Meet our new blogger John (aka Penile Tease) the owner of our sparkling new Fresh Meat blog Boy Meets Floor. Here is what he has to say:

Last night was great! I didn’t think throwing yourself at the ground was meant to be quite so much fun? Well, I was grinning my ass off all the way through, and can safely say I thoroughly acquainted myself with the floor. We’re total bezzies now. Managing to bruise the best part of my elbow through my elbow pad somehow? Epic fail.
Dead chuffed for my first time on wheels. I couldn’t even move at the start of the night, but by the end I was loving it (if still wobbly as hell). I need to get the whole forward momentum thing a bit more together and I’ll be away… some practice to be done, but I thought I’d be worse to be honest!
Thanks to Mischief, Phoenix and Dusti for some awesome coaching. You guys made it so easy to pick stuff up.

and if you want to have some fun and build up a collection of interesting and unexplained bruises (and frankly who wouldn’t) come and give roller derby a go. Our beginners sessions run on Thursdays 7-9pm at the spandex palace.
Email us at info@rollerbillies.com or click on the fancy-schmancy contact us button at the top of the page for details

Goodness, is that the time already? We should probably get a bout or two in before the end of the world. And bake some macaroons. Countdown to the Apocalypse starts on Saturday August 6th with Quadrophobia, when we play the unbeaten (we don’t do things by halves) Brighton Rockers Roller Derby. Awesome! Their pants are fancy and they fight giant killer squid before breakfast, so we are more than a little excited and very pleased to be asked to skate against them. We shall also be running the traditional Rollerbillies Injury Sweepstake as soon as the team is announced, first prize as always being a Jägerbomb and a ride on a pig through Romsey Town Square. Tickets for this joyous clash of coloured spandex and neon facepaint are available online from http://www.brightonrockers.com/ Bring your nan.

*http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1769/allamerican-chocolate-chunk-cookies

If you play derby you’re probably painfully aware that sports halls tend to be a lot smaller than a full size track. Derby comes from America; stuff is bigger there. For most leagues here, it’s pretty tough finding a venue big enough to fit your needs. It’s not so bad when you start out and there are 8 of you (if you’re lucky) and you’re excited about going round cones.. but as time goes on you get bigger ambitions. Like, playing the sport properly. So you get a tape measure and figure out that your hall is dinky, and therefore so are your laps, which means that you’re kidding yourself thinking that you can easily handle 25 in 5 minutes. This can be depressing. By contrast, the first time you get to skate on a full track is delightful. When you get hit off the track, you don’t hit a wall – you keep going. This is known as a slide out zone. When other people try to pass you, you can hit them into the slide out zone, which they will travel through until the audience gently breaks their fall. It’s a revelation.

So, after two years of training in tiny little sports halls we were actually bouncing off the walls, and desperate to get more than one training session a week. The epic forces of space and time were conspiring against us. What could we do?

Luckily, She-Ra appeared.

“Oh Rollerbillies,” she said, “you shall have your very own warehouse!” Golden sparkles filled the air and we found ourselves transported to a derelict building near the allotments. Grey dust filled our eyes as the ceiling threatened to fall in on our heads.

“Awesome!” we exclaimed. “What shall we call it?”

“The Spandex Palace works for me,” said She-Ra, “I think if you ripped that suspended ceiling out, found an angle grinder to take out those studs in the floor and padded those small columns, this place would be the nuts. You could even get pegs with your names on.”

Our eyes glazed over with rapture as the air was filled with swirly light and possibly particles of asbestos. “By the way,” said She-Ra, “there’s a stack of mattresses no one’s using in the other room – help yourselves.”

Fabulous secrets had been revealed to us. “You have the power tools!” said She-Ra.

“Where do we plug them in..?” we asked. But she was gone. The building has been unoccupied for the last two years, so we are officially off grid. Despite this oversight on She-Ra’s part, we were undeterred. We’re grassroots. Like, where the dirt is. We know people with generators. The demolition job began.