B-Rant

- submitted by J.Glarsten on 12/11/2007

  

ENCORE: Confessions Of A Recovering Leaf Blower Addict -- 2

CONTRIBUTING WRITER: J.GLARSTEN

I've been doing pretty well the last couple weeks. My wife, against my explicit instructions, disposed of my last blower. It was a Makita "demo." Not on the market. I'd gotten it as a gift from a landscaper I know and it was, simply, amazing. Lightweight, balanced to precision, state of the art decibel modulation.

Part of me wanted to strangle the wife -- I mean all it was doing was leaning against a wall in the garage; I hadn't touched it in weeks. I also hadn't done any blowing of other peoples' lawn ornaments, or testing of gust thresholds against unsuspecting pets or local animals (or postal employees), or any of the other harmless social-entertainment things I'd enjoyed with leaf blowers over the past few months. I had been "good." And my wife's bit of disrespect ("temptation management," she called it) pissed me off.

Still, after some deep breaths and recalling the words of my "empowerment counselor" ("visualize pleasant things, not related to leaf blowers, before saying or doing anything your instinct tells you will be counterproductive"), I smiled at my wife and said, "no problem." I almost meant it.

Truth is, I hadn't really missed leaf blowers all that much. Work was nuts. I'm in the middle of finishing up a project that's going to redefine how TV and internet content can converge with fluid audience participation...at least that portion of the audience that isn't brain dead. (Sound pretentious and ridiculous? It is. But they pay me a mint to come up with grandiose sounding concepts, most of which never get beyond my office-lab, so I'm not complaining.)

Anyway, I'd been working hard, playing a lot of basketball and looking forward to my vacation coming up.

Then my buddy, Jack, asked me out for a beer. We had a few and Jack asked me if I wanted to check something out, something cool, something he said I'd appreciate.

The warehouse was about a 20 minute drive from town, situated somewhere between suburban dullness and calm and miles of factories and refineries, prehistoric-like oversized cranes and metallic structures lining the east river.

We went inside. The place was huge, like 2 airport hangars long. I had no idea what this place was -- or used to be -- used for. Toxic waste storage? The outside was littered with rusting barrels and massive pieces of torn metal. Inside...hard dirt floor and long rusting metal walls with slat openings at the top. From a distance, through the slats, you could see fire streams pouring from the smokestacks of the nearby refineries. The ceiling was lined with massive fluorescent lights and dents that looked like they must've been caused by smashing boulders. It was bright as hell and it reminded me a little of the Road Warrior movie, Beyond Thunderdome; the place felt something out of reality, at least suburban reality.

Here's the thing. The room was packed (or the 1/3 that hadn't been cordoned off by a thick rope fence). Hundreds of people (probably more) were lining the walls, drinking -- there were a bunch of beer and alcohol stations in various parts -- sitting on makeshift chairs made out of old barrels or wooden crates or whatever was available.

In the middle of the room was a large ring -- like a boxing ring, only 2 or 3 times bigger -- demarcated into a bunch of sections by bright colored painted lines and circles.

This was an event, something about to happen; and I knew, and at the same time didn't know, what it was. I recognized some of the people in the crowd. Women on the PTA in my town. Guys in golf shirts who lived a couple blocks from my house. These people were way too well dressed for the setting -- which seemed more like a dirt-greese-stained jeans and blow torch-welding-kit kind of place.

Jack had disappeared into the crowd. Women in white skirts and pressed khakis were sipping aquamarine colored drinks from plastic glasses. A friend of my wife's -- Gloria, a wired tight as piano wire lawyer -- was laughing hysterically with a few women friends whom I didn't recognize.

What the f**k was this, I thought.

Then the lights dimmed. And a couple spotlights shone on a far corner of the warehouse. Music started blasting from speakers attached to a wall near there. Sounded like Nirvana.

And two guys entered the arena from the corner, into the light, and with the crowd cheering and clapping.

The guys were in gym shorts and t-shirts. One guy was bald, sweating, huge, like 5 ½ feet and 300+ pounds. He was wearing around his head a bright red head band handkerchief. I didn't recognize him. The other was taller and thin, 175 pounds if he was lucky. Him I recognized. An accountant who lived 2 blocks from me! Jerry or Jake or something. A complete dweeb, I'd thought. And here he was, pretty buff, dancing around the ring, smiling an I'm-so-fucking-happy thing, holding above his head a leaf blower, the crowd going nuts.

What the f**k f**k f**k, I'm thinking.

Both guys took off their shirts, grabbed their leaf blowers, walked to the center of the ring. Another guy in a striped shirt -- the manager of a shoe store the town next to us -- was in the middle. He shouted instructions to them.

Jack came back. I had moved closer to the ring and had grabbed a beer. The room was loud, hard to hear; I shouted at him, leaf blower competition? He nodded. It started a couple months ago, he said. Do not tell anyone. It's still underground. The people in the audience, some were from our area, others were from places I (we) never heard of.

The competitors looked like gladiators, I said. Jack said, it's a sport, I thought you'd appreciate it. Nobody dies.

If my wife knew I was here she would kill me. But I didn't know I would be here until I got here. (Also, I thought like an infant, she doesn't trust me? Fine, now maybe there's a reason not to.) The whole scene was ridiculous. Who does this, I thought. Jack apparently heard me. Nobody, he said. But we're doing it. A new sport, he said. Underground now, the best kind.

The music, shut off for a minute, was now blasting and suddenly a bucket of balls -- actually compressed leaves in the shape of balls -- was dumped into the ring. The competitors charged toward them. Lights flashed like strobes. People were screaming. I had no idea what the rules or goals were. The accountant lunged at the bald meat slab, blasted his blower at him -- it was gusting unbelievably strongly -- and knocked him over. It's physics, Jack yelled to me. (No sh*t.) The gusts, if aimed at the right angles and at the right body parts...the biggest fattest load could be knocked down like tissue paper.

The bald guy had lost his breath, but was up. Somehow the accountant had used his blower to knock a bunch of the balls into baskets hanging from his end of the ring. He was ready for baldy who, when he got up, was met with some kind of recurring, throbbing gust from the accountant's blower which seemed to temporarily blind him. He kneeled and was shaking his head, while his opponent used his upper body to shove him to the ground, then pointed his blower at some more balls and directed them into another set of baskets.

The crowd was going nuts. It was exhilarating really, even though it seemed like chaos. A couple guys around the ring took their own shirts off (why?;who knows); it was hot in there.

The bald guy, who looked so menacing only a few minutes ago, was still on the ground, breathing hard. It looked like he was hyperventilating. The accountant stung him with another gust which shifted him onto his back. Suddenly the main lights went on and the ref stepped into the ring. Baldy was done. Accountant had won.

Money was being exchanged throughout the audience. $50s and $100s. A bunch of hot ladies were crowding to get to the winner. Was this guy married, I wondered? I couldn't remember. Accountants as new sex objects, I thought. Why not?

Jack tried to direct me to a place where a few guys -- a couple in suits -- were standing and talking. Closer to one of the doors. I was watching the Accountant. He was sweating, drinking a beer and looked utterly euphoric. What the . . . I know, I'd said it too many times.

Jack said to me (I think he said it; it was incredibly loud, the music now back on -- Pearl Jam)...we want you to join us. I shook my head, no. Contests are regular, but not too often; there are teams. And real money. He kept looking at the suits. Again, I nodded, no.

Jack said, we'll talk later, whenever. He walked toward the door. I looked at the fires still visible through the slats. I thought, tomorrow this will all seem totally absurd. More absurd than it already seems. It will, I'm pretty sure...read more rants