Well I’ve been 30 for 5 days now and surprisingly the world hasn’t ended. The above photo was taken of me on Saturday night at the Raw Meat Skate Night. I’m wearing a Tron shirt, acting like a complete fool and posing in-front of old arcade machines. What’s clear is that regardless of how old I get, I will never grow up.
My actual birthday was a pretty low-key event. I went to work, had a bunch of meetings, friends bought me a coffee in the morning and an ice-cream in the afternoon. After work I went downtown and roller-skated the seawall enjoying some beautiful weather. Melinda had some delicious cake waiting for me at home which was awesome. Oh and Nintendo unveiled the 3DS, and Valve unveiled Portal 2. Both very nice birthday presents, thank you Nintendo and Valve!
I was actually supposed to have a birthday bash on June 12th. I tried to rally my friends and get them out for some cheesy rollerskating. Alas, schedules were tight so the party was not able to get the critical mass needed to survive. It was ok though because that same weekend I started meeting a whole bunch of new people.
The Fresh-Meat Wannabes met up for the first time on Friday June 11th. We had an insane turn-out. 23 people ended up joining us including a few skaters with the Terminal City Roller Girls. It was clear that there was a need for an informal get-together of “derby-driven” people. What was most awesome was how well I got along with so many of these people. Many of us stuck around after the skate to drink beers.
The following day I went to the public skate only to find several of my new friends there. I got to skate with them for another 2 hours. Then on Sunday June 13th I met up with a couple of them again to skate the seawall. So much skating! So much socializing! So much fun!
This weekend we had our second “Raw Meat” Skate Night (yeah.. Raw Meat… that’s our nickname). 22 folks turned out. We again had beers afterward. And today a few of us met up on Main St. for Car Free Days. It’s really really nice having friends that are obsessed with roller derby as well.
So yes, I’ve turned 30. A milestone birthday. But I can’t think of any better way to start my 30s than with a whole pile of new friends (to compliment all my existing friends of course!).
