Last Saturday we had a belated birthday party for Naomi's man Phil and his twin brother Tom (and me) at Go Kart Racer in Burlingame. Gary, Veronica, and i showed up a bit late and met up with the scooter crew, who were just checking in. I was expecting something akin to the casual racing atmosphere of Malibu Gran Prix. I was not expecting having to put on a racing jumpsuit, head sock, helmet, and getting a crash course in race administration. Our group of 10 opted for the "Grand Prix" package, consisting of a 10 minute practice race, and a 5 minute qualifying session followed by the official 15 minute race. Having sat through our briefing session, we headed out to the indoor track and entered our karts. I got lucky number 7, but had to get the assistance of the race official to help me move the seat to a comfortable position. The karts were streamlined vehicles, riding maybe a couple of inches off the ground. You sit just to the left of the engine, and have a brake and gas pedal (no clutch or gear shifter). The wheel rotates perhaps 120°. During our practice run i quickly learned that the kart doesn't like to accelerate from a dead stop when the wheels are turned. This was important for the racing situation because our track contained a nasty S curve early on. If you took the wrong line, you came to a dead stop and had to slowly accelerate into a turn. However, i soon found the trick to avoiding this problem: power slides. Just as in Mario Kart, if you take a turn at high speed and spin the wheel sharply, you lose traction and slide/spin around the curve. After a few trial laps i began to become comfortable in my kart, and finished the practice race in 6th, ahead of Gary, Veronica, Naomi, and Phil.

We had a half hour downtime to compare experiences with our fellow racers before our formal race began. Qualifying consisted of a brief five minute race in which everyone vied for the best lap time. I managed one great lap before spinning out and having to wait for the race official to extricate Veronica, Naomi, and i from a wall. Luckily my lap time put me in fourth position, just behind Gary and scooter boys Andrew and Oscar. The trick in the race proper however turned out to be escaping the pack at the start. Andrew and Gary took off while i got stuck amidst the crowd. After getting some distance, i was able to see on the trackside leaderboard that i was in fourth, behind the three who had been seeded ahead of me. Andrew was the only racer wearing a red jumpsuit, so i kept my eye out for him and soon enough spotted him ... about 50 feet behind me. I was in fourth and about to be lapped. I managed to hold off the leaders for the majority of the race, but with about five minutes left i made a series of bad turns and was overtaken not only by the leaders but also by Phil, who'd been trailing me the entire race. I finished in 5th, a bit disappointed but thoroughly pleased with the experience. Gary managed to lap me twice and beat the pack to take the race honors.

Naomi came off the track breathing fire about having been bumped repeatedly by other racers, a practice that was condemned by the race officials but not strenuously enforced during the competition. I did my fair share of bumping during the race. Because everyone has more or less the same kart with the same acceleration and top speed, turns become the place where you can use your skills to pass. And because the track is only so wide, you generally have to identify a hole and commit to surging through it to pass your opponents. By midway through the race, my offensive driving skills had taken hold and when i saw an opening, i was seizing it. Even though this generally involved bumping my foes in the process and occasionally causing them to spin out. All part of the fun ... i took a few bumps of my own in the process. We all collected in the lobby and shared stories, analyzing the race reports printed for us by the race officials. Each car is monitored (by some wireless system, presumably), so at the end of the race you can examine your lap times and statistics. As you have to clench the steering wheel to control the kart as you power slide through turns, at the end of the race my arms were jelly. When we were pricing the affair i thought $60 for a half hour of racing sounded like a lousy deal, however now i don't think i could handle more than 30 minutes. Especially when you factor in that i was getting decidedly carsick by the end.

I friggin' love the new Editors record, especially their evolution on the single "Smokers Outside the Hospital". Although the use of piano by any brit indie band will incur the requisite comparisons to Keane and of course Coldplay, i think Tom Smith and co. incorporate the instrument quite well within their mopey aesthetic. My only rankle is the lyric "you came on your own, that's how you'll leave" on the otherwise vibrant title track "An End Has a Start", which falls a little too close to the Verve classic "On Your Own" and its chorus "you come in on your own, and you leave on your own".

Wow ... what a mindbending pair of tunes. Listening to them back to back has got me all misty.

someone hit the light, 'cause there's more here to be seen
when you caught my eye i saw everywhere i'd been
and wanna go to
you came on your own, that's how you'll leave
with hope in your hands and air to breathe

you come in on your own, and you leave on your own
forget the lovers you've known, and the friends on the road