Monday Night Practice

I would have blogged about this last night -- I came home from practice feeling really good, if exhausted. But when I got home I found that Charlie was gone, and so were Moxie and Jack (our 4- and 5-year-old Corgis). It turns out that they had gotten out through an open gate (I don't *think* we left the gate open, but I guess it's possible. Usually we're very careful about that.)

Charlie had already called the Albany police department's non-emergency number and reported them missing; Jack was spotted pretty quickly, trying to get into someone's car a few blocks down our street. Charlie brought him home shortly after I got home, and then we both went out looking for Moxie.

No luck last night. We both got up early this morning to go and search some more. While I was walking around with Jack and a stack of leaflets, Charlie called me on my cell. The police had called him; someone had found a Corgi. We had an address and a phone number, but Charlie got voice mail when he called. So I got in my car and headed over to the address.

When I rang the doorbell, a wonderful lady named Holly answered, followed by a Corgi: a brindled Pembroke. Shit. But close on the heels of that dog was MOXIE!! Which is what I said: "MOXIE!!!!!" It turns out that a bus driver friend of Holly's had spotted Moxie and thought she looked like Holly's dog (she doesn't, but I'm *so* glad the bus driver thought so).

Well, to make this long story short, or at least no longer: all of my dogs are safe at home, and we have a guy coming later today to give us an estimate on fixing the gate.

So, back to derby. Remember derby? This is a blog about derby.

Last night was a good practice. Brick was our trainer. I'm not saying *any* Sick Town trainer is easy, because they are *so* not. But it seems like Brick's practices are especially brutal. If you think I'm complaining about that, I'm really not. When I get through one of Brick's practices, I feel *great* -- like I have really accomplished something. Honestly, I feel that way about all the Sick Town practices.

One cool thing is that last night we did the 40 laps in 8 minutes drill. If you were reading my blog back in January, you'll know that the last time I did that drill, HotBoxxx had to push me just about the entire way.

Well, last night, I skated the entire drill. I did get some push-assists from some of the girls, but no one had to shopping-cart my ass around the track. (I also got some whip-assists, which I continue to love, love, love.) I've also gotten to the point where I'm not embarrassed about needing help (the fact that I need less help than I did a couple of months ago helps). My goal is still to be one of the girls *giving* the assists, instead of *needing* them ... but I'm making progress!

We also did relays and sprints and sprawls and just a whole lot of endurance drills, and then it was on to the hitting pace lines. I got through all of the pace lines (boosh!) and even got some good hits in on the OGs (I tried to hit more gently when I was hitting new girls). I think at one point I hit Pwny well enough that it sent her out of bounds. And ... this is awesome ... I'm doing better at taking hits. I (unintentionally) ran away from Brick when she went to hit me the first time, but after that I made sure not to do that again, and I never once popped up when someone hit me.

One of the neatest things last night, though, was all the encouragement from the other girls. It's a pretty amazing thing to be skating your best and hear your teammates (well, leaguemates; I'm not on the *team* yet) cheering you on.

Love, love, love Sick Town.