The Texas Rollergirls is a league of women who skate in a circle and wear flimsy clothing and score points every few weeks in Austin. There is another league of women who skate in a circle and wear flimsy clothing every few weeks in Austin. I imagine every good sized town should have several such leagues. So that all of the women who like spending their time orbitting anti-clockwise with their tattoos showing can get a chance to do so.
I went to see the other league today. The Lonestar Rollergirls. This is only my second visit to a roller derby so I’d be hard pushed to comment with any authority on the skills on display, and how the two leagues compare in terms of technique and sportsmanship. What I can tell you is that this league appears to have different clothing restrictions. All of the girls are forced to wear underwear that might have fitted them at the start of puberty. They are allowed a few bolstering bits of flimsy cloth to try to retain an air of modesty despite being shoehorned into bras that are less about pushing up, and more about throwing out. Their website photos don’t really do their indecency justice.
The action is more violent. Ruby Sioux put someone or others’ head into the railings until she didn’t move any more. Someone went flying through the wooden railings at one point, into the motorcycle parked by the rink. The motorcycle was started up and revved heartily whenever the Rhinestone Cowgirls were doing well, in case you wondered why there was a motorcycle at the side of the rink. The necks of the crowd might not have been as red as those at the Texas Rollergirls, but it was still a pretty white affair crowd-wise. I arrived late and tried to catch up.
“How did you enjoy the first half?”
“Er. Pretty good.”
“Who won?”
“Er. I don’t know. I spent most of it outside.”
“Is it good outside?”
I looked into the saucer-sized pupils of someone having an interesting time, as he deliberated the answer to this one.
“Yeah, it’s pretty good. I’ve drunk about a bottle of R————n.”
“The cough medicine?”
“Yeah. It’s pretty trippy. Somewhere between acid and mushrooms.”
“Tastes pretty good too, I bet.”