When did tv shows come out with their own line of underwear? I’ll bet I know the location of Mr. Hankey, who appeared in the first season of South Park. You can see his appearance here. (WARNING: You must have the sense of humor of a 10 year old boy or my wife to appreciate it.

Here’s the same boy as yesterday, shortly before heading to the starting grid to receive his whuppin’ from Sara. There was something vaguely familiar about this and I realized it’s similar to what you see before a Nascar, Indy or Formula 1 race, the driver looking contemplative, lost in his own world, while the pit crew (Dad) makes last minute adjustments to the car. Things have changed a lot since I raced go-karts, race suits in place of jeans and tee shirt, full face helmets instead of open face and goggles, racing gloves and boots and knowing the pose.

There’s a small dirt go-kart track a couple of miles from where I live. Saturday was race night and by coincidence, cheap date night, which is how we ended up there. Mexican food and dirt track kart racing. Noone can say I don’t know how to live.

This is Sara. She comes from a family of kart racers. Her dad races. Her mother races. Her brother races. They have 8 karts between them and nowhere to park the family cars, since the garage is full of karts and kart parts. She hasn’t been racing long, but has managed to learn how to project an air of confidence as she checks out her main rival. Sort of a “don’t get your hopes up” look.

This is her rival. He started on the pole, Sara on the outside. It took a couple of laps to size him up, then she gave him a little love tap on the bumper and, as Linda Ronstadt sang, she “Blue Bayou”, and that was the last he saw of her until he passed by her in victory lane. About 10 minutes later, she was out of her race suit and back in her jeans running around acting like a 10 year old girl.