Flat Track Madness!

Mar 26, 2010 by

I may not be a sports fan in general, but I love the new era of flat track roller derby that has grown up over the past five to seven years.  Back in New Orleans I was fortunate to count a number of the Big Easy Roller Girls as friends. (VandallO’Reilly #C8H18 I’m looking at you!) Rollergirl bouts were one of the bright spots in the post Katrina months, and one which the entire city rallied around. Maybe it was the humid swampy air and the heat, but I got the Rollergirl bug in a big way and its not something that has abated in the least since my move to the Northern reaches.

So, that brings us to the Cincinnati Roller Girls. My new home has team, trust me we checked before moving up here, and they kick ass in a big way. As a matter of fact I gather from the neighbors that the prior owner of our house in Northside was a Rollergirl, fancy that? Check out their intro produced by locally based Plum St. Studios:

It’s not your father’s roller derby. The Rollergirls I know are some of the toughest, most empowered and confident ladies I know. Its got a lot more gutsy feminism to it than lurid memories of Roller Derby’s history from the 50′s through the 70′s might suggest.

Metromix has a nice little piece about the CRG, in which they talk to some of the rookies:

Sarah Lima and Alison Fields used to be friends who called each other by their real names and ate a lot less food. Then came a 2009 roller derby movie directed by Drew Barrymore.

Blame “Whip It.”

This is how Lima and Fields, both in the same doctoral program at the University of Cincinnati, ended up here, inside a warehouse in Blue Ash, lacing up their rollerskates and strapping on helmets and getting ready to subject their bodies to yet another grueling Cincinnati Rollergirls practice. It’s how they came to call each other Bombtrack and Hop Devil and double their daily calorie intake and shrug off injuries that would make most people cry.

Good stuff, check out the whole piece. Especially if you are not familiar with the 21st Century incarnation of Roller Derby. This adrenaline fuelled sports trend has done nothing but grow exploding to over 400 teams nationally (of which the Cincy Rollergirls are #15, baby!).

So get out there and show these lovely ladies some support! The 2010 home schedule is :

March 27 vs. San Diego | April 17 vs. Arch Rival | May 8 vs. Chicago Outfit

May 29 vs. North Star | June 19 vs. Brewcity Bruisers

Go Fan their Facebook Page, follow them on twitter, feast your eyes on their YouTube Channel, friend them onMySpace, or just sample the kinetic delights of their main website! Tell your friends! Represent!

Can’t make it to the season opener? Don’t despair! Watch the action online with live streaming video, follow along with a text boutcast,  submit your comments and questions about the games and more.  As Derby News Network says, it ain’t at all like being there – but it’s close!

To watch the game online and participate in the boutcast, go to Derby News Network

Also, only in the ‘Nati do the Rollergirls Chicken Dance. See for yourself:

As a recent transplant I have yet to see this chicken dance firsthand, but I’ve heard stories. Oh, the stories I have heard…

-Loki, Founder and Curator of CincyVoices

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The Great SuperBowl River City Crossover

Feb 6, 2010 by

I’m sitting in Cincinnati watching the snow pile up outside. It feels perfectly appropriate since the Saints are going to their first SuperBowl in history. Satan is skating to work through a frozen hell-scape today! The excitement gripping New Orleans is so intense I can physically feel it up here in Cincy, and I can’t stand football!

It’s hard to get across what things are like back in NOLA to many of the people up here. This is not a slam, not at all! There is a lot of genuine support for the Saints even here right next to Colts territory. There is just no frame of reference for my new neighbors as far as both what this means to the Crescent City and just how outlandishly we embrace the attendant revelry, especially after the past four and a half years since New Orleans was 80% destroyed by the levee failure that followed Hurricane Katrina. After hosting 9 SuperBowls the Saints finally get to play their first one! It’s a moment that crosses all socioeconomic boundaries, all ethnicity, all political divides. There are only black and gold people in the city now no matter what shade their complexion may be.

Rachel Maddow did a great show last night from down in the French Quarter and some of the scenes she showed illustrate exactly how wonderful and crazy things are right now. Check it out! [The Rachel Maddeux Sheaux]

There, that should help those not in or of New Orleans to understand. But why am I posting this on CincyVoices and on HumidCity you ask? Because I will always be a New Orleanian, just as I will always try to embrace and be a part of my new home here in Cincy. Of course it doesn’t hurt to have an outpost of “Who Dat” in “Who Dey” land. (BTW, I hate to break it my Cincy people, but Who Dat predates Who Dey by a long, long time. Since the 1800s in fact. )

So this is a heads up for all of you in both cities: tomorrow we will be sharing some absurdity with all of you. As has been documented, I have a long standing “bet that will never have to get paid” about the Saints. One which I now have to pay up on. I’ll be watching the game tomorrow, my first willing football game, and I will be doing so in a Saints cheerleader outfit. Not only that, but thanks to my colleague Bastlynn who found it online, I will be doing so in an authentic cheerleader’s uniform worn by a real Saints cheerleader in the 1970s. Yes it will be blogged.

For the amusement of our readers in both cities I’ll be cross-posting it to both HumidCity and CincyVoices so that eveyone can get  a good laugh. I’d like to invite our New Orleans WhoDats to leave us some comments in the Cincy Site and vice versa. There are lots of great people in each scene and I think the discussions that could ignite would be a blast!

One last thing. Since it is Carnival season right now I’d also like to mention a Carnival oriented event I stumbled across up here in Cincy called Krewe. Yes, they spelled it right. These folks do a Mardi Gras party that is a fund raiser for local charities, I’ve meet one of the organizers and I’ve got a lot of respect for what they’re doing and how they’re going about it. If you’re reading this in Cincy check it out, it’s a good party for a good cause. If you’re reading this in New Orleans throw em a few words of support. [Krewe by the Bacchanalian Society]

Bringing a little New Orleans to Northside Cincy-  Who Dat!

This post is mirrored on HumidCity.

-Loki, CincyVoices/HumidCity Founder

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Who Dey? For The SuperBowl It’s Who Dat!

Jan 31, 2010 by

As some of you are aware I’m the member of the team most recently relocated to the city. My wife and I came up here last Spring from New Orleans and rapidly became ensconced in Northside. My point of origin is crucial for understanding this post.

You see, this year the Saints are finally going to the Superbowl. I can already hear Satan skating to work. Not only that, but I have to wear a Saints cheerleader outfit and blog it during the game. It’s one of those “so long a shot you know it will NEVER happen” bets, and now for many of us that hail from the Crescent City “never” has arrived.  On our sister site back in New Orleans, HumidCity, one of our bloggers observes:

Apparently a lot of bets are being paid off this year with the Saints first appearance in the Superbowl. From cash to expensive bottles of alcohol to cross-dressing, the Bet That Will Never Be Paid has turned into a very profitable wager for the Faithful. Perennially a 100-1 dog, (or worse,) the odds at the start of the 2009 season for the Saints to get to the Big Dance were between 10-1 and  4-1. And it was a great bet for 43 years. If the Saints made it, you got paid; if they didn’t, you didn’t lose anything. You can’t find better odds than that! Even people who don’t like sports got sucked into the action – case in point: our own Loki.

Indeed. I’ve never had any great liking of sports in general, but even I made one of those bets. The full story is available here on HumidCity. Take a moment and give it the once over so you’ve got the proper background. I’ll wait here.

In the meantime here is the part that effects us here in Cincinnati. I will be watching the Superbowl for the first time ever, and I will be doing so while wearing a Saints cheerleaders uniform. Not only that, but one worn by a real Saints cheerleader back in the 1970s.  I will be taking a cue from Buddy D. this next Sunday, and raising a toast to New Orleanians everywhere. Our day has finally come! Yes, it will be blogged both here and on HumidCity.

While Who Dey is the cheer you’ll hear from CincyVoices, the Bengals aren’t in the running and all our energy is going  into a good solid New Orleans style WHO DAT!

Another  Cincy / NOLA synchronicity is the addition of a Cincy born blogger to the ranks of HumidCity.  Jack “Monkeyboy” Ware, a voice much missed in the NOLA blogosphere since he retired from NOLA Metroblogging, has turned out to be a Clifton boy, something I was completely unaware of.  So now we have a Cincy boy on HumidCity, and I’m the New Orleans boy on CincyVoices. I’m amused by that. [View Jack Ware's Bio Here, 5th one down]

-Loki, CincyVoices/HumidCity Founder and Temporary Saints Cheerleader

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