MINDLESS MUSINGS

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  • POTENTIAL DEATH OR SERIOUS INJURY: True Stories #14

    Walking, or should I say staggering drunkenly, along the main street of Kings Cross after a big night on the piss, I was stopped by a guy who I mistakenly took for a bouncer. Greg and Joe were further ahead of us heading for the station, as it was the end of festivities for us tonight. Jonno was standing beside me trying to wrench the ‘bouncer’s’ hand free from my collar.

    I didn’t realise I was standing in the gutter and everyone else was on the footpath making them all appear much taller. The guy who had my shirt was a white guy and he was talking to his islander mate asking, “is this the guy?”

    I had no idea what was going on, and I was confused by Jonno’s insistence that the ‘bouncer’ let me go. I was thinking I was being mistaken for someone else who had caused trouble in the club these two guys worked for.

    Finally, Jonno wrenched my shirt free and pushed me on my way. I stepped back up onto the gutter and realised that I had not been accosted by a couple of giants. I also realised that these were not bouncers and that this was not some misunderstanding. I know now that I was free to go all along, but in my drunken stupor I was very slow to react. Turns out these were just two blokes hanging around outside Porky’s who had nothing to do with the club. Either way I was walking away now.

    I do not know how far I had gotten when the flash of light rang through my head. I knew that sensation; I had just been hit. I staggered drunkenly towards the road and miraculously hit a no standing sign or something similar. Had I not I would have stumbled helplessly onto the main road of Kings Cross and into the path of an oncoming vehicle; squish!

    I turned just in time to see Jonno punch the white guy in the head. He then turned and called Greg and Joe. The bully wasn’t so keen to continue hitting people once the numbers were not in his favour. It was all well and good hitting a tiny bloke like me with only one full sized mate to defend him. I would have been 58kg wringing wet at the time, so technically it was two against one and a half; the half being stumbling drunk as well.

    After a bit of push and shove nothing eventuated so we continued our walk to the station and headed down the travelators. I could feel a nice shiner rising on my right eye. I didn’t really mind. I thought of it like a reminder of the time I nearly ended up in traffic from a dog shot I most certainly did not deserve.

    I still get chills when I remember how I could have so easily stumbled into oncoming traffic and God only knows what could have hit me or where I might have ended up. Wrong place at the wrong time, but at least a little luck was shining my way that night.

  • WHO’S THE BOSS? Rise of the Tycoons #11

    A tribal settlement might grow to become a village and would probably have someone like a chief. If this village continues to expand and either merges or takes over surrounding settlements and villages it could well earn itself the title of kingdom! The chief who manages to convince the population that they are the rightful boss, or knocks off all the competition, may now call themselves a king (or some other lofty moniker).

    Without getting too complicated I should point out that there would be many variations on the kingdom theme. Aside from the one abovementioned there may be a group of separate fiefdoms scattered across the land, each ruled by its own Baron or whatever haughty name the one in charge wants to give themselves. These may choose, or be forced, to unite under the flag of a supreme wanker (I mean ruler) and this person would be the king or queen. This where you find all the “Game of Thrones” intrigue. Those flag manufacturers were on a good wicket I’d say.

    On the other hand, there is the middle of nowhere kiosk that grew to become a successful watering hole and crash palace, which then attracted more merchants and establishments and swelled into a successful town. The original retailer might hold the reigns or be toppled. More often the town would choose their own leader and representative – a mayor or Burgermeister (I love that word!).

    If this metropolis continues to develop, eventually it will become a city. I have no idea how this is achieved. I suppose there are certain criteria that need to be met. I don’t think an actual person comes out like a Guinness Book of World Records representative to make it official but then again…

    So here we are at the inception of people living in large numbers, in close quarters with people they may have no kinship with whatsoever. Lots of strangers coming and going. A different form of community will take root, and a new leadership should emerge. Should, but it will be mostly the same bullshit going by a different name. Humans are pack animals after all, and they will usually follow the person who seems to know what they are doing more than anyone else. Either that or the person who scares the shit out of them.

    Every group will inevitably produce a head honcho of some sort. We don’t like to admit it, but most of us would prefer someone else making the big decisions. That way we can blame someone else if there is a major fuck up. A truly great leader will walk that fine line of taking credit for the wins and palming off the blame for any losses. The average peasant has their hands full just staying alive. If you add in a family, they are swamped! It’s easier to complain about the people in charge and chatter about how things could be better without having any authority and thus no responsibility.

    These cities may or may not stand alone. Some will be under the domain of a kingdom, just swap baron for Burgermeister (I had to). They rule the realm, but they answer to the king or shogun etc.

    Now back to the Game of Thrones contest. When I was a kid there was a game for the Commodore 64 called Defender of the Crown and the aim was to gain as much territory as possible to expand your kingdom. It was very rudimentary, but the goal was logical and applicable here. Conquer or be conquered. Unfortunately, we do not live in a world that is fair, and no matter how much we would love to just get along, there will always be assholes who want more.

    Whether you play the game or not you are in it and you will be affected by it. The majority can merely keep their heads down and hope they don’t get stomped on, especially in the lawless times we are discussing.

    Sadly, if you are the one in charge and you do get into all that ‘peace, love and mung beans’ stuff you will be crushed along with your pacifist followers. You’re only chance, as I mentioned before, was to run for the hills and keep the hell away from the ever developing ‘civilisations’.

    If you want to live amongst the throng you have to stick to your station and hope your ruler is good at the game; or whoever replaces them. In this competition a sovereign must be ever vigilant against treachery from without and within; you snooze you lose. If you are not growing your wealth and army, you better hope the invaders are satisfied with a reasonable merger. If not, you just have to cop it sweet.

    So, the more symbiotic clans continued to create distance between themselves and the overwhelming wheels of progress. The nonconformist mobs who stood their ground and put up a good fight earned themselves the title of barbarians. Those rebellious savages on the outskirts that refuse to assimilate to the prevailing hierarchy and social norms who don’t have the decency to flee or be wiped out.

    As for the kings, czars, maharajahs and any other synonyms. They would play the game. Thousands would die without a clue why. The boss hogs who managed to win (for a while at least) entered a new stratosphere of power – they became the leaders of empires!

  • Another ‘Happy Ending’ That Broke My Heart: CORPORATE CONFUSION MEETS MOVIE MUSINGS

    Avatar (2009)

    ***spoiler alert***

    (plus a massive bummer alert)

    This wasn’t James Cameron’s first foray into corporate greed, and I will definitely be covering Aliens in a future post. Sci-fi is such a brilliant way to critique the human condition when it is done well, using fantasy to tell the truth. This one is about as subtle as a hammer – the mineral the humans are trying to pillage is called Unobtanium for fuck’s sake! A superconductor worth more than gold, oil, diamonds etc.

    The plot and the allegory are simple: Pandora is the only place this phenomenal profit producer can be found. The Na’vi are the indigenous population who live in synchronicity with the natural environment around them. The humans are doing what all humans (or white people to be more specific) do; swoop in and help themselves to the natural resources of a place they have no right to do so in. Now that all of humanity is combined it is now an equal opportunity invader and plunderer. Screw those aliens though.

    The naïve (Na’vi?) natives have no clue regarding the value of this coveted mineral nor do they care. They live in harmony with their habitat. They have no concept of property, profit or all the other evils of capitalism. The corporation, for their part, has no concept of the whole “we are all connected” bullshit. To them these ‘tree hugging’ natives are in the way.

    The individual humans range across the spectrum from an innate and long denied sense of kinship with the natives, all the way to the corporate cry of ‘fuck ‘em!’ The real monster is the insatiable apparatus they are all inextricably connected to. Their livelihood depends on their service to the corporate overlords represented here by the Resources Development Administration (RDA).

    Eventually all of the separate clans realise they are about to get severely screwed and band together to fight the RDA and protect their land and birthright. They are technologically outgunned and it seems that all is lost, when the badass wildlife joins the battle and help defeat the villainous intruders. A huge victory for the ‘one with nature’ mob over the greedy industrialist ecological rapists.

    We get to share the joy of the righteous local population as they victoriously expel the RDA. A peculiar empathic trick where the audience (I didn’t see any Na’vi at my screening) gets to distance themselves from their own species and celebrate vicariously through the virtuous natives. It also helps to have a few upstanding humans to identify with.

    So, the credits roll and the evil corporation has been sent packing with its tail between its legs. Success, right? I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who felt that pang of hypothetical dread for the future of these imaginary victors. I mean you do realise this unobtanium is still the most valuable resource in the universe and Pandora is still flush with it.

    The only lasting victory would be the total annihilation of the invaders combined with somehow erasing any way the fuckers might have of ever finding the planet again. Even after that you can bet your ass the RDA will spare no expense trying to locate this El Dorado and will continue to do so ad infinitum.

    You see, as satisfying as it was to see the ruthless Colonel Quaritch get dispatched, he was always expendable and perpetually replaceable. There would be no shortage of ambitious military leaders only too eager to return with a brand-new battalion of fodder to ‘avenge’ their fallen comrades (and if the new colonel makes a name for himself, that might be nice to).

    Either way the RDA will never relinquish this cash-cow unless through some miracle the balance can be tipped to a point where it is too costly for them to continue pursuing it. It is fucking atrocious, but it is the horrific reality of the corporate machine. The humans the Na’vi encounter are simply drones, not as far removed from slaves as they like to think themselves.

    Okay, okay, settle down I hear you say. It’s just a movie. I know that, but as I said earlier, it is a piece of fiction designed to draw attention to a very real issue wrapped in a cloak of entertainment and for that reason it had to have a ‘happy ending’. Nobody is going to invest in a movie that bluntly concludes with the futility of stopping progress when your technology (especially weaponry) is horrendously primitive and you have the audacity to declare an insanely valuable piece of real estate is your ‘home’.

    The only reason the Na’vi won this battle was the magical alliance with the badass wildlife. That’s enough for now. There are so many threads forming in my head from this. Thanks for reading.

  • WE NEED TO DIG A LITTLE BIT DEEPER

    “Dearly beloved
    We are gathered here today to get through this thing called life”

    Prince “Let’s Go Crazy”

    I promised I wouldn’t be venturing into philosophy and mysticism, and I still don’t intend to (for now). However, it is crucial to look at the almost countless worldviews of all these humans on this big ball. The paradigms people see the world through have an immense impact on their reaction to the situation we each find ourselves in.

    I still remember the glee of one of my philosophy lecturers when I said to him “metaphysics really does underlie everything”. While I don’t propose that we embark on a detailed investigation of existence, reality and the mind, I think it is important to at least acknowledge that every one of us has some way of making sense of this soup we are swimming in.

    I have no intention of trying to convince you of my ideas on the subject, nor am I suggesting we spend our time trying to find THE TRUTH. I merely wish to illuminate how individual and group values and beliefs affect the way we behave and interact.

    Your nature and nurture characteristics + the family (or lack thereof) you are born into + the place and era you are born + your station on the spectrum of haves and have nots + your physical appearance and attributes + your race, which is very impactful if you are an ethnic minority or majority.

    All that before we even begin with religion and societal norms.

    Okay, so that’s kind of what to expect from this thread. Please come along if you’re interested.

    “Cuz you didn’t ask to come to this motherfucker and you sure can’t choose how to leave. Cuz you don’t know when you gunna go. So don’t take this shit serious. You better have some fun and plenty of it. Cuz when the shit over and you ask for a recharge it’s too late. So all I can say is keep some sunshine on your face.”

    Mud Bone AKA Richard Pryor

  • POTENTIAL DEATH OR SERIOUS INJURY: True Stories #13

    On our way home from Cronulla beach we ended up in the outside lane at a set of lights. Cars were parked in front of us just across the intersection. Wayne was driving one of his shitbox cars he picked up for a couple of hundred dollars. For the story let’s say it was a Toyota Crown in very far from mint condition.

    On the inside lane beside us was a brand new looking BMW or something similar; a car that would have no problem eating our shitbox in a race. Regardless of this it seemed that Wayne was intent on attempting to outrun this car and jump in front of it.

    “Don’t try it” came the first warning from Ed in the front passenger seat. I was back seat middle and really couldn’t understand the severity of our situation at this point.

    The light turned green and Wayne floored it. We meandered forward and the BMW was not even trying and was keeping right beside us.

    I had Robert laughing like a madman in my right ear and from my left Corey yelled “Wayne you’re not gunna make it!”

    As the parked car drew nearer, the BMW driver must have understood the suicide mission Wayne had undertaken and hit his brakes to give us a gap. Unfortunately, Wayne had taken his hands off the wheel and placed them beside his head in a shattered sense of defeat. Major problem was, his foot was still on the accelerator and that parked car was getting treacherously close. A full speed collision was imminent!

    Miraculously Edward reached over from the passenger seat and steered us through the available gap with one hand. I will never forget that; hand of God or hand of Ed, I do not car, it was a miracle! I also thank the BMW driver for slowing down every time I recall this fiasco.

    I sat dumbstruck as the other passengers’ derided Wayne for his senseless attempt. He just drove on in silence and listened. I reckon he was as amazed as the rest of us that we had gotten out of that without some serious injuries or death.

  • THAT SCENE IN ALIEN (1979): Movie Musings #7

    ***Spoiler Alert***

    (Especially if that title means nothing to you)

    When we picked it up from the video store it was “that movie where the monster busts out of the man’s chest”. There was a strange kind of grapevine for movie recommendations back then. Beside the movies you already knew about and the ones you saw in the previews that played at the beginning of every tape, there was the word of mouth in the school yard. Movies were often endorsed on the basis of one unforgettable scene.

    Problem was that when that scene arrived, we already knew what was about to happen. Make no mistake, it was still shocking, and I never forgot it, but can you imagine what it must have been like to see it having absolutely no idea it was coming? On the big screen? Fucking awesome!

    I’m sure there were lots of people who picked up that cassette box form the video store with no clue of how that monster reproduced and I do envy them. Those people who saw it when it was first released in the cinema and collectively witnessed the “chest burster” scene for the first time with no idea it was coming – Total freak out!

    Except for that guy in the back-left during a test screening in 1979. Looks like we have a gore hound folks.

    Now a bit of trivia: rumour has it that the actors in the scene had no idea of what was going to happen either. Seems the director thought it illicit a more genuine reaction from the actors. They do look proper shocked.

    Of course this is only a half truth. The effects people would have had to working before and during the scene, so the actors would have suspected something coming. The script read “the monster appears”, it just didn’t explain how or from where.

    Regardless of how much they figured out through John Hurt’s positioning and the FX people under the table (it is possible that this could have been set up in advance without the crew present I guess) I do not think they had any foreknowledge of what the monster would look like, nor were they warned of how much blood there would be and the shock of the actual bursting part.

    Fucken awesome scene! Spoiled or not.

  • I’LL SKIP THE CURRENCY CREATION CONUNDRUM FOR NOW & GET STRAIGHT TO ITS’ EXCHANGE AND ACCUMULATION: Rise of the Tycoons #10

    The world I have envisaged at this point remains tribal and by extension familial. Besides inter-tribal marriage and mob mergers, by force or mutual agreement, even the largest villages had a generational lineage. After enough time these tribes would have something resembling a royal family. You know, the descendants of successful scoundrels. Okay, there probably was a few noble and worthy leaders (automatically passing it on to your kids is a whole other argument), but either way the upper and lower crusts were in place.

    Towns were a different kind of set-up. I’m pretty sure they weren’t created through conscious planning at first. Maybe they sprung up around a tavern or inn on a busy trade/pilgrim route. Some budding entrepreneur passed by a nice spot on a well-worn path between two villages and thought I can smell opportunity here. I sense an itch in need of scratching. For a fee of course.

    A meal, a beverage and a place to crash – bingo!

    Maybe the place gets so popular that other enterprises start popping up alongside. Gambling, women of the night and other forms of entertainment. An ancient version of a kebab shop or hotdog stand perhaps. I don’t know. What I’m getting at was that it wasn’t necessarily “build it and they will come.” My theory is that people were already going by; but the successful establishments made people change their route just to visit them. The towns sprung from these places when people started visiting for the sake of visiting.

    These places weren’t just for passing through anymore; they had become the destination. More traffic equals more merchants and bigger operations requiring staff. Some of those visitors decide to stay and my hypothetical town is born!

    An alternate idea could be something like a trading post situation. Prior to this, tribes and villages might meet and trade directly amongst themselves or with travelling herdsmen etc. – but there was no actual marketplace. Did this spring up outside a tavern or did the savvy seller set-up their tavern alongside the bazaar?

    Something similar may have sprung up alongside a large village, but I can’t believe the village aristocracy would give it the green light without a nice kickback – maybe the first business tax or racketeering scheme, depending on how you look at it.

    While this could hardly be called the good life, things were looking up for the species as a whole, especially if you were one of the prosperous merchants or village aristocracy. Of course, everyone was susceptible to disease and ill health. After all hygiene, nutrition and medicine were literally ancient. You could die from a fucken splinter! The poor still starved and froze to death, I’m sure. However, the upper crust they were looking damn good for the era.

    Maybe for the first time, this group of people now had an added threat to replace the peasants’ perils – other humans. Now, murder was not a new thing, and crimes of passion are as old as the species. Vengeance for betrayal or maybe a misappropriated cow. Jealousy and envy are intrinsically human.  However, in these times of haves and have nots, homicide as a means to expedite an increase in wealth or status would be popping into the heads of many an aspiring social climber. I’m getting ahead of myself again.

    Let me just pause and see where this realm of mine is at this point:

    • We’ve got small, settled tribes all the way up to big ass villages.
    • We’ve got nomadic bands of hunter gatherers, herders and thieves/raiders.
    • We now have towns springing up one the edges and in between villages.
    • With those we can now add wandering entertainers, merchants, charlatans, craftsmen and tradesmen.
    • We may probably expect to find the earliest manifestation of the backpacker: a traveller, a pilgrim or maybe a wandering bum – depending on your point of view.

    Well, there you go. This is all coming together nicely. Which undoubtably means that it is wrong, but I intend to follow this line of reasoning to the present and beyond, so if you’re still on board we will move on.

    Next, we are getting really big. We are entering the domain of cities and empires!

  • MUSINGS ON THE JOB ABOUT THE JOB: This Place is Different

    In the late 1990s I worked for a magazine distribution company that will remain nameless. I was in my mid 20s and a weekend binge drinker like all my mates. I often credit this job for tipping me over the alcoholic edge. I’ll leave that downward spiral for another day. At this point it was party time!

    My cousin had got me the job, and his mother (my fun auntie) worked in the offices upstairs. She was already a high functioning alcoholic, and my cousin enjoyed a drink more than I did. I was amazed at the antics in this place.

    At lunch time a group of us would walk up to the pub and drink. Another group would head to the car park and sit in their cars punching cones – smoke billowing out the windows. The old ladies usually sat around outside smoking ciggies. I’m sure there were other people not frying their brains (wierdos) and there were occasional days when most people abstained (maybe not the potheads though).

    After lunch we would all head back inside and proceed to work with strapping machines and conveyor belts. Several bleary-eyed people would hop on their forklifts and continue the shift like normal. I do not recall anyone saying anything about this being odd.

    My cousin had even perfected the most efficient way to drink during the break. I forget now, but it was along the lines of “you buy a schooner of beer and two shots of bourbon, each in a glass with ice. You get a small bottle of Coke and that saves you having to waste time going back to the bar”. At the time I thought he was a genius – maximum efficiency!

    When we got back to work the radio would be a bit louder and the pub people would have a little extra bounce (and maybe slip) in their step. The car crowd would all have that cheesy grin on their faces. I have a clear memory of the first week I was there. The belt had stopped, and one young lady took the opportunity to jump up on it and start dancing. The reaction? Well, the radio was turned up of course and other people started joining in.

    The only time I can recall the supervisor being pissed off was when my cousin and one of the older blokes didn’t come back from lunch at all. It was raining that day and nobody could be bothered driving, but these two weren’t missing their lunchtime beverages – did I mention it was a Friday?

    As the afternoon work commenced it soon became apparent that two forklifts were unmanned. Everyone knew where they were, but the supervisor was optimistic (on a Friday?). After a little while my cousins’ fiancé, who worked in the downstairs office came over and handed me a cordless phone from the office (yes mobile phones were a rare thing back then).

    It was my cousin of course asking me to grab their bags after work. They knew I would be heading straight up there to join them anyway. The supervisor calmly took the phone from my hand and told them what he was thinking. He was such a cool supervisor. There was no hostility, it was the “I’m disappointed” tone.

    The other pisshead procedure my cousin introduced me was the before work drink. Sometimes when it was very quiet and there was not much work, we would be given only 4 hours work on staggered shifts. The last shift was something like 12:45pm. That was like a red flag to a bull for my cousin. He informed we would be meeting at the pub before the shift, as if it was the most natural thing ever.

    Other booze hound pearls of wisdom my cousin imparted:

    Him: let’s go to the pub

    Me: It’s only 11 AM

    Him: would you like a beer?

    Me: yeah, but-

    Him: then let’s go. Why do people have these bullshit set times to start drinking?

    Watertight reasoning.

    Last one

    Him: Let’s go to the pub

    Me: It’s Monday arvo.

    Him: So?

    Me: Fair enough.

    I worked at that place for two years and there was only one injury, and I am almost certain the two guys involved were blood tested and must have passed. Nobody was sacked and the injured dude got his compo. That’s fucking incredible! 2 years of intoxicated antics and only one casualty who was probably sober at the time. Oh, and the actual workplace was an OH&S nightmare itself.  More on that another time.

  • CORPORATE CONFUSION: The Future Outlook Under the Titans

    ***Massive Cynicism Alert***

    Things are looking pretty grim for anyone not willing or able to keep up with the accelerating changes, or for those that invest their precious time and energy on the wrong potential source of income. The profit hungry behemoths do not possess sympathy for those that do not generate wealth.

    Notice how I refer to the corporations themselves rather than the people who supposedly run them. For those who don’t already know this frightening fact: in most countries a corporation has the same rights as a natural person. Who owns the corporation? Investors of course. What do investors want? Profit. The people who manage the corporation are not the owners. They work for the investors – do you see the perilous lack of humanity?

    The highest person/s in the corporate hierarchy MUST make profits. If they fail, they will be replaced. They almost always get a nice golden handshake for their efforts anyway (nice that) and they will probably end up in another corporate executive position. They live and mingle with the highflyers. Therefore, if you find yourself in this ridiculously high-paying circus you are (if not already) very soon going to be very far removed empathetically from the working slobs at the bottom.

    There is a truly horrific rabbit hole here that I have cut and pasted for a future post. Let’s not gaze into the abyss too far too early.

    The point I am trying to make is that the CEO we see in the media is not the boss as in the owner of the business. He or she is the servant of the profit machine. The investors put their money in and if the machine is not paying out sufficiently, they will move on to the next one. I am not trying to garner sympathy for the poor suffering CEOs and top executives. I am merely pointing out the futility of appealing to their compassion. If one of these cronies dared sacrifice profit to soothe their conscience, they would be replaced quick smart.  It truly scares me to think about!

    So, we have established that profit is the paramount concern for the faceless behemoths we call corporations. Comin in at 2nd place would be the customers. They are important only because they are where that beautiful bounty comes from, but just like any other exploitable resource they don’t ‘matter’ in a human sense. Oh yeah, I mean we need to satisfy them of course, but if we can use marketing to mislead them into believing that satisfaction comes from whatever crap we’re peddling that will do just fine. The gist of customer relations to me seems to be this: get the maximum amount of money and try to ensure they keep coming back – to this aim we must respect our need for them and at least make it look like they are our number one priority.

    Running a very distant 3rd come the workers – “those fucken pests!”

    “I need more money”

    “I need to take a break”

    “I need to see my family and friends”

    “I need to eat, I need to sleep, I need to take a piss/shit”

    “Your unsafe equipment has severed my arm. I need an ambulance”

    The sooner we can smash the unions and weaken the labour laws the better. Barring that we should outsource as much as we can to countries with more corporate friendly industrial relations legislation. Best case scenario we replace those unreliable whinging flesh and blood assets for machines.

    The top brass may or may not share this sentiment; although if you play the game at this level it would grow on you, I’m sure. If you do not make profit and ‘continue to do so’ you have failed! If you do not like the rules of the game, leave. Feel free to sympathise with the plight of the people on the floor, but if your attempt to improve their conditions results in a loss of profit – au revior.  This is not a vendetta against humans, it is simply cold, calculated profit driven economics.

    There are of course public relations benefits to making your business look like a worker friendly environment (see THE COMMERCIALISATION OF CHRISTMAS: 2 SANTA FILMS 40 YEARS APART: Movie Musings #2), and of course it is extremely bad for business to be carrying a large number of unproductive and medically costly injured workers on restricted duties. An insurance premium nightmare! An actual workers compensation payout? DISASTER!!!!!!

    I will end the rant there and try to post something a little lighter for the next one.

    Please prove me wrong in the comments and give me a little hope.

  • POTENTIAL DEATH OR SERIOUS INJURY: True Stories #12

    I don’t know where the car came from, but it was copping a hammering in the park. My mates were taking turns thrashing it around the large reserve. I ended up in the passenger seat while Rob was taking his turn. He was spinning it so hard that grass was coming in through my window and hitting me in the face.

    He ended up spinning it out and stopping not far from where everyone was standing. We could see Ed running towards us waving his arms above his head. I had to stick my head out the window to hear what he was yelling.

    “The car’s on fire! The car’s on fire!”

    I just remember yelling “Run!” and jumping out of the car.

    I ran over to where everyone was gathered and Rob was close behind me. We turned to see the front end of the car smoking and burning. There was no explosion like in the movies and the fire slowly simmered down so I don’t reckon we were in that much danger. It was actually kind of a fizzer really. Nothing substantial actually happened, so this one is probably one of the least exciting stories in the series.

    However, the fact still remains that Rob had thrashed a car to the extent that the motor actually caught on fire and I was his passenger. There was undoubtably alcohol and pot involved. Any number of horrific things could have happened and my imagination reels with potential injuries or death. Luckily it ended well and we all moved on to the next stupid activity we could participate in that might maim or kill us.