Congratulations Ski Doo Dude!

Today you’re that guy on the internet who does tricks on his Ski-Doo. Normally you do them pretty well, so no one really gives a shit about you. No one except 14 year olds and people with problems coming too soon, the primary cross-section of humanity that subscribes to your Youtube channel.

But this Wednesday you’re going to try the toughest trick you’ve ever tried. You’re going to try ramping your Ski-Doo over a series of ski-shacks. Some of them will be on fire, not because of careful planning but because of careless drinking. You’re going to rev your Ski-Doo right up though, regardless of those looming flames. You’re going to point the nose down and put the pedal to the floor.

The snow will race beneath you, the air rush past your face. Your cheeks will burn with pressure and cold, your eyes will water with fear. As the end of the ramp approaches you’ll have a thought as to whether or not this was a good idea, but it’ll be a tiny thing, reverberating far below the drone of engine and the fire of the cylinders pumping.

When you take off from the ramp you’ll feel light beyond your wildest beliefs, a weightless thing, a bird. You’ll soar over trees and clear the first, non-flaming cottage. Then the second.

Heartbeats will pass between each one. The seconds will stretch into minutes in your mind, desperate things clinging to your mind, knowing what comes next. As the first flaming cottage passes beneath you you’ll think, for one of those heartbeats, that you could make it over the next one.

But the angle of approach will drop sharply. Physics will not favor your Ski-Doo today, and you’ll begin to arc down out of the sky towards the cabin, into the flames. You’ll enter at their zenith, catching fire and rolling across the second peak before you slam face first into the third burning building. The Ski-Doo will drop below the second roof, having crashed its weight into the building it collided into. You’ll sit there in shock in the flames, feeling them roil over you, feeling your clothes catch fire as you try to move but cannot make your nerves respond.

You’ll be dragged in under thirty seconds by nearby Ski-Safe-Tee personnel, who will put you out with fire blankets and snow. Then those personnel will escort you inside amidst cheers at the spectacle of your failure. You’ll be placed next to a fire, roaring and safely contained, where you’ll slowly regain your body heat and shiver occasionally at the thought of your possible death while pulling off a stunt for a Youtube audience.

You’ll think of how all your cred has been undone by your failure, how bad shit is. You’ll think this for a full hour and a half, until one of your friends brings in a laptop showing the view-count on your upload. You’ll see that it has already topped one-hundred thousand views. In one hour. At that moment you’ll realize that you and your Ski-Doo can make a lot more getting injured than you can pulling off stunts competently.

Thus will begin your brief, incredibly lucrative career.

Congratulations Ski-Doo Dude!