Ridge Racer. Riiiiiidge Raaaaaacer!

So I'm there driving some junky, 1987 Volvo 740 GLE to bring home my 84 year old neighbor from MANHATTAN.

Now, I was mentally drained since I had to get up at 4am, drive to Manhattan for like 5 or 6 hours, then, well, I was driving in FREAKING MAN-FREAKING-HATTAN... all. day. long.

Right, so anyways we're on our way back and already into New Jersey on 80 or 81 or whatever it is and I notice a guy coming up off a ramp. I even thought to myself, "Yep, this guy's going to do something reeeeeeal stupid".

I was right. He waited too long to switch lanes, almost got caught going back down the next ramp (lol!), then veered off at the last second into MY lane.

I was 100% expecting this, even chuckling to myself at his act of idiocy.

But then he did something TOTALLY inexplicable... he slams on his freaking brakes!!!

I instantly did a sharp left turn, then slammed on MY brakes so I could do a... I think it's called a "power drift".

Smoke was pouring out from under the wheel wells as the poor, ancient tires were being stripped of their outsides as they went sideways at 70MPH.

Luckily, the fruit basket had realized, "Oh. Hey. I almost made people like, die. They might be mad" and had stepped on it.

I did a quick glance to see if the big yellow Optimus-looking tractor trailer behind me had caught this whole fiasco going on in time to not flatten me.

I broke out of the slide by easing up on the brakes juuuust with enough time before impact with the trailer and then SLAMMED the gas pedal as I corrected myself back into going straight the RIGHT way.

It was actually pretty ###### fun! Now the reason I say Ridge Racer saved my life... man, I was beat. Even though I'd been jacked up on extra-caffeine french vanilla coffee, with about three creamers of Stok-d dribbled into them that I snatched from a convenience store (essentially, the drink was like 8 cups of coffee at once), I was still fallin' asleep.

The hot sun setting down on my flesh wasn't helpin' junk either.

Ah, but Ridge Racer... that crazy as ###### techno music was going through my mind, making me feel more alive than ever. As I saw the car come up, I was even thinking of Ridge Racer. Like, I wondered if they'd go straight, do a quick turn, or bump me. Then I thought about what I might need to do... veer off into another lane and get splattered across the highway, creating a 20 car pile-up with a bunch of kids wondering why their parents weren't coming home from work? (lol)

Or, a power drift? BAM, the driver made me have to choose and I'm certain that without Ridge Racer, me and my friendly bag of bones for a companion would be dead.

Summary: Long live gabber techno.