“I am an artist. I LOVE a good party. So, truce. Commence au festival!”

Summer in Ithaca has officially started, with the Ithaca Festival Parade, after which will follow three days of some of the best people-watching a writer could ask for!  I realize how prickish that must sound, and I’ll cop to saying/feeling that in a prickish manner when I experienced my first Ithaca Festival.  I’m not sure what changed, but I feel like it was something more than a mere moment of clarity. Anywho, the fact remains that every parade, I get a bunch of potential new story ideas, which is why my camera is my best friend this time of year…

My pals, the Ithaca League of Women Rollers (mostly Bluestockings, with a smattering of Sufferjets), were rolling at the parade, too.  Unfortunately, they were rolling a little too fast for me to get better pictures. 

“What’s my name, fool?”

I should apologize for the ratio of roller derby posts to writing posts lately, but you’ll probably see that ratio continue to skew just a little bit more in the coming days.

Last night at a scrimmage, I had a crash course in the art of penalty-box timekeeping, making me a Non-Skating Official (NSO) in my local derby league. My first bout will be in two weeks.  Unfortunately, I’m out most of July, what with Readercon and the “annual camping trip”* with friends.  But I’ll be around for their bouts in August and beyond.

The only thing missing, they tell me, is my roller derby name.  So, I’m taking suggestions.  Tell me something good in the comments.  Or if you’re one of my tweeps, you know where to find me.

My wrojo seems to have bounced back.  Toldja these ladies were an inspiration.  But while I’ve reconnected with my Inner Drill Sergeant, my Inner Gordon Lish is still MIA. I’m 700 words into the puke draft for a flash anthology with a 1,000-word limit, and I haven’t gotten to the point of the story quite yet.  I have time to play with, though–about two weeks.

I’m not quite fully recovered by whatever Andromeda Strain put me out for two days.  Between the writing, a bout of insomnia, and last night’s scrimmage, I’m using up energy as fast as I get it back.  It’s like I’m treating my body like a video game character with slowly regenerating life levels, where you’d take some hits to give some until you’re near zero, back off to get 2 or 3 tics of life back, and then go into it again. It’s not ideal, but if I’m going to allow derby further into my life, I can’t let the writing slack because of it.

So, yes–berate me for not taking it easy, just as long as you leave a roller derby name suggestion for me. 🙂

*Yes, this is code. If I say more, ninjas with the dim mak death touch will kill me before I finish typing.