It Never Ends...

I had hoped for a nice, relaxing weekend.

The plan was to drive up to Sacoftomatoes, show off the new car to mom and dad, hang out with some artist friends for an evening, go to Oakland Saturday night to check out the BAD girls bout, and then drive back to LA and maybe catch the casual bout that the Derby Dolls have scheduled for Sunday afternoon.

It was a nice plan. I liked that plan. It would've been great. However, it's not to be.

Instead, I'm staying in town, because the casual bout ain't so freakin' casual now. It's a full-on production...the only thing missing is a half-time live band. The rest is there...the uniforms, the DJ, the PA system, the scorecard girls, the many referees, the stats guy, security, the intro music for each team, vendor booths, El Pollo Loco, a bake sale, raffle, and incessant advertising on MySpace, a couple of Orange County newspaper interviews, and a live plug on the aforementioned evil radio station Indie 103 Friday afternoon during the rush hour drive home.

Oh wait, the other main thing missing from this bout is our coach. He's on "vacation" for the month. Fucking bastard. His timing on this wasn't accidental. Which pisses me off. That's another story, though.

Back to the whining at hand...since the coach also was the main rules guy and head referee along with running all our practices, we've had to find a replacement for him. This week that's fallen to me and fellow captain, Puncherello. You know what? Pimpin' ain't easy, and neither is reffing for a damn roller derby league.

Have I mentioned how fucking much I'm burned out after the whole SXSW funfest? And that I needed a break? Yes, I believe I have. Ad nauseam. With an emphasis on the damn nauseam.

Can I go take a damn nap now? Please?

Now enjoy the doodle of a bunny killing a baby:

I Feel so....Sanitary now...

Caught this bit of hilarity off of Cartoon Brew:

The Story of Menstruation

New Job, Old Weather

Yesterday I started work on another Scooby Doo direct-to-video project. This time the gang is in the Himalayas. I've never worked with the particular sequence director I'm assigned to, but he seems like an OK guy. He's worked in Disney Feature amongst other places, but doesn't seem snotty and makes a lot of jokes about being drunk. Gotta love that!

I'm trying to predominately work from home on this project. The atmosphere at the office is just horrible for someone like me. I'm just too loud and boisterous for an office setting, and I feel like I always have to be on guard at the office. They also started a new procedure of having to check out art supplies. What a pain in the tuchus that is. At least I now have an official employee ID, so that I can go to the main lot once in awhile. Studio lots can be a great deal of fun.

It's raining again. We rarely get rain this late in the season, but I'm kind of enjoying it. I plan on going jogging in about a half hour or so and enjoy the dampness that is the great outdoors.

Tonight we meet with our accountant for taxes. Yeehaw! The best part is afterwards, when we make our yearly trek to Johnnie's in Culver City for some post-taxes pastrami. Mmmmm, pastrami!

Here's another doodle of no one in particular. I think I was ruminating about prom dresses when I drew this out.

Got Indie?

For those of you in LA, you might know that only almost-listenable commercial radio stations in LA fired its morning show for no good reason. Over at LAVoice they have a blog entry about it here. The only reason I comment about it at all is because corporate radio SUCKS so much ASS!

I was astounded that in Austin, home of SXSW, their radio is as bland and horrible as it is in LA. Thanks, corporate America! If I wanted boring, I'd move to the midwest. Sorry, midwest fans, but it's dead boring there. Hence, I don't live there. Hell, that's why crystal meth is taking over the heartland of America...there's nothing else to do out there but stay up for days, grind one's teeth, and pick at one's skin until they have oozing sores all over the place.

Alright, back on topic. Sorta. Globalization be damned, can't it at least be interesting?

Sad

Three years ago on this date one of my heroes died. She wasn't famous, and I actually hadn't talked to her in about ten years, but she had an influence on me when we were in school. She spoke her mind, had her own sense of style, was very exotic-looking, well-read, could draw like a mofo, had a silly sense of humor, was good at listening to a friend's problems, and was the epitome of marching to one's own drummer. At a time when girls are pressured to fit in at any cost, she refused to obey that pressure, and her living example helped me set my own path that was more beneficial to myself.

Apparently she felt she was more flawed than I did. Her self-doubts and depression led her from a bright and sunny world to a dark, morbid pit that she felt she couldn't climb out of. What she projected on the outside was 180 degrees from what she was experiencing on the inside. What I thought she was capable of and what she thought she could do were totally different. She smashed my ideal of her in a bathroom in Oakland three years ago today.

The usual human wreckage after her death ensued. Her parents and boyfriend in particular were absolutely devastated. Even though I hadn't talked to her in a long time, she ripped at my emotional well-being when I found out. It didn't help that she did this about five months after another friend's young child took his own life, so I was at a particular low point.

I think I understand where the bible was coming from when it condemned suicide. It's not about the person who wants to die, it's about the effect of that person's death on the people who are left. The feeling of despair and helplessness is overwhelming. The shoulda/woulda/coulda's take over. Some people can't get on with their own lives when a loved one dies by their own hand, and that can be unforgiveable in some circumstances.

When I was younger I had the usual morbid thoughts about wanting to die, but I never succumbed to them. Thank goodness. For those who did, like Delia, I hope they found some kind of peace.

Entropy Project Update

This morning Beavis, the obnoxious neighbor from across the street who insists on leaving his non-running peesa-chit pick'em up truck parked in front of our house, was trying yet again to keep the damn thing running while not actually moving it. Apparently he has a new girl, too. She looks to be the type that inspired the phrase, "tramp stamp" for the tattoo on the small of her back.

Note: I'm not saying that all women who have a tatt on the small of their backs are tramps, but this one certainly looks to be of the "tramp" variety, especially since she's knockin' boots with Beavis.










The husband actually had a conversation with her a few weeks ago when he put his old computer monitor out on the front lawn to see if it would be taken by someone, anyone, who might want a free monitor(they didn't, and so we have to dispose of the damned thing some other way). She asked if the monitor worked, he said not really, she looked disappointed and wandered off. The husband also said she'd be perfect for roller derby. Ha!


Below is a photo of Beavis' Crappy Caddy that's been parked in front of Mommy and Daddy's house for about a month without moving. Note the crap piling up in the back seat. I think some of that crap was piled in the cab of the Peesa-chit truck, but it's hard to keep track of the flotsam and jetsam that is Beavis' trash.











Another photo of the Crappy Caddy. Note the paper plate on rear window. The cheapo carjack that's keeping the trunk lid closed. The strip of duct tape that didn't work in keeping the trunk closed previous to the carjack being placed on the trunk lid. This just screams class, doesn't it? If he wasn't so old, he could've gone on Pimp My Ride with this thing and actually have something interesting done to it.











This afternoon I came back from running a couple of errands to see that Beavis has finished maintaining the Peesachit truck for the day, and has left a memento in the form of a plastic bag on our lawn. How thoughful!












I wanted to return the favor, so I took the plastic bag and threw it in the bed of the truck, where it's joining another recent acquisition, a tire. It looks so good just laying up against that crapacious surfboard, don't you think?











In other news, I'm apparently starting a job next week on yet another Scooby-freakin'-Doo direct-to-video. I have to finish up a logo for a Bakersfield derby league that's trying to start up. It's going to be pretty damn cool, if I say so myself. It's a rejected idea that I did for the Derby Dolls logo. Will post a pic of it in some form soon.

More Misc. Photos

Here's a couple more photos from last Thursday's bout. Below is fellow captain Puncherello lookin' mighty fierce:













A shot at halftime with two of the guys from the Datsuns. From left to right: Suzy Snakeyes, Phil Datsun, me, Clobber Girl, Volt Ron(behind CG), Redjenn, and Christian Datsun.











The afterparty before things got scary. Yeah, you read that correctly. The guy on the right is one of the TXRD production guys named "Doc". You do not want this guy asking for your panties. Well, maybe you do, but most of the rest of us didn't. He does an excellent job on putting together bouts, I'll tell you whut.













On an entirely different note, this is the latest toilet seat I painted. It was commissioned by a guy in Tejas who do concert posters and stuff. He wanted a seat of the three dogs that he and his wife has/had. Doing skeletal portraiture was pretty freakin' cool! The seat looks pretty awesome under black light.

Just Flew in from Austin...

...and not only are my arms tired, but so is just about every other part of me as well. Jeez, what a week! It started out so bad, but ended up being pretty good overall, and the skating itself was just a freakin' blast! Here's some quick photos that I've gathered so far:

The lineup:










The looking lost in the infield:










The skating:










The back of my shirt after the bout:










Some highlights include:

Simon.

Getting lost in north Austin late at night for two and a half hours and having to ask for directions twice in that time period.

Getting back on the banked track.

Having Witchbaby ask to use my skates for practice.

Drinking vodka and cranberry juice all night at the Red Bull house.

Losing my text messaging virginity to Matt and Juana.

Having Kitty yell, "I need to make out with a boy!!" and knowing what happened after that.

Babysitting Punchy and Myna after the game.

Skating against Smarty Pants.

Taking down Venis Envy.

Starting shit with Betty TaRoll.

Getting yanked off the rail by Cherry Chainsaw and two other TXRD skaters and then getting dogpiled by the rest of the team.

Getting boo'd by the Texas fans at the beginning of the game, but then had them come up to me after the game to take my picture with them.

The Flamers.

Having the husband write inspirational messages on a whiteboard, only to have the board forcefully yanked from him by Bones and Chola.

Being hugged by Kasey.

Walking around the SXSW fest with people saying, "Wow, you girls do roller derby? How cool!"

Almost getting into a fight with some hipster jackasses at the Jackalope.

Seeing the Datsuns.

Seeing some kickass psychobilly bands at Headhunters.

Hearing Doc ask Punchy for her panties.

Climbing up and down the stairs of the convention center parking structure with a buttload of skate gear.

Figuring out how to get all the Derby Doll merch checked in and on its way back to LA.

Having Juliette Lewis bump into me on the plane and apologizing profusely for it.

I need a break, but I don't think I'm going to be getting one anytime soon. Ah well.

Dear Diary...

It has been an interesting time in Austin. After Monday night's bitchfest on this blog, we managed to get horribly lost for about two and a half hours in north Austin trying to find our way back to the house where we are staying. We had to stop for directions twice and still managed to screw it up! Eventually we got back around 2:30am and I had a shower. That made a world of difference in my attitude, and I've gradually started to act less like a jackass. Very gradually, unfortunately for my teamates.

Yesterday was our first practice with the TXRD team that's skating against us. Oh my, what an eye-opener that was! Our skating styles differ enough to cause a bit of frustration on both teams, and many conversations were had with the referees to figure out what's legal and what's not on both sides. It was a great joy to be back on a banked track, especially when I fell for the one billionth time on my fuxxed up knee. It didn't hurt as bad, and I was actually able to get back in and skate. What a novel idea! On our way home we only got lost once, and it was fixed in about five minutes. We even got a little bit of sleep last night. Woohoo!

Today we had another practice with their team, and frustration-wise it was a lot less hairy. Which is good. Everyone thinks TXRD will beat our asses, but I think it'll be a close game no matter who wins, and it'll be hellishly entertaining for the fans. It'll be webcast, too. The TXRD website has info about that.

On a sad note, a major inspiration to many of the all-girl roller derby leagues out there died yesterday. Ann Calvello was known as the "Demon of the Derby" and she skated derby for seven decades. Yow! I never got to meet her, but the TXRD girls who did were quite in awe of her. RIP, Ann.

This has been a long, strange trip. The only thing we can do about it is laugh in the end, which we're doing copious amounts of. I can't wait to skate the game!

Ugh

I'm in Austin with the Derby Dolls.

It's amazing how foul of a mood I can be in when I'm put into close quarters with four other women with access to only one bathroom. And everyone's constipated. That's right, it's bloated gas time! I'm tired, sore from walking around a lot, cranky over having severe lack of sleep and privacy, and I just want to go home. Well, alright, I also want to skate a lot.

When we got into town, the TXRD girls were in the process of moving their track from its current non-permitable space to the convention center. We helped load everything up, helped unload everything at the convention center, and helped get the track together. It was glorious when we actually got to skate!

But that's the only fun I've had. I haven't showered since I got to Austin. I look like sh!t. I must smell horrible, and my fashion sense is nonexistant. My grumpiness is coming through, so now I have to try to shut up so that I don't get killed in my sleep.

Is it Saturday yet?

Changing the Rules to Sainthood

Yesterday I decided that the rules to sainthood will be changed so that my sister can be the newest saint in that pantheon.

Why?

She saved our Derby Doll asses.

Things have been rocky when it comes to getting sponsors for the Derby Doll/TXRD bout. Plans have fallen through sponsor- and money-wise just about every damn time. The latest was having our air travel plans go kaput at 4am yesterday morning, but the skaters weren't told until mid-afternoon. FAWK! That was the final straw. All hope was lost, yet there was an undercurrent of, we HAVE to do this; we HAVE to go to Austin. We've worked too hard NOT to go. I morosely shot an email to my sister about the latest major roadblock, who just so happens to be a travel agent. Five minutes later she calls me, "WHAT?!?!?!?! What do you mean your flights were cancelled at the last minute?!?!" she immediately gets on the computer and starts looking up alternate flights and says she might be able to pull something off before the end of the day. I call one of the league owners and the league business manager to get the OK for this. I get it, everyone starts talking to each other, and the Texas league fronts us a credit card that isn't maxed out to get the tix.

Five hours later and our trip to Austin is saved. We're leaving tomorrow, Sunday, for our first inter-league bout. I'm exhausted because I became the liaison between my sister and the league. My sister's exhausted because she took care of 17 reservations on top of her already-insane workload to take care of our sorry asses. This will be worth it, though. I CAN'T WAIT!

So I give mucho thanks to St. Mary of the Austinly-Bound. Thanks, seestir!

Entropy Project 2006

Still no news about the Derby Dolls going to SXSW, so I thought that while I'm going insane with waiting, I'd share neighbor Beavis' Entropy project.

Here we have his peesa-crap pick'em up truck parked out in front of my house. It's been there for around six weeks. It doesn't look too bad from a distance.




When one approaches the vehicle, one notices the trashbags full o' crap that are in the cab:



The sticks, dirt, and bird crap that adorn the exterior are quite becoming, don't you think?


In the truck bed there's a surfboard, doggie carrier, old oil container, sticks, and of course a Top Ramen wrapper.



Beavis' other entropy project is his Crappy Caddy. I think it might actually run, whereas the peesa-crap truck's battery is still dead. Take special note of the tie-down that's keeping the trunk closed:


If there's anyone out there that thinks that rednecks don't live in Los Angeles, they need to meet Beavis. The only difference between him and a Deliverance character is that I think Beavis has more than one tooth.

Great Googly-Moogly

When things in derby go bad, they go weird, too.

Our major sponsor that was supposed to get our asses out to Austin and keep us lodged has pulled out of the sponsorship deal they had with us. BASTARDS! All is not completely lost...yet.
Tomorrow we find out for sure if we're screwed on the whole deal. Oh joy.

In the meantime, enjoy my Ramones/presidential seal rip-off. This was a real pain in the ass to do, but I learned a lot doing it.

Countdown to Austin

Today I spent about three hours farting around in Illustrator working on making templates for helmet stickers and shirt iron-ons for the LADD/TXRD bout at SXSW next week. My back is killing me from sitting hunched over at the computer as a result.

Below is a quick doodle that I did for a friend who was playing with the idea of starting a women's clothing line called Beaversnug. Ingenious name, I think. I'm thinking of making buttons with the cute beaver on it, minus the Beaversnug tag. I need to come up with a cool t-shirt design for myself or something. Being a nobody sucks.

Random Mutterings

I spent last Friday in relative seclusion. I worked on Derby Doll crap for the upcoming SXSW bout and stayed home with the husband and did a whole lot of nothing and ate Thai food. I really needed that, as the stress of derby crap is getting unbearable.

Saturday night I went to a party that was hosted by one of the Derby Dolls. I didn't want to go, as it was advertised as a "girls only" party and I'm not much of a girly-girl, but it turned out overall to be more entertaining than I expected. It was a small affair, maybe about 12 girls were present, and just about everyone was drinking except me(I'm planning on not drinking at all until March 16 at around 9:30pm). We ate dinner(delicious Mexican food)and played board games and tried on hats and even painted our fingernails. I learned things about some of the girls that I'd never guess on my own. I'll just leave it at that.

Today I made a button design for SXSW. Isn't it cute?












If you're wondering what the hell it means, the hand signal is a fingerbang, which is kinda the "secret handshake" for the Derby Dolls. There's a backstory to it that's too long to explain here, but it's not as bad as it looks. Well, maybe it is. After all, we are a bunch of sickos.

I was also reading blogs here and there, and it really cracks me up to come across snarky comments on other blogs. They're always made by anonymous posters. Which makes me wonder how gutless these morons are in real life. Stand behind your snarkiness, dorks!

Another Rainy Day in LA

It's freakin' cold today. And rainy. Actually, it's probably warmer outside than inside my house by a whopping five degrees. It's happened before.

Today I was prepping a shirt design for the SXSW bout in Austin. It's going to be danged cool. I hope. I'll show it when I actually see it printed.

I took a little nap this afternoon, mainly to give myself an excuse to bury myself under covers so that I wasn't so cold. I was woken to the dreamy tones of Beavis from across the street dropping the f-bomb about 800 times. I blearily stumble out of the warm comfort of bed and drag myself to the even-colder part of the house to see what's going on. His crappy pick'em up truck is still parked in front of our house(of course), but the hood is up and the passenger door is open. Apparently he's trying to perform a Lazarus on the poor thing. Should be interesting. Unfortunately for me he figured out that he left the passenger window open last week, and has since rolled it up. Damn. There goes my plans of squirting cat piss into the truck cab with a squirt bottle.

I think I'm going to put on a wool jacket and sit in the cold art room to watch the hilarity. Enjoy another bored-at-last-night's-meeting doodle:

Meetings with Me

I hate meetings. I especially hate meetings related to derby stuff. I really especially hate meetings related to derby stuff when I've reached my saturation level of derby drama during the day. This SXSW thing is turning into a nightmare internally, and I'm sick of knowing what people are ticked off about in regards to stuff that was decided on on the Derby Doll side. It doesn't help that I landed on my barely-skateable knee last night at practice.

Anyway, so I was distracted at the meeting I was at tonight. The only thing it was good for was that I got some doodle time:

Guess Who's Coming to SXSW?

It's looking like the Derby Dolls will be making their way to Austin, TX in two weeks for our first inter-league bout against the Lonestar Rollergirls. Yes, those Rollergirls from tv. Am I excited? Yep. Am I stressed out? You betcha. We don't have firm hotel accomodations. We don't have firm air tickets. We haven't had many practices to get ready for this thing. We haven't gotten the rules from the Lonestar girls. We need uniforms.

Yeah yeah, a bunch of whining. Whatever.

Here's some more silliness...

The neighbor across the street has a very obnoxious son. The boy is about 31 years old and looks like a surfer. When we first moved into our house almost ten years ago, the boy would have his scumbag deadbeat friends over, and the scene reminded us of Beavis and Butthead, so we dubbed this boy Beavis due to his blondness. Beavis and his buddies had the immediately annoying habit of assuming that they could take up all of the street parking in front of our house. Why he couldn't park in front of his own damn house is beyond me, but he knew he was annoying so he kept doing it. The only times we'd get a respite from his annoying parking habits, his dumping his empty beer bottles on our lawn, hitting my car when drunkenly pulling out of his driveway during a late night booze-fest which he wouldn't ever acknowledge or apologize for, or his just being a general low-life was when he would either end up in jail for robbery or some such thing, or knock up an unsuspecting dumb girl and go play house for awhile until each baby momma would wise up and they'd split up.

As if his general demeanor wasn't enough, Beavis likes to get vehicles and park them at mommy and daddy's for entropy experiments. He has a work truck(he apparently learned welding through one of the jail programs, I do believe), an early-80's vintage uncool Cadillac, and another big ol' pick-em-up truck. Five weeks ago he parked the pick-em truck in front of our house, with not enough room for me to be able to park the lovely rental car I had at the time after the dear departure of my Grand Am. After three days I went outside to move the car so that the husband could get his car out to run some errands, I saw Beavis talking to his mom on their front porch, with his latest toddler child wandering around. I called over, "Hey Beavis(OK, I used his real name), could you move your truck so that I can park in front of my own house?" His response was typically white trash. He started yelling and cussing and generally throwing a temper tantrum about how he won't honor my request. Nothing says good parenting like screaming the f-word repeatedly in front of one's toddler, don't you think? We yelled back, he kept yelling and was generally a jackass. We left before I went bonkers on his prison-bound ass, and when we got back he had moved his truck a full foot so that I could barely park a small car in front of our house. What a giver!

Five weeks later. The pick-em up's still parked in front of our house. Beavis has either used his work truck or his friends for transportation. He had to get the piece-o-crap Caddy running so that he could use that for getting around after exhausting his friends' generosity, as his work truck died, too. In the meantime the pick-em up's battery died, he's left the passenger side window open just enough so that it's been tempting to drop something dead in there, but instead just rain has gotten in. It's also covered in bird crap. I'm able to park the new car in the small space left in front of the house, so the husband and I are watching this latest entropy experiment with growing amusement. It's been tempting to call parking enforcement to get the pick-em up towed, I'll admit it. However, I wouldn't put it past him to either strike back on our vehicles directly, or have one of his scumbag buddies do something charming and destructive.

Overall it's gotten to the point where I'm less ticked off and more amused that this moron is willing to put himself and everyone else around him out just to annoy the neighbors. Ha!

Here's an ugly doodle: