Charge…

How dop we know I’m not a professional photographer? I don’t follow the golden rule, which is always make sure that your batteries are charged and you have enough space on your cards before you leave the house. As it is, I’m down in Asbury Park, at the new house of a friend, and in the middle of a very fun evening, my Nikon’s battery died. So this is one of the few pictures I got of the Jersey Shore Roller Girls warming up for their Roller Derby match last night. There was a bunch of other things that would have been great to shoot, but c’est la vie, as Robbie Neville used to sing.

Even with the power outage, myself and Lolita have been having a fantastic time. The house is two blocks from the beach and the boardwalk, and our hosts are gracious and excited about their new place. Lehigh has been a bit badly behaved, I’m sorry to say, but that’s just been a bump in the proceedings.

Roller derby is a bit more of a finesse game now that it was when I used to watch it growing up. They’ve eliminated the banked track and the railings which means that there isn’t as much violent checking as there used to be. The players still go down (and we had one injury that was sever enough for someone to have to be helped off the track) but it’s no where near as brutal as it used to be. Since I’m someone who can’t rollerskate for a foot in any direction without ending up on my ass, I’m astonished by the skill displayed by these women maneuvering around the track and through dense clumps of competitors.

The whole thing has gotten a lot more campy too: every one has that is essentially a drag name. My favorites: For a player: Sharmaine Tank. For an official: Biroller Disorder DSM4, for an announcer (and singer of the National Anthem): Mannah Montana. And then there was the local favorite ref: Douche Springsteen, whose name prompted a local yahoo to bellow “Hey DOUCHE! You’re a DOUCHE!!!” Every single time he saw it printed on the ref’s back. Some people are very happy to have learned how to read.

After the event we hit the board walk for pizza and ices and a visit to the Pinball Museum which allows you unlimited plays on a hundred vintage machines. I managed to get a high score on SkyLab, a machine I used to play thirty years ago.

Today is brunch and then wending our way back home.