't the only thing there is that gets me wet."

"let's just be friends," he hissed, arching an eyebrow, flexing his sinewy wrists, and flaring his beautiful muscular nostrils.

i realized then he might be a vampire. or really gay. or a really gay vampire.

i should have known. he had erasure cassettes in the car.

- review of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight by this guy.

This may be the one and only electro(?) song I like.

Roller derby facts and figures

It is a proven fact that the number of tights and socks a girl owns will exponentially increase the longer she plays roller derby. Tights are a roller girl's staple, as they serve not only to make her look exceptionally hot, but also to protect her precious thighs, lest she fall and incidentally remove all the skin from them; a tragedy known as 'rink rash'.

As you can see, ownership of any vaguely hookerish clothing is positively correlated with the length of time one has been on a roller derby team for. You will notice that booty short-ownership increases differently to that of tights and socks. As you can see around the three month mark, when the idea of so flagrantly displaying one's ass in public doesn't seem that strange anymore, the number starts to increase. It isn't until about the five month mark, however, when one has enough ass confidence to actually wear the aforementioned shorts in public, that we really start to see some growth.

Another phenomenon we often see in roller derby is the effect of the sport on players' legs, as seen in this graph:

Derby girls are generally renowned for their impressive badonkadonk (fan page for Estro Jen's ass, anyone?) and leg muscles, but the unfortunate truth is that any attractiveness gained along with said muscle tone is often nullified by the inordinate number of bruises that clad the legs of derby girls the world over. I personally often feel the need to assure passersby that I am not, in fact, a crack addict, or the subject of leg-related domestic violence - I simply take roller skate wheels to the shins at high speeds several times a week.

Finally, another interesting trend that I'm sure many roller girls have seen come to fruition:

For whatever reason, I have had more male friends than female friends for most of my life. I think I generally feel intimidated by most females, but surprisingly, the beautiful, strong, and fit women I have met through roller derby, who are all far more impressive skaters than I am, do the opposite of intimidate me. A roller derby team ain't no group of Sex and the City girlfriends, but legitimately rad females, with whom the friendships I have would not exist if it weren't for roller derby.

I did briefly entertain the idea of punching the numbers to compare alcohol consumption before I joined a derby team with the present day, but I think that's a door that best remains closed. 

PatheticGirl43's video diaries

I found Dee's video diaries that Charlie posted on YouTube under the name "PatheticGirl43." And they are awesome.

Dos Hell - Pretty Girls

My friend Danny is in this band called Dos Hell, who are kind of kicking asses and taking names at the moment. Sometime last year Mikey Young of Eddy Current Suppression Ring took an interest in them, and it wasn't long before The A & R Department were on board, too. Their EP In Stereo was produced by Mikey of Eddy Current, and a handful of other well known dudes in the industry. This is the first video they've made, for their song Pretty Girls, which you may see on Rage, if you're lucky. I thoroughly enjoy it. What do you think?

Lafayette Brawlin' Dolls vs. Rollergirls of Southern Indiana

Starring the one and only Scarburst

It's the Brawlin' Dolls' third home bout of the season, and we're gunning for a good one. We stand at two losses and one win so far this season, a score we plan on settling on our home turf. 

Tickets are only $8, and, look, you're more or less guaranteed the best night ever. After the last bout, I was without my voice for over a week because I was cheering so ferociously the whole night. 

Brown Paper Tickets is your one stop Brawlin' Dolls ticket shop, and you can get all the details of the bout on the facebook event page. The last two bouts saw almost 1 000 people packed into the Brawl House, and we're expecting an even bigger crowd for the Devil Wears Derby. Speaking of the devil: 

The more Beck the betterer. 

Why some roller girls terrify me

After I told her I was always afraid of getting punched or stabbed playing one of our rival teams, one of LBD's star jammers Valentine Massacre confirmed my fears about how some of these totally renegade derby girls roll:

Embarrassingly, I very much have a 'type'.

How unfortunate. 

A friend and I sat on my bed discussing our ‘types’, as far as physical attraction goes. After vehemently insisting that I did not, in fact, have a ‘type’, I then went on to say, “Although you know, I do like boys with beards - even more so if they also have messy hair. Curly, messy hair. Preferably brown. And I do love when boys wear poorly ironed plaid shirts. Oh, and totally glasses, but not in a ‘these still have the clear Perspex in them from when they were on display’ kind of way. More in a ‘if I wasn't wearing these, I couldn’t stare dreamily into your eyes without them going blurry’ kind of way.”

Alarmingly, it seemed that, not only did I very much have a type, but also that type had a decidedly homeless vibe to it. I have somehow reached a point in my life where unkempt facial hair and a lack of laundry skills can turn any average dude into a veritable sex bomb of a man. Throw in a couple of clever tattoos and a very obvious Adam’s apple, and I’ve already turned jelloid. My claim of being type-less could not have been further from the truth if it tried.

Perhaps more to the point, it perplexes me to no end that I find eye diseases alluring. Not even in a sympathetic way – no, we’re talking “let me smooch that eye patch right off your beardy face,” kind of stuff. For whatever reason, the prospect of a boy with poor eyesight does things to me. Astigmatism, you say? Oh, baby! That’s right, big boy, talk eye drops to me. What happened in my life that could have resulted in such an attraction? Perhaps someday I’ll find out that, all along, I was repressing some memory of an unrequited love that will explain why exactly I get my kicks from the physical ailments of my mates. Until then, I suppose, I just have to try and control myself lest I go weak at the knees every time I see a boy on crutches.

It’s not even as though this sort of aesthetic is particularly original, or vaguely hard to come by; it’s more or less the unspoken uniform for every twenty-something Arrested-Development-watching, indie-music-listening-to, quasi-creative type on the planet. On the contrary, this ‘type’ transcends time and space, and spans many an ocean, a phenomenon to which I can attest. Perhaps my guaranteed adoration of such a man comes down to the fact that, with this ever-growing army of plaid-clad Beardies comes the assurance of meeting a slightly off-kilter dude who, growing up, was always just unpopular enough that he was forced to develop a delightfully self-depreciative sense of humour (that is to say, the XY-chromosomal version of myself).

I feel like it's somewhat of a security blanket - as in, I know what kind of dude looks this way, therefore I must know what to expect. Yes, on articulating that, I know how sad it sounds to have a security blanket-esque fetish. Even if it is a very, very comfortable blanket.

Beck - Sexx Laws

I'd like to introduce you to another one of my husbands. I love this so hard, I don't think I can even express it. The song is rad, the video is totally badass, and Beck "looks so fly it hurts."

Welcome to Swoonsville

as seen on F Yeah Eric Northman

Lafayette Brawlin' Dolls vs. Circle City Socialites

Do you live in Indianapolis? Or within a 100 mile radius of it? Because, obviously, this is worth the drive. CCS beat LBD earlier this year, so on June 12th, we will be exacting our revenge. Summer of Shove is a twofer - for $10 you first get to see a bunch of dudes beating up on each other (having never watched male derby, this frightens me...we'll see how it goes) and at 7:30, LBD will take to the track to give CCS a good, ol' fashion ass-whooping. Here are some more details, or you can purchase tickets directly from here.

Meet Heartbreak Scorsese of the Lafayette Brawlin' Dolls

Welcome to the Brawl House

Name: Heartbreak Scorsese

Number: 18

Positions: Blocker and wannabe jammer 

Theme song: I guess technically it would be Heartbreak Scorsese by SnobScrilla. But screw technicalities, my theme song Feels Like Pain by the Grates!

Likes: Live music, good coffee, and watching Arrested Development again and again.

Dislikes: Unkempt eyebrows and Michael Moore 

Favorite music/movies/books: Have you got 10 000 years? Ok, I love: 

- Youth in Revolt (the book and the movie) and anything by David Sedaris.
- (500) Days of Summer and Stranger than Fiction are the greatest movies ever. Oh, and Harry Potter. And Iron Man! 

- I have a new favourite band every week…[yes, I said ‘favourite’…we Australians appreciate the letter U!]…Right now I basically listen to Spoon, Silverchair, the Kooks, and the Cure on a constant loop.

Bad habits: Ummm, I don’t know that I have any; I’m pretty awesome. I kid...probably hassling people about their shit grammar and spelling. I’m an English student; it’s in my nature!

Favorite quote: “But where did the lighter fluid come from?!” No, that’s probably a lie. I love “Be your own hero”.

Why do you play roller derby? Um, because it’s freaking awesome? I’ve always loved skating, and, maybe surprisingly for a sport where you’re constantly battering and bruising other girls, the sense of team spirit is really amazing.

What do you do when you’re not wearing skates? Well, playing the English student card again, I read a buttload. I also do lots of craft and draw and write. And I spend a lot of time in WalMart.

So, I'll keep you posted on any bouts or otherwise sweet happenings in the world of derby/The Brawlin' Dolls. Or, you can check out our website or our facebook. Or all of the above!

Conscious

I am hyperbole.
Taking to the cosmos with a fine-toothed comb;
poring over everyday mise en scène.

Everything is exaggerated;
everything is illuminated when
you live in 3D.

The world can beget
such synchronicity when
you see in surround sound.

Inside every second is om;
a sacred cry like the
rich warble of a cello.

Contained in every moment
is a magical Uncanny,
shooing cynicism as it goes,

if you let it.
And you should.



Nikkee Boyle, March 2010