Once Upon A Time in Sydney...
Back in the 1980s when we didn't have anything like the internet, we really had to make our own entertainment. This is why we formed bands or formed up in groups to go watch movies together or played Dungeons and Dragons. It's what we did in those days and it wasn't even particularly cool.
We were probably an earnest, callow bunch in most respects, and we seemed to do a lot of driving around at night. Looking back on it, it seems incredibly dumb but also quite energetic. We were full of beans and we'd drive around, just cruising and talking about things - deep and meaningful things as we used to call them - and generally kill time waiting to be entertained in some way. I think about it now and most of my memories of those times are night time jams and conversations and games and pizza parlours.
Phil, who is a respected doctor now, used to have this Alfa Sud. He knew how to drive it too because he grew up in one of those wealthy families that let their kids race go-karts so he had this racer's instinct for taking corners hard. I remember sitting in the passenger seat as he drove me home in the middle of the night with nobody else on the road, the Alfa Sud engine roaring through the leafy 'burbs. It was pretty anti-social when I think about it now; but also a kind of quintessential Gen-X experience.
Phil looks after dying people now in palliative care. He sure doesn't drive like that today.
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