Brownstain Chicane
Me [passing my ‘event rival’, Nathan McKane]:”Oh, look … it’s Nathan McF*ckface — bye bye, F*ckface.” ¹
I’ve been killing people for a while now … and it’s been … cathartic, I suppose.
But, for every user there comes a time when the high just can’t be chased any more … when no amount will satiate the need … and, whilst I’ve not run out of heads to shoot nor bullets to put in them, it just isn’t cutting it for me anymore . Or, rather, it’s cutting it too much — I need a harder, faster hit to keep the intrusive thoughts at bay … my meditation is becoming porous around the edges … things are creeping in.
So … I’ve finally had to cave and switch to motor racing.
I’ve been putting it off.
Compared to the coke fueled rampage of the first person shooter, motor racing is the adrenaline junkie’s armful of bathtub meth; it’s fast, brutal and there’s nowhere to go afterwards — it’s the last train to oblivion and there’s no return service (once you get to the end of that line, it’s game over).
According to the voice in my ear, I just set the fastest lap this race.
And, indeed, the brown stain seeping through my underwear and trousers … ruining the sofa … is testament to that.
Other banalities I could do without being distracted by when trying to navigate the hair’s breadth between life and fireball include
“That was off pace for sector one.”
“That was off pace for sector two.”
“That was off pace for sector three.”
“Try and shave a bit of time off your laps.”
I’ll shave a bit off you in a minute, mate! ²
After a bout of updates about my progress, Forrest the Great remarked “Lol! So much anger”
I demurred with the observation that “Before every race I’m told whom I have to beat as my team/race rival, so I figure I ought to enter into the spirit of things.”
But that’s not strictly true.
It’s technically true … insofar as I am capable of abstractly thinking it when put on the spot.
But, really, I am angry.
Very angry.
Duh … I’m behind the wheel of a car and people are trying to run me off the road!
Look … I’m the first to admit it … the Endurance competition, like the Tuner competition, isn’t my forté. High speed Formula class cars, I am surprisingly good with. Likewise street racing (my best discipline, in fact). And, whilst I might not come first every time, I can even hold my own in Touring class competitions. When it comes to driving a Chevvy Breezeblock Aircushion, however … skittish AF, no matter how I tune it, and just keeps on traveling in whatever direction the wind last blew it ³ … for hours on end, in the rain and the dark
… yeah, no, it just doesn’t play to my strengths — second in the bedroom is one thing, but sixteenth is taking things a bit too far, IMO.
What’s that you say, Cletus?
“Y’all just don’t posses the skillz to drive a real man’s car”
Really? and what use would those ‘skillz’ be to me? I’m never gonna f*ck my sister.
So, I’m never in a good mood after one of those.
And I really don’t have time to pay attention to minor details at the kinds of speeds I’m traveling at … at which a miscalculated millimetre can mean a spectacular end to my driving career … and can’t say who
… but some of the drivers seem to have such a hard-on for my Gary that, next time, I’mma have to ruin both our days, slam the brakes on, get out and demand f*cking rent!
In fact, in one of the competitions, it transpired that the homicidal rapist trying to ramraid my arse … shunt me over the hills and into orbit … was none other than my own teammate!
He has tried to commit highspeed murder so often now that I’m beginning to wonder if there isn’t more to it than simple professional rivalry, personal dislike, or even his having been paid (or put under pressure) — whether he isn’t, perhaps, sleeping with my wife behind my back.
Because, if you’re behind me in the endurance race, you’re either so shit you should just give it up, mate … or there’s something else going on.
I have, however, noted one other contender for the person I am going to beat to death with my helmet back in the pits award; coincidentally, one of my race rivals, Nathan McF*ckface (or whatever the b*stard’s name is ¹ ).
Well, I braked … hard … in his face, during the final lap of the final race of the season, let me tell you (take that, F*ckface! ¹ ) and … hahahahahahahahaha … the f*cker crashed — putting me four points ahead of him and I won the season overall (suck on that, f*ckface ¹ ).
It took quite a few replays before I perfected the angle required to smash into my opponent … side-on, slowing him down enough to slip ahead without slowing myself down so much I couldn’t pass him … whilst undercutting him on the corner, and take first place with only half a (very short) lap left to go ⁴.
Then the voice in my ear said “Your teammate has crashed — they’ve dropped to second.”
Yeah, yeah, whatever … I haven’t got time to worry about them, I’m busy — I‘ve got half a lap to go and seventeen other people up my Gary.
Wait, what?
Second?
So, that means …
Oops! ⁷
Anyway …
If you want the ultimate aid to meditation … motor racing’s the thing.
Killing people leaves time to think about logistics: “Will I find any more health/ammo and, if so, where?” Time exists.
With motor racing, however, there is only room for the here and now (a thousandth of a second is forever) and, whilst the reasons for it differ at various times, the one, and only, thought in your head is “OhshitOhshitOhshitOhshitOhshit!!!”
Now that’s Zen.
Right … breaktime is over — it’s back to the grind for me.
I’m halfway through an endurance race in the dark, hurtling around in four tons of ludicrously overpowered breezeblock with all the roadholding of a hovercraft (the hot-air balloon of watercraft) … my tyres are already balder than a twelve-year-old and … having somehow (the Lord alone knows how) managed to get myself into fourth place … I’m desperately trying to fend off fourteen homicidal Arschgeier with designs on my rear-end, whilst some dickhead distracts me … at millimetre critical moments whilst I’m traveling so fast you need to travel backwards in Time to even see when/where they’re going to be … by whining in my ear about my laptimes being a trillionth of a second slower than last time … which is very distracting and …
OhshitOhshitOhshitOhshitOhshit!!!
—
¹ I hate that guy.
² Have a guess which.
³ As far as I can tell, the steering wheel doesn’t actually influence the direction of travel and is just there for decoration. If some of the cars are Olympic ice-dance gold-medalists, then American ‘muscle’ cars are a blind whale riding a drunken elephant on rollerskates down a glacier — lumps of lard that look like beached whales, wallow like whales in a kiddies’ paddling pool and steer like a herd of cats.
⁴ I’m not saying I drive that way IRL, but buses and eighteen-wheelers do get out of my way when they see me coming — even when there’s no ground to actually give ⁵.
⁵ I don’t know what it is about my driving style that means they manage to break the laws of Physics and, impossibly, create space that just isn’t physically there, but they do ⁶.
⁶ It possibly has something to do with the fact I’m in charge of two tons of metal powered by a series of barely controlled explosions, people have been trying to run me off the road, or otherwise contrive to make me crash and die, all day and I’m really VERY ANGRY NOW.
⁷ Upon reflection, I wonder if that mightn’t have something to do with my teammate’s later attitude — some people do seem to take things personally.
