Amazing practice last night!

Last night our fearless leader England's Glory arranged for a guest coach to come out and teach us some new things.
Miss E. Vil is a well known derby coach with a wonderful reputation and a wealth of knowledge, and she came out and handed our collective butts to us.
We started with the obligatory warmups, then our guest coach arrived. She started from the very beginning since our fresh meat class was still with us when we started. She demonstrated stance, and explained it differently than anyone else has thus far. I was able to get a better stance with this new explanation. We worked on balance on the edges of our wheels, inside and outside. Which was difficult, but super fun. After that we did a little work on backwards skating, which I still suck at, but did learn more about. We worked on stops. She had us work on turnaround stops. I have never been able to do one of these. Until last night. I only succeeded once out of about thirty attempts, but I did it. We also did plow stops, which I have definitely improved, and Hockey stops, which I had never tried. To my joy and pleasure, E told me my form was perfect on the hockey stop, but I needed to push harder with my outside leg. YAY! I did something right!
At that point, most of the freshies had gone and we started working on pack strategy. This is where it got really fun. We learned about fast pack versus slow pack, and how to get the pack where you want it to best assist your own jammer or make it difficult for the opposing jammer. We did several mock "jams" to practice these concepts. I took a LOT of falls last night. I am hurting in so many places, and I feel fantastic.
I did take a couple of nasty falls. I wrenched my elbow and wrist pretty bad, and had to sit out for a few minutes. Once I recovered from that, I did one last jam, and ended up at the bottom of a three derby girl pileup, courtesy of Mannarama. She hit someone, who hit me, and then there was the floor, and Vera on top of me, and Manna on top of her. I am fine, but it did give me a few bruises that are going to be pretty beautiful.
All told, it was the perfect practice for the day I had at work. It had been one hellish day, and I was able to skate like the wind, work my muscles and engage my mind for a few hours.
I love derby.

Summertime is busy...

So I DID skate in scrimmage on Thursday. It was most excellent. I jammed twice. The first time, I got my trash kicked all over the track by the lovely Cherri Chokehold. It all started because I fell right off the bat, and wrenched my ankle. This pissed me off. Being pissed off, made me skate like a moron. I basically floundered and fell down for two full minutes, until the jam ended. This included a rather exciting full-speed collision into the wall. UGH.
The second time I jammed, it was a thing of beauty. I slid through a narrow opening in the pack, and booked it to the front. I was lead jammer!! I made one full lap and got halfway through the pack before calling it off to avoid letting the other jammer get any points. I only scored three points, but they were real points. I did it.
After the scrimmage, I went out to Piper Down to meet up with anyone who cared to come out. It ended up being myself, The Colonel, Wanton Rebellion, Collin D Shotz, and Rubber Raw. Referees and me. We talked rules, and how one goes about becoming a ref. They were all very supportive and encouraging in my desire to join their ranks. I think several of them were expecting it anyway. LOL.
The next morning, hubby, kids and I went to hubby's family reunion at Bear Lake. Three days of mosquito bites. It was really fun, and my children were so well behaved, I am so proud.
Now, Sunday evening rolls around and it is time to get ready for another week at work. Hope this week is better than last week.
Love to all!

Results are in!

I just got my biopsy results from the lesion on my lip today. It was not a cancerous lesion, and appears to be completely gone. Now just to heal up. I have been cleared to skate in tomorrow's scrimmage as long as I am not bleeding or anything.
YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!
That is all.

Not skating related, but still fun!

Today I made my debut as a full on Tarot reader. I even had paying customers! A friend of mine does Henna art at the People's market, and has invited me, along with another of our friends, to join her in her space and read cards for people to earn a few extra dollars. I will be working every other Sunday from 10-3 reading cards and hopefully helping people out. I feel great about myself today, I was able to help a friend make a difficult decision by doing a simple layout for her. I was able to spend some time with some good friends, and get to know one particular friend much better.I received my very first tip, and even did some trade work. I have an appointment already for my next session, one of the ladies in another booth makes really cool jewelry and had a necklace that I really liked. She wanted to have a reading done today, but due to the wind and other weather issues, She had to close up early, and so did we.
After we loaded up, I took a rainy walk in the International Peace gardens in the rain. It was beautiful. Until it started POURING. Like Wall-Of-Water pouring. I tried to wait it out, but it just wasn't going to clear up, so I made a break for my car, becoming completely soaked in the process, and drove home. We had originally planned to go up in the canyons and have a wiener roast, but with the insane rain, that wasn't going to happen. Hubby had the brilliant idea of building a little firepit in the driveway and roasting said weenies there. It was fun, even in the rain. All told, a delightful evening.

NO, my husband did NOT hit me...

Earlier this year, I noticed a harmless-seeming little bump inside my upper lip. It looked like I had just bitten my lip or something. This little bump grew and grew. Finally, over the holiday weekend, it became so large that it showed on the outside, and became very tender.

Most of y'all know that I work for a dermatologist, and I went to my boss and showed him my "harmless" bump wondering what I could do to make it hurt less. To my horror, he told me he felt it really should be biopsied. NO! I don't want a biopsy. He said we should do it soon and offered to do it on the spot, but did mention that he thought it would bleed quite a bit, being on the lip and all. Well, Ibuprofen thins the blood, and as all derby girls, I live on the grace of Ibuprofen most days. He decided it would be in my best interest to wait a couple of days before doing the biopsy. Yesterday, at the end of our work day, we went through with the biopsy. It hurt a bit, and I could actually see myself bleeding, since apparently this growth was attached to the artery that runs across the lip. Ugh. So, now today I have three stitches in the inside of my upper lip and a bruise that looks like I lipped off (pun intended) to the wrong guy.

Is it sad that I am wearing my derby shirt to avoid having people look at my sweet husband with suspicion? I have already been asked what happened to my face three times, and I have only left the house once since coming home from practice last night. I have just taken to answering with "I play roller derby" because it is easier than answering with the whole truth.

I am a little nervous about the results of this biopsy, and my face hurts, and I just want it all to be over and done with.

I did go to practice last night (how's THAT for dedication?) but really wasn't able to skate much. I managed a few laps, and a few of the easier drills, but decided against doing falls, pushing and hitting drills. Last thing I want is to split my stitches.

So, that has been my weekend thus far. Hope everyone else is doing better!

Indy

Independence Day weekend with lots of fun derby goodness.

It has been a glorious weekend of derby goodness. We started with Scrimmage on Thursday night, which was fun as always. I will refrain from the jam-by-jam runthrough, as it has been a few days, but I had a great time. Unfortunately, Gyro was not feeling well, and didn't come to practice, so our weekly tradition of hot tub time was just not going to happen. I decided that rather than go home and sleep (who needs sleep anyway?) I was going to go out to Piper Down with several of the ladies and a few gentlemen of the ref crew. HOLY crap was that fun! I was saved from certain molestation by Phillip McCrevasse, who is now my ever loved hero. I have some delightful friends who bought me drinks and generally made me feel loved. I plan to do the Piper Down trip more often. Maybe next time I will wear pants.
Friday was a nice relaxing day spent at home with my awesome little family, though I had a LOT of cleaning to do in preparation for Saturday.
Saturday we had a little Independence day BBQ for some friends and family, but not until after this year's first Picnic scrimmage hosted by our sister League Wasatch Roller Derby. Picnic scrimmages are great. Ladies and gentlemen from almost every league in Northern Utah came to the warehouse to play together. There were two co-ed scrimmages and two women only scrimmages. The Red Rockettes were admirably represented by our mamas Wanton Rebellion and England's Glory, but I am most proud of my derby crush Bruiser Ego, who skated with the big girls and kicked a little hiney! I went and helped out as NSO, primarily tracking penalties with another league-mate Wicked Intent. It was fun, as always. I love that the referees keep telling me I should join up. Love you guys!
After the scrimmage, I came home to the BBQ. That was another good time with great friends, with the added bonus of a couple of my derby friends coming out to join us. Thanks for coming Bruiser, Colonel. It was good fun, and I hope to see y'all at more of these shindigs. The fireworks were lovely.
Last night was another chill evening in with the hubby and kids. Just the four of us hanging out.
Now today is Independence day. One of my favorite holidays, just because I love summer, and nothing says summer more than July 4th. I just got home from skating in Liberty park with a few of said derby friends, one of whom I haven't seen since I stopped attending SCDG scrimmages. D Flower! It was great to catch up with her, and fun to skate. Colonel pushed me pretty hard and made me skate longer, faster, harder than I would have otherwise, even though I know I was slowing him down in a big way. Thanks for that. I can't wait to do it again. We talked about rulesets, the joys of being a referee, and what I need to work on.
I don't know what we're doing for the rest of the day, but I am sure it will be fun.
So that's what Indy's been up to. <3 you all!