Dixie Speedway

"Come to the demolition derby!" he said. "I think they're going to race some cars beforehand, it'll be fun!"

We got there just after 7, they didn't start smashing anything on purpose until around 11. What a culture shock it was! Jared took me to Dixie Speedway with some of his coworkers (yes, "dixie") and we got hip-deep in local culture.

The racing was NUTS! The track was dirt, and short, so it seemed like most of the racing was turning., and the trick with turning was to not go spinning out of control what with the ground being nothing but red clay.

Thank heavens Jared remembered ear plugs! Although some noseplugs would have helped too - the smell of gas and dirt was intense... WHEWEE!

I actually got really into it. The loud and the shaking when a race started was pretty exhilarating, although a co-worker and I agreed that the whole driving-slow-because-they-need-to-clear-an-accident-but-the-guys-in-the-back-now-have-a-chance-to catch-up-to-the-guy-in-front-who-WAS-half-a-track-ahead-and-now-they're-right-behind-him-trying-to-over-take-him-all-sneaky-like seemed pretty unfair. But what do we know?

Oh, and the guy waving the flag was fabulous. Really splendid technique.

I do have to say my favorite moment of the night was when Jared got up and announced "I'm going to buy something fried."

Predictablly, he came back wanting to change careers because the idea of charging $3 for $.15 of batter and powdered sugar sounded awesome. And it was numnummy!

Oh - and no pics of this - but did you know there's cars that race that have 2 drivers - one with the wheel and one in charge of the gas and brakes?!? And the nuttiest thing was - those cars had NO accidents in their race, unlike all the others with one driver! We should get that done to our van. Solei could steer!

Then at the end came the demolition derby. It was too dark to get decent pictures or video, but it was not at all what I expected. The junkers drove up, the flag came down and they just started ramming into each other. I thought there'd be some kind of pagentry or something, but nope, just smashing. And yes, there was fire. Very gratifying. And very awesome.

I learned back when I lived in Texas to just set aside my comfort zone and enjoy what the world around me had to offer, even if it did seem pretty nutty. I wish I'd learned it sooner, but I am having a ball experiencing this southern thing! This is right up there with the monster truck rally we went to on our first anniversary:)