According to a few of my friends, ever since I had a piece in the Keep Dallas Deviant art show/auction, I have become obsessed with the Assassination City Roller Derby girls. This may very well be true. It is hard not to love these girls. They are like modern day gladiators wearing makeup and on wheels. On top of that, they are a truly wonderful group of women and they have a slew of devoted fans. 

I’ll be the first to admit that my experience with the roller derby scene is limited. One of my best friends growing up, Amy, was a member of the team in Austin. I had the opportunity to see her skate in a match a few years ago. It was a great experience and helped me to realize just how much I’m into watching sweaty (glowing) women knock each other’s blocks off.

Over the years, I have taken up a few derby bouts, but I always felt that I stuck out like a sore thumb. Maybe I shouldn’t have worn a business suit to the bouts, but it wouldn’t be the first time I made that mistake. I recently got back into painting and through a posting on Facebook a friend of mine suggested that I enter a piece in the Keep Dallas Deviant show. I immediately felt at home with the derby girls. They are all a combination of little sister, big sister, best girl friend, and favorite lover all wrapped up in one.

After the art show, I kept in touch with a few of the girls via Myspace and email. Trigger Mortis, of the Lone Star Assassins, invited me to come out for beers the next week. Ever since then, she and I have either text’d or talked every day. Upon returning from a weeklong trip to Kansas City, on the Friday before All-Con, Trigger invited me to come up on Saturday to hang out with the girls. 

Due to the combination of my usual inability to get up and around, the car lag of an 8 hour drive, and a day spent running around playing catch-up. I didn’t make it up to All-Con until after 5pm.

Immediately upon entering the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Addison, I realized that I wasn’t in Kansas anymore. I was truly in the presence of geekness. I’m not sure what got my spider-sense tingling more: the women in the lobby wearing the random anime costumes or the grown men in the bar holding their porcelain succubus dolls. Regardless, Trigger met me in the lobby and presented me with an all-access pass. I felt like a groupie who just got backstage at a Poison concert in 1988.