Melificent

Derby at the Races

I hope all of you had a fantastic Labor Day weekend – I know I did!

Time absolutely flew by (as it always does during long weekends), but the highlight was definitely attending the Coconut Grove Bed Races with my fellow derby sisters to push Tinker Tank‘s bed. For those of you that don’t know, I joined the Miami’s Vice City Rollers, Miami’s first roller derby team back in July. A few weeks later, I can honestly say that I have made a lot of great friends and learned so so much about technique and the game. Despite my hectic work schedule, I am trying to make it a priority and may have even suckered the hubs to jump on board as a ref! For all those interested in joining the team, we will be holding an open house on Sunday, September 18th. For more information, make sure to check out our website or Facebook fan page.

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My 1st Day as a Derby Dame

I have to say, I was pretty nervous come Sunday night. It was time for my first roller derby practice to be part of the Miami Vice City Rollers, and aside from skating around my house (literally, up and down my hallways) and briefly around my neighborhood (I really need outdoor wheels), I had not been unleashed in the open so to speak. Due to inclement weather, practice was moved from an outdoor roller hockey rink to a local skate rink, Super Wheels (a site that hosted many of my childhood birthday parties). Because of the change in venue, practice took a very different feel and instead of doing drills, we were told it would be more of a “dodging” practice.

And dodge we did. There were several children’s birthday parties occurring and just an influx of people that clearly had never seen a roller skate in their life, much less put a pair on their feet. I kind of felt like I was in a video game – there were small children colliding and face planting all around me, and I did my absolute best to avoid plowing through each and every one of them. One of the lovely girls on the team helped me begin my journey towards crossover turning (never learned as a kid), and I did my best working slowly towards sliding one foot in front of the other. By the end of the free skate, I’m pretty sure I had improved somewhat, but was still terrified to attempt to lift off fully (probably because of the pint-sized hazards).

I didn’t fall once (squee!), and was able to chat with a few of the girls – all of which are super sweet and supportive. I honestly cannot wait until next week’s proper practice, although I must say I am extremely overwhelmed with this new world and its lingo/science. Bearings, bushings, toe guards. What? Slow down, crazy. I also really need to build up my endurance: skating around for 2 hours had me seriously beat. Good news? Since the team is openly recruiting, we did not have to try out. We are all part of the team and will work up to be bout ready by December.

Guys, I’m a derby girl!
Here’s to keeping all my body parts and teeth in tact.

Roxy’s Derby-licious Photo Shoot

Remember my 2-year anniversary pretty nifty photoshoot giveaway? Well, Roxy was one of the two winners and we were finally able to coordinate a session a couple of weeks ago. She is just the cutest little thing with tons of spunk and sass (two of my favorite qualities). She wanted a mixture of pin up and roller derby, as she is fresh meat on her Houston league back home. The ideas sounded great to us – my hubs had never shot anything in these styles so he was more than psyched to give it a go. I have to say that we had the best time with Ms. GrrFeisty – she even inspired me to give derby a go (I’m looking at you, Vice City Rollers)!

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Cadillac Ranch Grand Opening Party

Although CG Burgers really let me down, I am very excited about West Kendall getting another new joint: Cadillac Ranch. They tout themselves as a premier all american bar and grill offering BBQ, comfort food, cocktails…and a mechanical bull. That spells trouble – the kind I’d like to get into. And this Thursday, July 7th, I will be – and so should you! Cadillac Ranch will be hosting their grand opening party starting at 6pm with half-off cocktails (until 10pm). Even better? All money from each mechanical bull ride will go towards Autism Speaks! As if you needed extra incentive to have a go at the beast. 😉

For your free tickets, contact Joany Meurice at joany.meurice@autismspeaks.org and tell her Melificent sent you! Hope to see you there, fellow Kendallites!

Weekend Highlights: SheCon

I was really looking forward to SheCon. Since revamping the blog, I needed some pointers on how to grow my readership and possibly monetize it. So I thought this would be the perfect place to gain some knowledge and network with people in the industry. Unfortunately, I was sorely disappointed on many fronts.

Before I continue, I want to say that I only attended Friday from 9am until noon-ish. That is when I decided I had enough. Maybe it got better afterwards, but from friends’ accounts I don’t really think it did. With that said, I thought the event was very poorly thought out. Attendance was extremely low (I’d say there were about 60 people at the Guy Kawasaki panel), and the quality of material presented was crap. Aside from Kawasaki (who actually recommended the Bieber movie as a must watch), the speakers seemed really off target and not very knowledgeable or well-rounded. I can honestly say I learned nothing from their presentations, sadly. I don’t want to go into too much detail because I don’t want this to be a slam fest, but suffice it to say that it was a huge let down. Huge.

Thankfully I was able to make the best out of the situation and spend some quality time with friends that I don’t get to see too frequently. So it wasn’t a complete waste of a day. However, I really hope that SheCon is able to take all the feedback and improve upon it for next year because the concept was really great and had the potential to be something pretty special. Here’s hopin’.

Have a great week, everyone, and congratulations on surviving the elusive rapture! 😉