"When you see two pink elephants chasing a raped ape, grab your nuts and run." - Brad
Daaaammmmmmnnnnnn-O!!!
What a blast this weekend was. I almost don't know where to start.
We met up at the Garage around 11 as planned. We didn't have to strap anything down, thank God, and 'Puff checked out the van. He gave it the OK so we headed up to Wise to pick up Aron. Aron - "You all are gonna have to come around back. The front door is messed up!" Brad - "Where's that???" Loooooooord God, I don't know what I'd do without Brad to laugh at haha. Anyway, the fun really got rolling when we started documenting the trip with the camcorder. I did a solo performance of "I Believe In A Thing Called Love", which was damn good anyway but even more impressive considering that I was truckin' along I-81 at a little over 70 mph while giving ample attention to the camera. I let Garon take over the driving eventually, and I took over the camera. An opossum ran out right in front of us and got completely slaughtered. And yes, I somehow caught it on tape lol. We also ended the "big blue cock sticking straight up out of the ground" debate. As we all pretty much knew, Brad was wrong lol. Apparently, you can't really see what's 40 miles away... who knew? lol
We made it to the grocery store (a "usual stop" lol) around 5:30 or so and picked up everything else we needed but the beer since they don't start selling it down there until 7. We took the shorter, Mapquest way to the track, which Brad bitched and bitched about lol. Then, I tried to explain to him where we were in relation to the track and where we usually camp, and he argued to the death with me about that, surprise surprise lol. We picked up Chad in the free parking area, set up camp, and sat around under the canopy since it was already daylight and too uncomfortable to sleep because of the heat.
Eventually, in a desperate move to get out of the heat, Garon, Aron, and I decide to heat back towards Statesville and the Evernham Open House at the raceshop. This ended up being one of the more awesome parts of the trip. The shop was right beside the airport back in literally the midlde of nowhere. We got there almost right when Riggs and Mayfield were coming out for interviews. I was probably 15 feet away and got some pretty good pictures. We went into the body shop where a small area was taped off. We talked to one of the engineers back behind it about the race and how things were going there at the shop. Eventually, he said "You guys seem pretty cool. Go around the building to the second door from the end. I'll meet you there and show you some awesome stuff." Hell fire, I reckon! lol We got nearly the grand tour. The fabrication shop, the chassis shop, the rest of the body shop, detailed info on all the equipment, the front end of the car of tomorrow, and a few souvenirs... What were the souvenirs? Well, in the body shop, one of Kasey's wrecked cars was being repaired. The entire right side had new metal on it. The dude wound off the set of lug nuts on the left front and gave them to Garon, the left rear to Aron, and the right rear to me. How awesome is that?!!? That guy even voluntarily gave us his email. He was just like one of the guys with us... Eventually we made it back to the track (camera rolling through traffic, of course) and watched the Busch race, which wasn't all that great, but oh well haha. My trip had already been made.
Yesterday wasn't nearly as bad and hot on us at Saturday was. We did a whole lot of filming around the camp and just the usual ridiculous talks we have. Eventually, it was time to go to the Coca-Cola 600!!! That race was twice as long as the Busch race in distance, but seemed like it lasted half as long. There wasn't a dull moment. I don't know what happened to Riggs. He should've finished 3rd at WORST, but somethin' evidently happened on pit road. I would've liked to have seen him win it just because he hasn't won yet, and he's balls to the wall as that engineer told us. He was right about everything he said and told us to look for, now that I think about it... Anyway! Kasey won! Shew, damn, we were all about wrecks there towards the end of it haha. It was awesome, to say the least. After a couple more "Lanternside Chats", we all hit the bed.
We parted ways with the track around... 11 or so, I guess... Damn, some funny stuff went down which was caught on tape. I wish I could share some more of it here but I just can't haha. That's actually pretty much all I can about today, other than I'm damn tired and happy haha.
I can't wait for the fall race. We might burn the damn place down next time haha.
What a blast this weekend was. I almost don't know where to start.
We met up at the Garage around 11 as planned. We didn't have to strap anything down, thank God, and 'Puff checked out the van. He gave it the OK so we headed up to Wise to pick up Aron. Aron - "You all are gonna have to come around back. The front door is messed up!" Brad - "Where's that???" Loooooooord God, I don't know what I'd do without Brad to laugh at haha. Anyway, the fun really got rolling when we started documenting the trip with the camcorder. I did a solo performance of "I Believe In A Thing Called Love", which was damn good anyway but even more impressive considering that I was truckin' along I-81 at a little over 70 mph while giving ample attention to the camera. I let Garon take over the driving eventually, and I took over the camera. An opossum ran out right in front of us and got completely slaughtered. And yes, I somehow caught it on tape lol. We also ended the "big blue cock sticking straight up out of the ground" debate. As we all pretty much knew, Brad was wrong lol. Apparently, you can't really see what's 40 miles away... who knew? lol
We made it to the grocery store (a "usual stop" lol) around 5:30 or so and picked up everything else we needed but the beer since they don't start selling it down there until 7. We took the shorter, Mapquest way to the track, which Brad bitched and bitched about lol. Then, I tried to explain to him where we were in relation to the track and where we usually camp, and he argued to the death with me about that, surprise surprise lol. We picked up Chad in the free parking area, set up camp, and sat around under the canopy since it was already daylight and too uncomfortable to sleep because of the heat.
Eventually, in a desperate move to get out of the heat, Garon, Aron, and I decide to heat back towards Statesville and the Evernham Open House at the raceshop. This ended up being one of the more awesome parts of the trip. The shop was right beside the airport back in literally the midlde of nowhere. We got there almost right when Riggs and Mayfield were coming out for interviews. I was probably 15 feet away and got some pretty good pictures. We went into the body shop where a small area was taped off. We talked to one of the engineers back behind it about the race and how things were going there at the shop. Eventually, he said "You guys seem pretty cool. Go around the building to the second door from the end. I'll meet you there and show you some awesome stuff." Hell fire, I reckon! lol We got nearly the grand tour. The fabrication shop, the chassis shop, the rest of the body shop, detailed info on all the equipment, the front end of the car of tomorrow, and a few souvenirs... What were the souvenirs? Well, in the body shop, one of Kasey's wrecked cars was being repaired. The entire right side had new metal on it. The dude wound off the set of lug nuts on the left front and gave them to Garon, the left rear to Aron, and the right rear to me. How awesome is that?!!? That guy even voluntarily gave us his email. He was just like one of the guys with us... Eventually we made it back to the track (camera rolling through traffic, of course) and watched the Busch race, which wasn't all that great, but oh well haha. My trip had already been made.
Yesterday wasn't nearly as bad and hot on us at Saturday was. We did a whole lot of filming around the camp and just the usual ridiculous talks we have. Eventually, it was time to go to the Coca-Cola 600!!! That race was twice as long as the Busch race in distance, but seemed like it lasted half as long. There wasn't a dull moment. I don't know what happened to Riggs. He should've finished 3rd at WORST, but somethin' evidently happened on pit road. I would've liked to have seen him win it just because he hasn't won yet, and he's balls to the wall as that engineer told us. He was right about everything he said and told us to look for, now that I think about it... Anyway! Kasey won! Shew, damn, we were all about wrecks there towards the end of it haha. It was awesome, to say the least. After a couple more "Lanternside Chats", we all hit the bed.
We parted ways with the track around... 11 or so, I guess... Damn, some funny stuff went down which was caught on tape. I wish I could share some more of it here but I just can't haha. That's actually pretty much all I can about today, other than I'm damn tired and happy haha.
I can't wait for the fall race. We might burn the damn place down next time haha.