I can no longer keep quiet. I cannot, in good conscience, let this go on when it’s clearly a moral problem. If you went out to 80s Skate Night and raced competitively in roller blades, there is no glory for you.
How can you justify such a thing? Do you respect the one kid at the pool in goggles who crushes everyone else at Sharks and Minnows? Of course not. Wearing roller blades to an 80s skate race is as tasteless as showing up to your cousin’s post-Thanksgiving football game in cleats and shoulder pads.
Roller blades were designed for crushing sidewalks at unholy speeds with your mid-90s lover. No one wore them in the 80s because people understood that speed isn’t as important as looking cute. I don’t care how 80s authentic your costume is: if you’re topped off in blades you might as well be blasting Vanilla Ice from your Discman. Just to ensure historical accuracy, I watched a movie called Solarbabies (1986) and enjoyed every minute of post-apocalyptic quad skating action. Then I watched Prayer of the Rollerboys (1990), which is about a bunch of agnostic teenagers rollerblading around and dealing drugs. I can’t make this stuff up. Clearly, quad skates are more relevant to 80s culture while blades symbolize 90s paganism.
But why do I care so much? Because I have a strong sense of justice and I hate losing. Of course I’m bitter after spending the last three straight weekends training at the rink only to lose to some kid with the equivalent of two bicycles on his feet. After suffering a humiliating loss in the first round, I slunk to the back of the crowd and quietly watched one of the dozen bladers in attendance take every single race. Is there some type of PotR cult that’s been training on the tennis courts in the wee hours of the morning, or are roller blades just 30 percent faster?
I kept waiting for Daniel Dupree to sweep out of nowhere and clothesline someone, or for DJ Git Lowe to pause the music and rebuke the student body for its foolishness, but no. Every authority in place just stood by and watched like it wasn’t even a problem. I never thought I’d say it, but in this case I think student administration might be giving us too much freedom.
Heed my warning: if anyone shows up to race in blades next year, I will shove gobs of chewed Hubba Bubba in their wheels. I’m willing to be socially crucified if it means future Scots can enjoy fair, competitive skate races. By the way, if you disagree with any of this you should write a response so we can get into a Bagpipe battle and make tons of stipend money.