e:zobar, I never knew you were so proud of doing naughty things to me. I think you should exercise your pride more frequently. My vagina will just be over here, ok? So if you need it, you know, to be proud of, you know, I'm here for you.

Anyway. I had never actually attended a Pride event before, so this one was exceptionally exciting for me.
I was sick as a dog, though, which reduced the amusement value.

The whole thing should really more accurately be named, "The Festival Of Awesome T-Shirts" because I saw so many hilarious clever shirts.

A few samples I can still remember:
"I FOUND JESUS-- he was behind the couch the whole time!" (worn by a dude standing right next to the first group of protestors, who I skated up to in complete innocence and handed handbills to without even noticing they were yelling about my shamelessness in their megaphones. I told you I've been sick.)
"Girls are better at eating pussy." (I suppose out of diplomacy I shouldn't comment. but out of pride one should practice more. right??)
"I'm not gay, but my boyfriend is" (worn by the husband of a rollergirl)
"Don't like abortions? Don't have one" (seen it before, but it's worth mentioning)
And then there were a lot of cool or clever graphical ones I can't really convey here, but they were cool, take my word for it.

However. The coolest part of the whole day, at least to me, ruled so hard I just can't get over it.
So there are a pair of protesters, one with a megaphone and the other with a sign that says, like, Jesus hates you, or something to that effect. Whatever. The megaphone dude is going on and on, really loud, about how "YOU ARE ABOMINATIONS-- YOU SHAMELESS WOMEN WHO LIE WITH WOMEN" (I assume this was directed at my group, who were all rollergirls; most of us are straight or bi [and of the bi girls, most of us are in monogamous heterosexual relationships so it's more a matter of self-identification than anything else] but you know, whatever. We were skating in a Pride parade, so we were sort of ready to be called lesbos. I don't think any of us mind.) Then the dude started going on about marriage, probably because the float a little ways behind us was about legalizing gay marriage (like nine out of ten of the floats were...)
So I hiked my shirt up and flashed him my bra, and yelled "JESUS LOVES YOU TOO!"
The dude looked at me and pretended not to see me, but the next thing he said was "THE ONLY REAL LOVE IS BETWEEN A MAN AND HIS HUSBAND."
Then there was kind of a pause.
"ER I MEAN WIFE."

I died laughing.

So.
e:zobar is at the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies' Annual Convention, in Oregon of all places.
I am horridly jealous, as I have never been to OR or indeed any of the Pacific Northwest or for that matter the West at all except 1 brief visit to SoCal and a trip to AZ as a 12-year-old. (OMG. FUCKING GORGEOUS DESERT. It's a damn shame I can't deal with too much sun.)

Anyway.
More importantly:

I am home alone. It's just me, here. Me, and the plecostomus catfish (creatively named "Pleco", or "Plecosaurus" when I'm drunk). Me and the catfish in his tank, and the liquor cabinet, and wireless Internet.

This oughta be good.

The catfish, I might mention, is shy, and so if you look at him, he flips out. Somehow, despite being about as inert as it's possible for a living thing to get, he notices when you look at him from across the room, and tries to dive under the gravel in the tank.

I'm about evenly torn between totally trashing the house and cleaning it top to bottom. We'll see how the weekend progresses. It's still only Wednesday.

http://www.estrip.org/articles/zobar/37398.html
Apparently we've never blogged the catfish/green bean wrestling before. Too bad. It's amusing. But Pleco(saurus) hates it when we watch now.

I had an awesome time at roller derby practice tonight. This bout is going to be crazy awesome great. I can't even tell you how much.
I might wind up jamming one or two jams. I really feel like I'm skating well lately. So we'll see.

I have to pimp the upcoming bout. It's next Saturday, the 23rd. It's the LAST ONE OF THE SEASON. It will be ALL THREE teams in a round-robin-- so, a full hour of roller derby, not counting timeouts and halftime and the like. I swear to you, it will be awesome.
ALSO:

The night before, Friday June 22nd, at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, FREe: their Gusto At The Gallery Event is roller-derby themed. Yes! There will be an exhibition/demonstration of how modern flat-track roller derby is played, performed by members of the Queen City Rollergirls; there will be booze, there will be a 70s dance party and also! There will be a free showing of the movie Kansas City Bomber.
FREE.
FREE.
June 22nd.
This is CULTURE, people!! It is also free. And it is roller derby. Also we're going to try to give out coupons for discounted admissions to our bout the next day. SO.
June 22nd, Gusto at the Gallery, Roller Derby Nite. I think it's 3 pm until like, late, I dunno.
June 23rd, 7 pm, Rainbow Rink in NT, it is the Battle Royale, the Season Finale, and I promise we will be way less lame and probably more violent than some notable season finales of late.

Also I am making a personal promise to all of you that I will kick ass.

The setting: The car, windows down, on a beautiful soft night after the rain has swept the day's muggy heat away. On the way home from a punishing roller derby practice of brutal scrimmaging and exhausting endurance drills, THE ROLLERGIRL is driving, one arm out the window, while THE BOYFRIEND sits in the passenger's seat cueing up music on the iPod.

RG: What a beautiful night.
BF: Mm.
RG: (coyly) Hey, you know, we don't have to go straight home.
BF: Hm?
RG: We could, you know, pull over on that dark street we used to visit... you know... enjoy the evening.
BF: Why?
RG: You know. Make out a little.
BF: No thanks. You smell kinda bad.



Honest-to-God true story from tonight.

(I just read "Rollergirl: Totally True Tales From the Track" because my mom heard about it on NPR and bought it for me. It's good, but my life is just so much more glamorous than that girl's. I need to be the one writing a tell-all memoir.)
0607/IMG63820619.jpg
That's a real bruise on Sissy's ass. That's also her real hair.
OK, I uploaded that one twice and it won't show up, so if y'all want to see Sissy's bruised ass (which is bruised again) you'll have to come to the bout THIS SATURDAY NIGHT.



Just a couple teaser pictures for you. Lower photo by Ron Douglas

She doesn't have a name yet, but I just abducted one of e:leetee's neighbor's kittens. I stole the gray one from her post.
We carried her out to the car in a shoebox, which upset her deeply. I gave her my finger to gnaw on through one of the holes in the box, but it wasn't much comfort. So once we were in the car I let her out.

While e:zobar went into Wegmans to get a litterbox and some kitten chow, I let her roam around the car. She climbed up on my headrest, leapt around the back seat, climbed up into the rear windshield ledge and stalked the guy collecting shopping carts, and then abruptly remembered I was there and came flying back to chew on my nose.

We got her home and let her explore the house. After she ravenously devoured like, five kibbles of kitten chow, she ignored the food and wandered around.
Then I played with her with a cat toy for about half an hour. I finally wedged it between my mattress and box spring so the string part would hang down. It took her fifteen minutes to bust it apart and carry the feathery fur-mouse away to gnaw on it.

Now Z has gone to bed, and I am in my bed, and she is wandering around the house meowing. I called her and she came racing into the bedroom, took a flying leap, and made it up onto the bed, where she briefly gave me lovies, but then leapt off to explore the house again.

Oop, she's back. She's climbing on my head and shoulders and down my back, purring like a small electric motor, the function of which is to produce cute.

There are four more kittens. They are all this cute. See e:leetee's post for more details.



Update: Aw jeez, she keeps running across the room and smacking into the mirror. I think she's looking for the other kittens. I don't have room for that many cats in this house!

Photos I took of her the day before yesterday, when it was 90 degrees and the only decent thing to do was pass the hell out.

This morning:


She likes the boob shelf. Usually the boob shelf is a little... er, higher, but I was wearing one of those built-in-shelf-bra camisoles and the shelf bra wasn't really doing much for the boob shelf. But that's really where she climbs up to sit.
She was also helping me use my computer.




I took some pictures of her sitting on the keyboard with my big camera, but I haven't downloaded them yet.

She is a marvelous cat, content to amuse herself when we are elsewhere or busy, but endearingly eager for attention when we're willing to provide it. She wanders around the house talking to herself, and purrs almost constantly. She's a shameless food-stealer, and at first people-mealtimes were an ordeal, but then I realized that her Dingle Mouse cat toy was distracting enough that she'd happily play with it through an entire supper and not bother us once, as long as someone jiggled the mouse once in a while.

She also has learned to sleep when we do, which is really important in this household. She no longer insists on arising with the sun, but happily lies on your face/neck/arm/chest until you feel like getting out of bed. She doesn't even claw you.

I haven't gotten an appointment with a vet yet because I'm lazy. But I will-- I'm going to try the one on Kenmore Ave because they're close. Z's mom takes her geriatric cat to the Small Animal Hospital on S. Elmwood, but says the Kenmore Ave one is affiliated with them and so is probably worth a shot. Can't beat the commute, at least.

Not that the little girl won't ride in the car-- she doesn't mind cars at all. She doesn't mind much. I don't think anything fazes her.

She's had one trauma so far. She was playing around the kitchen chairs while e:zobar was chopping veggies for dinner. Our kitchen chairs are folding chairs, I admit-- we're sort of still not very sophisticated in our furniture. She had been jumping up and down off one of the chairs in her mad scramble to thoroughly persecute Dingle Mouse. Suddenly there was a mad scrabbling. I assumed she had missed her footing while trying to jump up onto one of the chairs. So I turned, and saw her trying to scramble up. She squeaked in distress, so I put my hand under her backside to give her a boost. She squeaked louder, turning it into a shriek, and I realized that one of her front paws was under the chair seat.
I quickly realized it was stuck, so I stopped lifting her and she stopped shrieking. She struggled to get away but I clamped my hand around her and held her while I felt with my other hand to see where she was stuck. One of her toes, claw extended, was wedged between two parts of the folding chair.
I worked it free and she immediately began to purr.
I looked her toe all over and it seemed OK, so I put her down and she ran nimbly away. I guess it didn't hurt that much.

I just thought it was so funny how fast she started purring. She was like, "Ok! All better! Let me go get that mouse!"

Ahh well. In closure, I have to link to this:


It's so true. I'm a babbling idiot.