Teddy Bearlesque

Being derby girls, we are obsessed with ass. Normal women worry that their asses look too big; not us. We want our asses so big and padded they constitute a serious obstacle to other women. We like to use our asses to bruise our friends, and expect them to appreciate it. We’re even willing to put panties on our heads in front of a crowd. This is not normal.

So we celebrate our asses, but we also get to fall on them a lot. Ouchie. Padded pants seemed like a smart idea – not only would they protect against the ouchies, but they would make our asses even more formidable! So we tried some on, but they seemed to place more emphasis on armouring the crotch than bigging up the ass. Perhaps they were designed by men? Things weren’t going our way. In addition to our lack of padded pants, we also had no costumes for Salon Rouge. What could we do? The answer was obvious: make the biggest, most paddedest asses we could possibly make. Out of large piles of stuffed toys. Thus creating: super bad-ass teddy bearlesque.

This was a task that required bin-bag loads of charity shopping. We bought animals, then went back and bought more animals – it was amazing how many animals the asses could take. We hoped we wouldn’t end up wearing anything donated by children who had lice. Or scabies. Or scarlet fever. Nothing a thorough dousing with febreze couldn’t fix though, surely?

We didn’t bother offering people cupcakes this time, we just barged right on past them with our formidable asses. We barged each other, did the shaky-shaky with our animals, and played a bit of full-contact musical chairs. And we were nice and warm. Really warm. Not only were we really, really toasty furry warm, falling was fun. It didn’t hurt, and sometimes the toys on our asses went squeak.

And so did AWESOME SOCK MONKEY! Captain Carnage was going to take him to a Megadeth gig, but AWESOME SOCK MONKEY likes a bit of glamour, and he wanted to go some place there’d be lots of girls walking around in their panties.

And he wasn’t disappointed – look at his happy little face. There were panties a-plenty (on asses, not heads), a nice clown, a scary clown, a woman painted gold (but she didn’t suffocate through her skin, don’t worry), some impressive twirling of more nipple tassles, and man who sang a jolly song abut self-harm. Another splendid night at Salon Rouge.

Thanks to the Salon Rouge crew for having us again, and to Andrew Stubbs, Alan Hussein Parker (Captain of the Romsey Town Rollerbillies All Male Cheerleading Team), and X-Ray Bex for the photos.

Handmade Birthday goodness!

THANK YOU to everyone who came to celebrate our birthday with us! We’re now full of the warm fuzzy derby love, and dishing it out to the kick ass cake bakers, knuckle duster bunting makers, skate-shaped cookie cutter welders, DJs, Lindy dancers, and raffle prize creators and donators who made it happen. We love you! Yes, knuckle duster bunting, you read that right. Lime green and leopard print nipple tassles, several impressive moustaches, a leopard print teapot, skate shaped cookies, psychedelic cupcakes, fishnet covered fine art, and pants crafted from stuffed animals. What more could you want for your birthday?

Huge gratitude is also due to whichever member of the prize-winning public pulled Captain Carnage’s raffle ticket out of the bag – he could have had alcohol, he could have had a date with aWeSoMe Welles, but no – what did he want? AWESOME SOCK MONKEY!

We are assured that AWESOME SOCK MONKEY will be accompanying Carnage on all future rollerbilly business. We’ll keep you posted.

Oh, and thanks to Andy for all the stickers saying BOLLOCKS. We had fun with those on the way home.

We are ONE

No, not in the cosmic sense, you filthy hippie. The Rollerbillies have been in existence for one whole year! Approximately. Typically, our origins are shrouded in mystery. It seems that once upon a time a punk and a figure skater eloped in the Ely Paradise Centre’s rental skate cupboard, and nine months later the sextuplets that were to become the Rollerbillies’ directors were born, kicking, screaming, and semi-conjoined, onto a malodorous crash mat. Sadly, we were abandoned amidst the cones, skates, and gym benches as soon as someone unlocked the cupboard door, allowing our parents to do a runner. But the kind folks at the Paradise Centre kept us, like pets, in the cupboard until we began demanding a week night skating slot of our very own, at which point they launched us down the river on a makeshift raft without a backwards glance. Pursued by swimming rats, we paddled frantically until we reached Cambridge, then ran until we reached Romsey Town, then staggered until we reached the pub, and finally sat down and wondered what to do next. Having been raised in a rental skate cupboard and denied the opportunity to go to school, our skillset was limited to skating and violent resentment. This left us only one option: form a roller derby league.

So to celebrate roughly a year of our league’s existence, we’re having a BIRTHDAY PARTY! You should come, it’s going to be awesome. It’s on Valentines Day, because we’re so full of love, and it’s really close to the train station, so even if you don’t live here there’s no excuse not to. (And ladies, if your sweetheart asks you what you’re doing as you leave the house on that special day, smile sweetly and tell him you heart the Rollerbillies.)

Besides, who wants to have dinner for two elbow to elbow with strangers in a crazy crowded restaurant when you could be eating cupcakes and buying tickets for our kick ass raffle? Come on, what are you going to win in the restaurant? You want to know what you could win if you come to our party? So many things! a piercing by Jack Attack from the London Rockin Rollers! a £20 voucher for skate and bike treats from Billys! ace merch from Last Gang in Town, As Seen on TV, and Piracy Boutique! astonishing knitted goods made by our very own Voodoo Doily! a herbal medicine consultation! aromatherapy treatments! Swedish Massage! a free meal at the Zebra! champagne! vodka! more champagne! a date with aWeSoMe Welles (that’s right, we’re pimping our ref) lime green and leopard print twirly nipple tassles! and… drum roll please… FAMOUS AWESOME SOCK MONKEY!

You will also be enjoying all kinds of savoury musical goodness from DJ Green Onions, with interludes of punk pop trash from the Cambridge Cunts Fixed Wheel Turntablists. So no competition really, is it? See you there.

If you need to know which way to walk for one minute upon leaving the station, check out the map.

Huge thanks to everyone who has donated all the awesome stuff for our raffle – you rock and we love you.

Fuzzilla made our ace poster and you can check out more of her work here.

CARNAGE!!

An unprecedented number of Rollerbillies were in London this weekend for a roller derby double bill – Clockwork Carnage: Steam Rollers vs. the Ultraviolent Femmes, followed by Referee Bootcamp and open scrimmage, yay! Once again we brought a bunch of bout virgins, and thanks to the high level of awesomeness on display we are happy to report a 100% conversion rate. We were also delighted to be joined by AWESOME SOCK MONKEY, who was hand made for us by Betty Trouble and Cherry Bomb from the Bandits. He’s (sob) going in our birthday party raffle. He was too excited to stay in the bag though – and can you blame him?

With a place in the season final to play for, the stakes were high in this game; some of us were cheering for the Steam Rollers and some for the Ultraviolents (AWESOME SOCK MONKEY was naturally cheering for the green team). We figured this was the best way to deal with the agonising conflicts of loyalty, but nothing was going to help us cope with the tension in this bout – both sides were out for blood. The Steam Rollers started out strong, taking the lead by the end of the first period. Their presence in the centre of the pack was more like a fortress than a wall, and a source of serious frustration to the Ultraviolents’ jammers. But nobody in this game was going to give an inch without a fight – if you want to see what it looks like when someone jams like a motherf*cker and you weren’t there on Saturday, then you missed it.

Pretty soon the penalties started stacking up and we were really losing track of who was getting sent off for what. The Ultraviolents were dishing out the clops and tolchoks and by the end of the second period they’d fought their way up to a tantalising score of 49-51. The crowd were in a frenzy. AWESOME SOCK MONKEY was barely coping. But the Steam Rollers weren’t going to let it go, and in the third period they managed to consistently outscore the Ultraviolents and emerged victorious on 84-64. Possibly the most exciting LRG game yet – more violence, more penalties, more jammerless jams, an exclusion – and the most stunning cupcakes we’ve ever seen. Nom nom nom.

But that’s not all folks. Sunday was Referee Bootcamp, and our ref Captain Carnage was ready for school. Unfortunately aWeSoMe Welles has temporarily abandoned our grumpy  little island and is now somewhere in Thailand, so it was down to Carnage to get clever. We should have got him a special pencil case and some new shoes, but we didn’t and he had to make do with a spray painted ref shirt.

We were psyched to get some scrimmaging in! Going to a mixed scrim can be a scary prospect, and we were super proud of our newbies who were braving their fears and playing with the big girls for the first time. There were more whistles than we knew what to do about, but we had a lot of fun. I saw weird spots before my eyes at one point, which just goes to show that roller derby is so damn good you can go blind. Luckily Nem gave me her half-eaten boost, and after that I was fine.

Captain Carnage reports “the mixed scrimmaging was brilliant, it was awesome how everyone just got on with it. I now appreciate how hard the refs job actually is! I’ve got my work cut out for me for sure. The whole weekend has made me so excited about Derby I might actually burst. *POP*”

So there you have it. We have him under observation. If he actually goes POP we’re going to be screwed.

Congratulations to the Steam Rollers and to the Ultraviolents for playing such a kick-ass game, and huge thanks to all of LRG for putting on the scrimmage and boot camp!

Many thanks to Betty and Cherry for AWESOME SOCK MONKEY, and to Ryan Hayes for the use of these super pictures. (The one of the cupcake is ours, in case you hadn’t guessed.)

If you want a chance to win FAMOUS AWESOME SOCK MONKEY you’ll need to come to our FIRST BIRTHDAY PARTY (hooray!) this saturday. If you can wait a mere 24 hours, you’ll get a post on here about that too.