Audrey's Oubliette

So what’s in a number? It is used as a way to measure something. That way you can know how much more or less something is. In roller derby the WFTDA (Women’s Flat Track Derby Association) has a set of skills you must pass in order to be bout ready. One of those tests is to skate 25 laps on the derby track in 5 minutes or less, commonly called 25 in 5. I already passed my assessments back in Sept 2009, but every few weeks I try the 25 in 5 just to see where I am. It is one of the few things in roller derby in which you can easily measure your progress.

Now I am not saying that speed is the most important thing in derby, for I feel it isn’t. Speed helps but maneuverability, awareness, taking and giving hits, etc are far higher on my list of important skills in derby. Of course speed does help when you are a jammer, but a slower jammer that is better at the other skills can make it through the pack quicker than a fast jammer that is not as good at those other skills. Plus your pack blockers greatly determine how easy or difficult it is to get through a pack. But I am getting side tracked.

Anyhow, last night at practice I did the 25 in 5 in 3 minutes and 42 seconds or an average of 8.88 seconds per lap. That beat my previous best time of 3.47 which I set roughly a month ago. It was a nice surprise as I didn’t expect to get close to my 3.47. Maybe that is what helped. I wasn’t going into it trying to beat my time of 3.47, I was just skating. Well that and also trying to keep pace with one of our fastest skaters in the league, which she came in at 3.39. Though I think she can still skate faster than that. I remember 8 months ago when I was a newbie trying to skate in under 4.30 and hope to be able to one day make it in under 4.00. So this is my brief moment to go, “Hell Yeah!”. Now I set my next goal to skating the 25 in 5 in under 3.40 and striving for 3.35.

A little over a month ago I got my first derby injury that was more than a bruise. Our league was in Raleigh skating at the a scrimmage-a-thon put on by the Carolina Rollergirls. Well the day had been going well and I skated in two scrimmages earlier. So I was joining in some derby drills to learn something new and pass the afternoon waiting for my final scrimmage later that evening.

Of course a simple drill goes ends up going wrong. I took a hit and went down, falling on my knee and elbow pads like you normally would. Well after hitting the concrete my elbow pads ended up sliding out from under me and my chin decided to kiss the concrete…really hard. At first I thought I had just bruised it, but it did sting. That is when I noticed the blood, more than just a little scratch. So I sat on the concrete dripping blood from my chin as they called over the paramedics. The paramedics said I needed to get stitches. Off to urgent care I went. I ended up with 13 stitches, 6 internal and 7 external. This is the first time I have ever had stitches. I was told after I left they had to get something to clean up the blood and had little bio hazard signs posted around the spot. That made me laugh. I wasn’t able to skate in the late scrimmage, go figure, but we did kick butt and win it.

Well it has been a month later and here is a photo of what my chin looks like now. It healed rather well and over time it should fade more. I can still feel what I call a “bean” under the skin. I am guessing it is scar tissue and the internal stitches. Hopefully that will go down in size even more. Over the month is has gone down about 2/3 the size. All in all I consider myself lucky that I didn’t fracture or break my jaw. Hopefully this will be the worst derby injury I ever get.

So this is my second bout poster for the Charlotte Roller Girls. I had to knock this one out pretty quickly while also working on our bout program layout for the 3.08.10 bout. In the end I think it turned out pretty nice. It is busier than I would have liked. Though being a double header I had more info than usual that I had to put on the poster. I think my Illustrator skills are improving. I have a number of the quick keys down now and I am finding myself wishing Freehand had this or that tool or feature like Illustrator when I am using FH at work.

This poster was easier to design since I already had elements finished, like the header that is now going to be used on all posters and bout programs. Plus I had converted all the sponsor logos to vector art last time. I need to start thinking about the next poster I will have to get done by the 4.10.10 bout. I want to try and go with something a bit different style wise. But who knows. I do have certain criteria that has to be met, the logo at the top, all the sponsors, bout/ticket info, each team playing must have their official logo, plus the image has to show real derby action. Something that people see and know it is roller derby. I hope you like it.

On an entirely different note I am liking the new layout options for blog posts, go Wordpress.

Well I am going to attempt to get back to writing on my blog about general things I have been up to. So my blog will move away from focusing mainly on gaming stuff. Though it will appear from time to time.

Since joining the Charlotte Roller Girls I have been doing some graphics for the league. Mainly laying out the bout programs and some team roster pages, etc. Well this year the committee I am on has taken over getting the bout posters made. I was asked if I wanted to take on designing them. I agreed as I would like the challenge, plus it gives me a chance to get to know Illustrator better. Work is still using FreeHand and it is a dead program since Adobe bought them a few years back and it will eventually stop running on the Mac OS.

The poster is being printed as four color process and not screen printed as spot colors so I was able to use almost anything I wanted in Illustrator. That was nice change since at work everything is screen printed and you have to design stuff with that in mind. There is a bit of a learning curve since I have only used Illustrator for basic things. Overall I think I am going to like using Illustrator more. There certainly are a ton more artistic options. I just need to get the quick keys down and not mix them with FreeHand. Well enough rambling for now, here is the poster.