Fear and Loathing in Kansas City

Or
Hawaiian shirts are an easy target.

Stay cool. Everything's figured out. We've got a day to day plan, with a whole truckload of photos and strange stories. It'll be on a non-point form basis with many, many links to many, many pictures. Getting at it is the easy part. Remembering specifics is not.

Wednesday

When you start off with a bunch of guys going on a trip, you tend to want to take a picture of everyone before you head out somewhere. The unfortunate thing for us was that it was snowing on the eight of us. Like devil-rays from up above telling us that it was the perfect time to go.

We hop in the trailer, and Eric, the old looking man behind me in the picture is our first driver. One problem with the whole deal is that the snow and wind are pushing the trailer into oncoming traffic and we're making terrible time by nightfall. Say 50mph up and down hills. They make smoke breaks after they search us at the border. Big man making jokes about weather shit. Smoke breaks turn into "hold the little guy!". People flying away, one eye open shit. Snow, snow, snow. All the way until morning. And the bumping of the trailer is cramping up the style of our Texas hold'em games on the table that are also impaired by our drinking.

So we move on to X-box and I learn quick that around these parts, one of the bastards goes by the route of never playing the game, and handily beating everyone. Thrown controllers and anger later, we're back to talking about the wind and the position of the driver's hands at 6 and 9 o'clock, instead of 9 and 12. Put your hands up and do it. Notice the amount of turn he was consistently putting into it.

The night ends in the morning of Thursday and I'm not sure how much sleep was actually begotten.

Thursday
Waking up to the sunrise in Kansas and seeing the track when you open your eyes is pretty fucking cool. Puts everything in perspective that you're actually here. So we get here, and decide that breakfast isn't good enough, let's do our first shopping at a hunting store. I ran around looking for hats that ended up being in the sixty goddamned dollar area, and then on my way out, had my first driver spotting when Ken Schrader walked by, but he was like a maniac on his cellphone and the best idea was for me to keep going.

After a bunch of weird crazyness, we ended up at a different mall.

If only I could tell you how much Kansas folk are really Kansas folk. How would I do it? Would a guy running the parking for trailers riding around in a golf cart with a gun rack work? Maybe. "Y'all from Canada? I got a friend up there. S'name's Red.. Red.. Aw.. Fuck.."

And then more shopping. A two tier mall with nothing in it save presents for myself in a tshirt and a girl i <3 back home. Then something weird happened. I was running/walking to come back and almost ran smack dab into a woman who could be considered a small time celebrity who said "Look out" quickly before anything could happen. I looked up and doubled back twice to make sure that I saw who I saw, and it was the height that confirmed my almost run-in with Callie Thorne, (Sheila in Rescue Me) but I didn't have time to chat and tell her that her sometimes whiny acting in Rescue Me was atrocious but cute. I was late for the trailer.

After un-packing, eating, talking about how shitty the weather was being in it's 60F-ness, and redneck gandering, the night ended with all of the bald men to Hooters, and the old men to the dog-race track and myself lying around falling asleep to the sounds of cars on the track and amidst some other non-mentionable thoughts.

Friday
Early breakfast happens after hours of sleep. Admiring the fog while eating. We leave to check out the Harley Davidson factory. Don't get in for tour. Hear a bunch of stories about bald men getting cut off of alcohol after 11 pitchers and having a relatively early night, which leads me to believe I went to bed on Thursday at around 9pm. That's fine. Nothing too important to note for Friday other than getting ID'd at Wal-Mart when trying to buy a cheap bottle of Captain Morgan's rum, and getting 'titties on the twelve hat' during my first-ever (and probably only) lapdance at a place called "Bazookas". The club, located in downtown Kansas is where all the old folk say that downtown is really only for "brothers shooting brothers and niggers shooting niggers. But who cares! I was on the recieving (and donating end) of a lapdance from a stunningly tall/attractive Asian stripper Who is not on the website. Dang. Late night! 2am. Holy fuck.

Saturday
We're here for racing, aren't we? Right we are. After being trampled awake in the morning (slept on the floor), I ate a really grossly tasteful breakfast and we headed out early, early, early for the track to watck The Kansas 300 Busch race and the NASCAR Cup Qualifying for Sunday's race. Hop on to the school bus.. I mean shuttle bus!

After walking around a bunch and not really buying anything, my dad and I jumped on a ride for Joe Nemecheck's little area (each driver has their own area of .. stuff. Tony Stewart - Home Depot - has one where you build bird feeders). Little did I know that Joe Nemecheck's ride (whose sponsor is US Army) was like having someone brainwash you into joining the Army. How odd.

In the meantime I caught a few pictures of the Cars going through inspection, and the Scoreclock thing that tells you at the top how many laps finished, and the places of each driver.

We then went to the track, and watched most of the cars qualify. I caught decent pictures of Dale Earnhardt Jr's shitty qualifying run, Mark Martin's decent run, and a rookie Crash out of turn four on his second qualifying lap. He was ok!

The qualifying was kinda cool, but it was the start of the Busch race (like the minor league to Nascar) that got me excited. First, it was seeing all the cars lined on the infield, and then after ceremonies (National Anthem et such), they did laps with the pacecar, and then came around one final time to start the race. A whole bunch of things happened, including Pit Stops, Even more Pit Stops, and a few crashes I couldn't get on camera, but in the end it was Kasey Kahne beating Greg Biffle by less than half of a car (Nascar.com photo). He went and did a great burnout, and that picture's ended up as my wallpaper.

The guy I was rooting for all day (Kevin Harvick) finished fourth after starting 19th. Great race was followed by a bustrip back where an old man got thrown off for being too drunk, and a whole bunch of drinking that turned into sleep, to get ready for the big day Sunday. The strangest part about this whole weekend up to this point was the weather between 60-70F. I was cold sitting on the benches, but getting sunburn. What the fuck?


Sunday
This day had us walking around taking pictures beside random stuff like The 97 Hummer, The Inside of Ricky Rudd's car, and my dad taking one of me standing in a crowd of people to give you the idea of how many people were around this horde of stuff. As you can see, my face came pre-sunburnt.

At this time, we did two things. We went and got headsets so you could hear what the racers were saying on the radio to eachother as well as the broadcast (fucking blurry picture! one of the only ones. BLAST!), and This Partially decent Panoramic view of the track.

The Banquet 400 race was ready to begin. The cars are twice as loud, and all of the drivers you know are again, sitting in the infield. It's time to do the National Anthem and the prayer. They do a prayer. Did you know that? Everyone loves God. All of the people stand together during the anthem/prayer, and it makes for a neat photo op, minus the heads. Afterwards, they tell you that a Stealth Fighter is flying by, but you never do hear the damn thing. I got this picture just in time.

So the race is going and going, and then you go and find some food and beer, and then you Take a video of the cars passing by just to give everyone an idea of how fast they drive, and how loud the would be. Holy god!

And then my favorite driver (Ryan Newman) gets involved in a crash thanks to your other favorite driver Dale Jr., and Mark Martin wins, (Nascar.com took those last 2) but you don't care. Sunday night and Monday are filled with drinking and sleeping and driving and sleeping and sunburns, but you don't care.


I got out of it what I put into it and it was everything I'd hoped for. It was great fucking racing, regardless of whether it was in circles, squares, or in the shape of the trail a snake would leave in the desert. I got next to no sleep listening to the same mix mp3 disc every night, but that doesn't matter, either. It was loud, fast, and fun, and I enjoyed every single minute.

To see more pictures that weren't in this update, Click Here.