***Just finished telling the whole tale. It is very, very long. Hope you have some time. ***

Strange things like to happen to me. I should stop going to the movies.

Some of you may know another story involving a movie theater and me. On an early "guys night out" with Mr. Walters and Mr. Bringardner, A clustered group of young men were passing around and checking out a firearm in the restroom while Mr. Walters and I were trying to make our way out discretely. That, combined with an earlier incident involving a 15 yr. old girl and her mom, made for a surreal evening.

I just had another surreal evening. Weird forces aligned and strange things clicked together.

I spent my ten-hour day doing hot dog cart things. Standing outside with pans filled with hot water and hot dogs over propane burners in 95 Fahrenheit weather for eight hours (for you mathematicians, the other two hours are spent on set-up, clean-up, and re-stock) is NOT the least-draining way to earn a hundred bucks.

Afterward, I was tired. I went home, threw my wiener-stinky clothes in the wash, showered my wiener-stinky body clean, and went out to grab dinner and a movie to unwind. Due to a little traffic, I was running a bit behind when I got to Taco Bell. I ate my nachos and a bean burrito as fast as I could, refilled my Mt. Dew, and dropped my two remaining bean burritos into my pocket. Toasty thigh...

I went to see "Gone in 60 Seconds." Mostly mindless, fun as hell action film, just what I needed. Angelina... yummy. (Bad girl, marrying wife-beating redneck twice your age!) As I sat happily munching my burrito and sipping my Dew, I overheard the prattling of a young man behind me. He sounded like a high-school kid, his voice was horribly grating. If you’ve been in the area around N.C., you know the voice I'm talking about: The redneck who listens to gangsta rap and thinks he's a Crip or a Blood. Disdaining political correctness, let's call this kid "a whigger."

Unfortunately, the previews started and the theater was quite crowded so I couldn't exactly wander around for a better seat. Another solo patron, a large (not fat, large) black man came in and sat next to me. You can probably see why he's important to the story already.

Yes, folks, our little whigger was one of those people who REALLY like to comment on every scene and repeat every line he thinks is good. Loudly. Much more loudly than you need to say things to be heard by the person next to you. My new, large friend and I made brief comments about it to one another.

That probably started to give the impression to the whigger and his friend that my large friend and I were actually friends. So, when he got a little louder I turned around and asked him nicely to keep it a little quieter. He said something (actually too softly for me to hear) and I turned back. He kicked my seat, promoting my new friend to turn and look at him. Well timed, and he was quieter until near the end of the film. ("Naw, not dat car. Naw, not dat car. Naw. Naw, not dat car.")

My eye-candy fix obtained, my hunger abated, I left the theater to head back to my home and sleep a little sleep. After leaving the restroom (no guns in there!) I headed out to my truck juggling my keys.

I had parked in a section of the lot near the back where others seldom go. In fact, there was only one other vehicle parked back there by the time the late show of "60 Seconds" let out, around a corner three spaces from me. As I got close to it, I saw that the whigger was the individual getting into the passenger seat. He saw me, too, since he said to his driver, "It's him, jes' him."

Aw, fuck.

I was backed into my spot, the driver's door facing the whiggers. I had to go past them to get out of the lot. I decided to take my time getting in the car; dickin' around with my cell phone before putting it in it's holder, carefully rolling down my window, extracting my house keys and other items from my pockets and arranging them on the passenger seat. Then I got in and leafed through my CDs to find a disc to play.

No dice, waiting them out wasn't working. They were still sitting there. The last two people anywhere near us were getting on their motorcycles on the other side of the median separating their section of the parking lot from the one I shared with the whiggers.

I started my truck. The whigger bent down and reached under his seat.

Given my history of guns in movie theaters, this raised my hackles a bit. As I said, I was backed into my space and had to drive past the whiggermobile to get to the parking lot exit. The motorcyclists were pulled up to the stop sign at the exit. I took a deep breath and dropped my truck in gear.

Now, I'm not one of those people who leave an action movie thinking that I'm the hero. I did not have any notion that I was Memphis Raines (Nic Cage). However, this is my town. This is my neighbourhood. I hit the gas.

I backed over the median between me and the road, spun around, and headed towards the main part of Crossroads Plaza (behind which the theater I was at opened half a year ago or so). The little car quickly took the corner in the parking lot, then the corner onto the road. Yes, folks, after seeing a car chase movie I was in a car chase.

My friends and I spent many hours wandering around Crossroads Plaza when we were younger, back when we were fourteen and couldn't drive. It is one of those "opposite of a mall" places, with a huge parking lot in the centre surrounded by stores like Toys R Us and Service Merchandise. I know every inch of that parking lot and the alleys behind and between the stores. Hell, we used to navigate them riding in shopping carts after hours.

Because of this knowledge, I could corner with confidence. I got quite a ways ahead of the boys, but whenever I would get on the road that goes down the centre of the place to make my way OUT of the damned complex they would catch up to me quickly with their little, zippy car.

I'd have to turn back into the lot or an alley so they wouldn't catch up. I needed a new tactic; I could only weave around the place for so long.

I cut between two buildings, killed my lights, turned to the left. I spun around just at the edge of the building and sat there sweating and shaking for a few of the longest seconds of my life. The little car pulled up between the two buildings slowing nearly to a crawl while they looked both ways to determine which way I went. Good.

For the first time in my life, I popped the clutch and peeled rubber. At the same time, I popped my lights back on. My bright lights. I cut just past them between the two buildings, hung an immediate left back to the centre road and slid to the right as I whipped onto that. I was headed towards the main road and freedom.

The little fuckers did NOT back up in order to follow me. They hung a right, went behind the building, and got on the road behind me. Far enough behind me that there was no way they could catch me, but they'd be right on me once we hit the main road.

Let me interject here that this was NOT fun for me. I did not know what would happen to me if they caught up to me. Maybe the whigger with a vengeance had a gun, maybe they would just hoot and holler as they zoomed past me. I did not know. I was scared almost to the point of urinating in my pants. Now that it is over, it is a great story, but I'd trade the story to have avoided living it.

We were out on the main roads and they were gaining on me. I stuck to the road a little ways, and then I cut into the residential streets of Lochmere. Smaller, windier, and with more available turns, I hoped I could lose them in there. Unfortunately, my truck is a little distinctive and the trick of pulling into a driveway and killing the car had already been used that night in the movie. I was stuck with the need to actually lose them. Whipping through Lochmere, I was able to keep the distance about the same between us. Apparently they didn't live in the neighbourhood, but their car was still faster.

I headed out of the Lochmere subdivision onto Holly Springs Road. Holly Springs is a very twisty uphill road for about 3/4 of a mile from where I left Lochmere to an intersection with the road my house is on. I learned to drive on Holly Springs. To go ANYWHERE from my home, I have to drive that section of Holly Springs. My friends and I used to see who could take that curvy patch of road the fastest until we had topped out our cars. We then competed in other ways, culminating in my (foolish, but I was young) driving the stretch of road at 60 m.p.h. with my eyes closed, all the way until the moment I stopped at the intersection with my road.

I know that road. I worked the transmission like crazy, finally gaining significant ground on the little bastards for the first time.

Then, I got lucky. Just as I got to the intersection with my own road, I caught up to a minivan. This minivan's taillights were very similarly sized and placed to the lights on my truck. I took the left onto my road while the minivan headed straight, and I killed my lights once again. There is a large light in front of the church just past this corner, so I would be illuminated, but I hoped that wouldn't matter. It didn't.

Following the lights, the kiddies didn't slow down for the intersection. The driver saw my palely lit truck and pulled a U-turn, but I had enough ground on them by then. With my lights back on, I turned into the swooping 1.5 mile U of a subdivision that comes out exactly a mile down the road from where I went in. It comes out right in front of my house. I came out before the whiggers were anywhere near in sight, did the quick left-right into the woods and killed the lights a final time. My heavily wooded, long driveway made me invisible as they pulled up to the intersection, and I saw their lights turn right onto the road. I headed the rest of the way down my driveway, parked in my spot, and hopped out onto the lawn to let loose a few fear-induced dry heaves. Whee-doggies, it was over.

I'd rather have a steadily interesting life than a boring one with these occasional patches of ulcer-inducing excitement. But, boy, do I have some stories...

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