If I were Alanis Morissette I'd be misusing the word "ironic" about now

[lillian13]

A few years back, just before he turned 50, my brother decided to rebuild a Mustang. Nothing old or classic; he just wanted to rebuild one from the ground up (engine, etc.) and then "race it". Oh-kay, whatever, midlife crises are fun to watch.

He has spent I don't know how much money over the last few years on parts, tools, another body to rebuild later, this that and the other thing. But it made him happy and he picked up a couple of friends doing it, so we all supported him. Right?

Well, last Thursday he puts the car on the trailer and takes it down to San Antonio to try it out on a quarter-mile track they have there.

Two guesses as to what happened.

Yep, it's totaled. He bounced off a wall. Twice. Brother has a mild concussion, some bruising, and a bunged-up rib. This is what happens when you take a car up to 100 mph on an unfamiliar track when you have racing slicks on it. (And frankly don't have that much experience at those speeds.)  He is very very sad about the car. He handwaves the injuries.

The sister-in-law is furious, and with the exception of the Nephew (who thinks it was awesome), we all think he's crazy. Because, yes, he's already looking for another Mustang to rebuild.

*sigh*

Is this what they mean by testosterone poisoning?

Comments

[vickita.livejournal.com]

::facepalms::

Oh, my. Well, at least he didn't get hurt too badly, thank goodness. Do you think, if he puts in the time and energy to build another one, he might be happy enough to just drive it on plain old, normal roads, at semi-normal-ish speeds and keep it for a while longer? Or is he going to think he's figured out what he did wrong and want to try it again?

[lillian13.livejournal.com]

Oh, he wants to keep racing. He's a little bit of an adrenaline junkie--he likes to jump out of perfectly good helicopters, for example.

I blame Racer X!

[dremiel.livejournal.com]

So glad his injuries are relatively minor.

After watching most of my sibs go through a racing craze (although they were, you know, teenagers or in their twenties) I can assure you that they next one will crash, too. It's what race cars do, at least when driven by not-really-racers.

Good luck with all that!