12 CHICAGO READER | FEBRUARY 3, 2006 | SECTION ONE

Happenings

Charity Beginsin the PantsThe girls were in the mud.The pigs were in the crowd.By Jessica Hopper

I t was 9:45 last Saturday nightinside a normally abandonedoffice building on the far west side.

An older man in his mid-to-late 60s,dressed in a suit coat and stripedshirt, was standing at the front of arowdy mob gathered outside a roomon the third floor. “You must let mein!” he pleaded in a thick easternEuropean accent. “I pay money! Idemand! You let me in!” A butchwoman about 40 years his junior, herchin covered in tribal tattoos, stoodwith her arms outstretched acrossthe doorway. “I don’t care who youknow, man,” she told him. “You ain’tgetting in.” Doors had been open forless than an hour and the place wasalready at capacity. A young woman

on roller skates made her waythrough the crowd, her flashlight theonly illumination in the dark corri-dor. “Coming through! Security!Coming through!” she yelled as shepassed, limbo style, under the bounc-er’s arms. The mob grew surlier,craning their necks to see past thebouncer, because just behind herwomen were about to wrestle in mud.

The Mud Queens, a Chicago-basedall-female mud-wrestling cabal, usu-ally stages bouts only once or twice ayear—and they tend to create havoc.This was their first appearance sincethe Around the Coyote Festival in

September. Mud Queens organizerMeg Bell, 26, says she limited theamount of people let into thewrestling room “for safety’s sake”and, anticipating the overflow, set up a live video feed in an adjacentroom to both accommodate fans and raise as much money as possible.All proceeds from Mud Queensevents benefit the Young Women’sEmpowerment Project, a local chari-ty that seeks to help women and girlsimpacted by the sex trade and streeteconomies. “It’s a benefit, and it’sonly five bucks,” she says, justifyingthe setup. “If it was $15, we couldn’t

[snip] And any one of them can cancelout your vote. Kevin Coyle, author ofEnvironmental Literacy in America, quot-ed at worldchanging.com, finds “a per-sistent pattern of environmental igno-rance even among the most educatedand influential members of society.”

Actually, ignorance may be too weak aword. The U.S. population is 298 million,and 45 million of us “think the ocean is asource of fresh water; 120 million thinkspray cans still have CFCs in them eventhough CFCs were banned in 1978; anoth-er 120 million people think disposable

diapers are the leading problem withlandfills when they actually representabout 1% of the problem; and 130 millionbelieve that hydropower is America’s topenergy source, when it accounts for just10% of the total.” —Harold Henderson |hhenderson@chicagoreader.comOur Town

The action ringside, the action in the ring, the raffle winner gets his.

SAV

ERIO

TR U

GLIA

CHICAGO READER | FEBRUARY 3, 2006 | SECTION ONE 13

do that sort of thing.” But for five dollars these people

expected to see muddy girls flippingeach other over in the flesh, not on TV.One belligerent man, after demand-ing a refund, called the woman work-ing the door a cunt and a fight brokeout as security—all members of local roller derby team the ChitownSirens—showed him the door.

Backstage the wrestlers made last-minute adjustments to their cos-tumes and makeup. A woman namedSunshine, who wrestles as VelmaPompadour, touched up the fake

black eye of her tattooed girlfriend,who wrestles as BT Bruiser. “It’s herfirst time,” she said. Bruiser took offher denim jacket with the Assuckpatches to show her costume. Othersoohed and aahed over Lexi Luthor’scostume—a vintage black girdle braand hot pants—and her newlyshaved head. “I even shaved my legstoo!” she said with a big toothy grin.

There were seven matches scheduled, featuring 14 wrestlers.Announcer Billy Carter, of the MudQueens’ house band, the Billy CarterBand, warned the crowd, “If youwant to keep anything you are wear-ing, or ever wear it again, we suggestbefore the wrestling starts you take itoff and put it somewhere far, faraway, because it is about to getruined.” The audience, which had lit-tle choice but to stay in the plastic-lined wrestling room all night—leav-

ing meant forfeiting your spot—pressed closer to the stage. Theknowing few had thought ahead anddonned recycling bags or raincoatsover their clothes; the others wereeither unconcerned or too drunk tocare. It’d been nearly two hours sincethe local band Gays in the Militarykicked things off, and the roomsmelled faintly of vomit because thesinger for the Functional Blackouts,who also played, had barfed threetimes during his band’s set. Ratherthan clean it up, someone coveredthe puke with flowers that had beenbrought for the wrestlers, as if thatwould cancel out the stench.

Before the first wrestlers made theirway onto the waist-high, tarp-coveredwooden stage at the back of the room,a woman clad in fishnet stockings andgarters sauntered through the crowd,a roll of tickets in one hand and abrown-bagged king can in the other.“Last chance for raffle tickets!” sheshouted. “Win your chance to wrestletwo-a these beautiful ladies tonight!”A middle-aged man bought 20, rock-ing on his heels as the girl doled thetickets into his hat. His date smirkedas he turned and assured that thetickets were for her. Besides, he said,“It’s for a good cause.”

As the Billy Carter Band fumbledthrough a rousing medley of punkhits—pulling out “Blitzkrieg Bop”anytime the crowd started to flag—aman in a Mud Queens T-shirtpoured two five-gallon buckets ofwatered-down artisan’s clay into araised plastic ring. The crowd wentnuts. Carter reached down, scoopedup a finger full, and flicked it towardthe front row, where it landed on theold man, who’d somehow managedto get in. “Don’t do that!” he yelled.“That’s my coat!”

The first wrestler to enter was ElBaño, clad in a push-up bra withsewed-on lightning bolts and wear-ing a toilet seat with a towel affixedto it like a cape around her neck.Her competitor, first-time wrestlerCheerbleeder, made a lap around

the ring and flashed her underwearat the crowd. Both took their posi-tions and pushed in earplugs tokeep out the mud. Cheerbleeder

egged on El Baño, calling her a“drunken bitch,” and at the referee’swhistle they tackled each other.

[snip] What was he saying when he had the powerto do some good? Greg Mankiw, former chair ofPresident Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers, pro-poses at wsj.com that public officials make the follow-ing New Year’s resolutions: “This year I will admit thatthere are some good taxes. . . . I will tell the American

people that a higher tax on gasoline is better atencouraging conservation than are heavy-handedCAFE [corporate average fuel economy] regula-tions. . . . I will tell people that tolls are a good way toreduce traffic congestion. . . . I will advocate a carbontax as the best way to control global warming.” —HH

continued on page 14

Lexi Luthor and Velma Pompadour, organizer Meg Bell and referee Kerry Spring.

SAV

ERIO

TR U

GLIA

The room smelledfaintly of vomitbecause the singerfor the FunctionalBlackouts hadbarfed three times during hisband’s set.

14 CHICAGO READER | FEBRUARY 3, 2006 | SECTION ONE

Our Town

“Mud wrestling is really intense,”Bell says. “It’s total sensory depriva-tion: The mud is in your mouth, youreyes, your nose. You can’t hear any-thing. And the mud makes it so slip-pery you can’t do anything but slip andslide around each other.” Nonetheless,the lady wrestlers went at it. The firstmatch ended in a draw, but the audi-ence pulled for Cheerbleeder, who—nopun intended—fought dirty, tuggingEl Baño’s bra half off.

Over the next hour and a half sev-eral of the Mud Queens exited thering with their costumes ripped inhalf or off; spanking was deployedduring submission holds; women inthe front row pawed BT Bruiser, beg-ging for kisses after her pummelingvictory over Pippi Jawstopping; a

pansexual make-out orgy took placeringside during the fifth match; peo-ple urinated in trash cans so as not tomiss any action; and everyone in thefront two rows got as soaked in mudas the wrestlers.

In the final round, the scrawnytwentysomething raffle winner put aG-string with “drama queen” printedon the crotch over his boxers and lettwo wrestlers clobber him. The filthyaudience then made their way out tothe street. The old man from the frontrow giddily wiped mud from his suitas he made his way down the corridor,sandwiched between leather-cladpunks. Uniformed police had justarrived and were standing at the frontdoor. As he passed the bewilderedofficers, the old man hoisted histhumb and said, “It’s the best!” v

15 Minutes

AmbushedSuzannah Martin’scoworkers and fiance ratted her out to the fashion police.

By Heather Kenny

S uzannah Martin’s friends willtell you that before last fall shewasn’t a total fashion disaster.

“She was just a rugged Vermont girl,”says Suzi Crawford, a friend ofMartin’s fiance who’s gotten to knowthe 36-year-old mother of two over

the last three years. “She’s down-to-earth, and her style and clothesreflected that.” But to DeCarlaHilliard, the office manager at theEvanston Koenig & Strey real estateagency where Martin’s worked forthree years, down-to-earth wasn’tgood enough to make the leap fromselling north-side condos to million-dollar North Shore homes. “It wasn’tso much that she dressed badly,” saysHilliard. “It was just that her profes-sional look needed help.”

The producers of the TLCmakeover show What Not to Wearagreed: they contacted Hilliard with-in hours of her initial e-mail,impressed by style gaffes like thepurple feather scrunchie that Martinhad borrowed from one of her young

[snip] The makeover continues. “Our planet’s future depends on our redesigning the currentenergy system, which relies on fossil fuels that emit tremendous amounts of carbon and green-house gases into the air,” says Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer, on its Web site. “Climatechange is an urgent threat. . . .We plan to reduce our overall greenhouse gas emissions by 20 per-cent over the next eight years. We will also design a store that will use 30% less energy and pro-duce 30% fewer greenhouse gas emissions than our 2005 design within the next 3 years.” —HH

continued from page 13

continued on page 16

CHICAGO READER | FEBRUARY 3, 2006 | SECTION ONE 15