Derbrarians

Move the hell over, 
I've got patrons to serve!

I've been getting a lot of support from my co-workers about my new obsession and many of them sent me this CNN story that was in the headlines recently.

Stereotype-smashin' derby librarian, "MegaBeth," a reference librarian in Akron Ohio, is 53 year old player for the Rubber City Roller Girls.

This article is bringing up an age-old battle for us librarians... Having to prove that librarians are actually cool. Well guess what folks. We are!

MegaBeth isn't the only librarian rolling around and taking names, let’s see more of these brawlin' biblio babes!

Judy Gloom plays for the LA Derby Dolls

Take a look at her blog, Hollywood Librarian.

Kiwi Derby Librarian, Bonne Fire from the Pirate City Rollers of Aukland, New Zealand!

See her wonderful video on the reference interview here at her blog, Derby Librarian.

Dame Deviant, a Young Adult librarian, plays for the Bend, Oregon Lava City Roller Dolls and likes to do library-supportive booty blocking!

And in Santa Cruz, we're lucky: Our league has the privilege of having 2 librarians (both in public libraries) and one retired player in library school!

Here's our very own Barbarian Librarian

Soon-to-be formerly known as Fresh Meat Kim.
She is a public library reference librarian and derby a** kicker.

*Side note* Yes folks, we have to earn our names. We spend 3 months as Fresh Meat, then need to pass our scrimmage assessment to be eligible to 'crossover' to the other side. Meanwhile, our chosen derby name gets sent to the name goddesses who have 2-3 months worth of names to get through. You better hope that your name gets approved, because if not it's back to the drawing board.

And then there's me... 
SCDG FM Profile Preview of Fresh Meat Daisy:

Tagline:
My Other Set of Wheels is a Book Cart

Why derby? 

They wouldn’t let me knock people down in salsa dancing.

Theme song:

I Was Born Making Noise- Suzi Quatro

Support your local libraries, folks, and the women who help them rock!! Oh, and please let me know of any other derby librarians rolling around out there!!

Changing winds?

I felt a billion times better at practice last night.  There was NO crying and I felt generally more positive about the drills and exercises that we did.  I admit that there was some trepidation about thirty minutes before I left for practice and I did find myself on the potty trying to figure out if my stomach felt funny because of digestive issues or nerves.  (Nerves.)  But I think the major change about last night was that I had practiced picking my feet up while skating.  I was ready for the thirty minutes of pre-stretching, warm-up skating that they make us do each week.  My master plan to be better at those thirty minutes was foiled (of course) by the fact that the coach made us skate clockwise!  Ugh! I had not practiced my clockwise skating this past week and I blame that on the Palladium.  Usually at Open Skate they play maybe one or two songs where we have to skate in the reverse direction, but at my last two Open Skates they did the limbo and the hokey pokey as their special skates!  Grrrrrrrr.

Next up:  Suicides.  Call me crazy, but I have always liked these and was first introduced to them at high school soccer practices many, many years ago.  I was a little bit excited to see how I would do at these after figuring out the lifting of the feet thing, but I got a bit nervous because there were a few too many people in my line and that made it difficult to navigate stopping and turning around.  I'm pretty sure I was last in all of the suicide drills, but it didn't bother me like it usually does.  Plus, between some of the drills we had to do that throw down abdominal exercise -- the one where a partner stands at your head, you lift your feet above your head, and she then throws your feet to the floor, but you can't let them hit the floor.  I love these!  I'm kind of good at them, because underneath my layer of stomach blubber I have insanely strong abs.  Plus, I think it's all about how you breathe during these ab exercises.

For the rest of the practice we worked on hitting drills.  Hitting!  Already?  But it has only been a month!  Okay, well I suppose we have to start that sometime.  We first did some drills with cones to figure out the foot and body movements and then we were partnered up.  Pixie Painful was my partner and she was really positive, encouraging, and gave me lots of pointers.  The worst part was figuring out how not to be crushed by her powerful hits.  She just said to get low in derby position.  I think that helped my butt stay off the ground.   We then did the drill in the pace line.  Yikes!  I made it through, though I veered off course a few times.  I also got knocked out of the pace line a few times by some super power blocks.  Crazy.

We ended the night with an optional Queen of the Rink, whereby you skate around, hit or be hit, and the last one left standing is the Queen.  I looked at FM Daisy who decided to stay in and, well, since she was my ride, I stuck around too.  I wasn't in for long before Pixie knocked me out of bounds, but before that happened there was one moment where someone came for me from the left, but I went right and behind her and avoided the hit. Yay!

So that was it.  I came home, soaked my feet, guzzled down some kiwi-strawberry flavored electrolyte juice, and went to bed.  I woke up a bit sore, but I'm actually looking forward to practice tonight.  That is a nice feeling.

Lumpdate

There is still a pea-sized lump above my left eyebrow from the injury I sustained at my very first practice about four weeks ago.  I still find it hard to believe that tomorrow will be my fifth week of practice.  I have really tried to concentrate on working on my crossovers since Tuesday's practice.  In fact, I was concentrating so hard during Wednesday's Open Skate that I took a nose dive to the floor and smacked my right eyebrow on the ground.  No lump there, but it is still pretty tender.

SAN DIEGO OR BUST!

Toxins B. Gone

I got home after practice tonight and just soaked my aching feet in a warm epsom salt bath while watching an episode of BSG 4.5. When I did that fitness bootcamp a few months back, the instructor kept telling us to soak our bods in epsom salt to rid them of toxins. I think I'm actually going to have to try full tub immersion one of these nights.

Okay, so tonight was better. After the warm-up, stretching and some drills, we were put in a pace line and before it even started, I was pulled to the side for some special instruction. I admit, that there was some welling, but when the coaches sent another Fresh Meater over too, well, it was such a relief. Misery loves company, right? Or maybe it is just nice not to be the only one who ever needs individual attention.

While the rest of the team was on the track doing their pace line, I stayed to the outside and practiced picking up my feet and eventually working my way to crossing over. This crossing over technique is supposed to help one expend the least amount of energy while skating and it helps to make one go faster. I definitely improved by the end and felt speedier. Not fast, but faster than before. I was so glad to finally have the mechanics of crossing over and picking up the feet broken down from the beginning.

Tick Tock

I have ten minutes before I have to leave for Fresh Meat practice. I am dreading it, of course, because last night was another fiasco of a practice. I could not even hold in the tears until the end of practice. I started leaking probably less than 45 minutes into practice due to my absolute inability to do a turn stop and due to multiple crashings to the ground while trying to execute said stop. Eventually, someone noticed my discomfort and I was then given some personal instruction by Charlie. Then the turn stop seemed nice and easy, but I was doing it slowly while also holding onto the handrail...but then we had to do it during suicides and it just would not come. Blah.

I had a bit of a break when I was called out of the pace line to have Pigeon look at my skates. That was actually really nice, because I made her narrate the entire process so that I could get my Skates/Wheels 101 fix. I rejoined the pace line only to eventually fall and trip a girl or two behind me. My knee got pinched in the fall, so I skated to the side to shake out the pain. Shamrock N. Roller then skated up to me and asked how I was doing and we talked about how derby is an emotional sport and she said that even though she yells during practice, she is really nice one on one. That was nice to hear, because she is intimidating when she yells. She also reminded me that I was there for a reason, because there were some girls who did not make tryouts and that I am not the only one who has ever been a beginner skater. That was also really good to hear, because it does seem that everyone else must have emerged from the womb with skates attached.

Socks!

Daisy picked up these meaty socks in Portland, OR.

RollerCon 2010??

If I get good enough and pass all necessary skills tests, I want to attend next year's RollerCon in Las Vegas, NV. Here is a promo video for RollerCon 2009, which ended in early August.

P.S. This video accompanied Mildred Fierce's article in Good Times.

When the Levee Skates

Last night a group of FM'ers met for Tuesday night practice in the parking lot of PetSmart in order to skate the levee along the San Lorenzo River. (Limited panoramic view is here.) I spent a good portion of the hour before practice dreading this skate. I figured it would be another hardcore, kick my ass skate, but instead of on wood it would be on concrete. Oh joy! Plus, this is not a straight, level track. The levee has a lot of downhills, uphills, tiny pot holes, bicyclists, dogs, junkies, and other skating dangers. Eeek!

I pulled into the lot and sat in the back of the Fit putting my outdoor wheels onto my skates. As I watched people pull into the lot, I realized that a lot of them had not dressed in workout clothes, but in jeans. This was the first indication that this skate was not going to be as hardcore as I had imagined. The second indication was that hardly anyone was wearing their mouth guards (well, I'm still terrified so I wore mine on the downhills!). Heather Headlocklear gave us a few pointers for skating the levee and off we went.

A pack of faster skaters, accompanied by Charlie Red Stick, went on up ahead and I stayed back with FM Daisy, FM Natalie, Heather Headlocklear, Cinzilla and Cinzilla's daughter/junior derby grom Hana Slam Tana, Mildred Fierce, FM September and maybe one or two others. It was nice to take it easy and to stop before each downhill portion. We would gather at the top of the hill and Cinzilla would spend time telling us what to expect, which was so helpful and I am again eternally grateful for all of her encouragement and support.

The downhill portions were really not that bad. Yes, they were really fast and scary, but it seemed that as long as I stayed loose, in a low, crouched position, with pressure off my toes and one foot just slightly in front of the other, then I made it down without crashing. Yay! And then I would hit the uphill portion and would just lose speed. I think that each attempt at going uphill in duck walk formation is what caused me to have a sprained womb this morning. Ouch! The lower abdominal muscles right above my pelvic bone are killing me.

I finished the skate with Cinzilla, Hana Slam Tana, and FM Kellie down a really steep slope and that was exhilarating! I'm really glad I didn't bite it when I ran over a plastic cup lid. Yay! I'm also glad I took time to tighten my jingling toe stops after both FM September and FM Elaina lost theirs. I am also still in love with my outdoor wheels...those monsters can handle anything!

Monday Night, Dry Eyes

At about 9:00 p.m. on Sunday I started to get butterflies about Monday night's practice at the Palladium. Those butterflies lasted throughout the flight home on Monday and right up through the first twenty minutes of practice. With my history of crying after each of the previous two Monday night practices, I just did not want to go through that again.

At the twenty minute mark, we had a group photo shoot with the Loma Linda Firefighters who were in town taking care of the wildfires up in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Then after our group stretch, the next hour or so was led by Hillary, a local skating coach. This was great. It was such a slow practice that focused on footwork and balance. It was not an easy practice...my legs (and right thumb) are definitely sore today, but it was just slow-paced, which is such a relief after the previous Monday nights. Whew!

Tonight, Fresh Meat skate outdoors at the levee, because the Harbor Hellcats need the Palladium to practice for their upcoming bout. This means, I have to switch out my wheels again. I'm a little bit nervous about skating the levee, because it is a pretty hilly skate and, as I discovered in Florida, I don't like inclines while on wheels.

(P.S. Photo lifted from Roxy Scharmichael's facebook page.)

(P.P.S. It's like a Where's Waldo game trying to find me!)