After re-reading this thread, I just realized I need to volunteer my old neighbor for one of the better moments in childhood evolution!
The setting: Suburbia. I lived in a dead end neighborhood with 3 major "circles". Quiet, dead end neighborhood streets ending in circles with houses spaced all around them. My neighbors across the street were notorious for frequently painting, and re-painting the doors of their house in strange and bright colors. Their house being dark brown lent itself to Red, Orange, Blue, Grey, and many other colors of front doors, and garage doors. Cheaper than painting the whole house every few years to give it a new look I suppose.
Are you with me so far?Must have been about 1983, and one of the (more liberal, make that MOST liberal) neighborhood fathers up the street was (among other things) into making home made wine from the home grown grape vine. They actually squished the grapes with their feet, the "old fashioned way", to make this wine.
So, you ask, what does this have to do with "Darwinian" VBMX? Everything!
For starters, this parent's name was, of all things, Darwin!
So now we have a bunch of neighborhood 14-16 year old kids, visiting Darwin, and his teen-aged kids, hanging out on our VBMX bikes one evening. It so happens the parents, and the sister, are in the process of making home made wine, squishing grapes with their feetses....."GROSS"! "NO WAY"! ..."YOU DRINK THAT!?"
(You're starting to catch up with me now, aren't you!?
) So, since Darwin was not one to be upstaged by a bunch of punk biaches in the hood, he proceeds into the wine cellar (laundry room, lol), and pulls out a one gallon jug of an "earlier vintage" of said "home made wine". Now the challenge is to get us to try this stuff that they are so grossly creating with their slimy feet! And of course his kids tell us...."It's good!"......"No REALLY, it IS good!"... (after re-thinking the evening, I believe it was a very large "Mrs Butterworth's" syrup bottle with the pop top spout, because we didn't exactly get out the wine glasses, lmao, we sipped from a fat old lady's head ...a beverage made from a ....nevermind)
Since, nobody had their licenses, and "Darwin" knew none of us were dumb enough to tell our parents what we had really been up to this night, he goads us, ....not only into trying it,.... but into finishing the bottle with him!
So, somewhere about midnight, we've learned a few things. First, the alcohol kills the gross sweaty feet germs. Second, that the stuff actually tastes pretty good. And third, there is a lot of alcohol in the stuff!
Well. when the "party" subsided, it's time for the "punk biaches in the hood" to go home .....on our BMX bikes.
My neighbor, feeling his new found oats, challenges the group to race home. A couple others went straight past our circle, and on to their's, and my neighbor and I said "C-ya guys", and we turned into ours, still racing. I was never one to get beat by such a challenge, and I must have beat him by 100 yards! Because I went right past his driveway, and looped around the circle to lap the circle before he made it to the driveway. (Hence I had come around and fallen in behind him for a perfect view of his next act of true brilliance!)
Well, he didn't give up, although he had already been beaten sorely, as he continued to race up his driveway and into his garage.
The problem? 1. It was a dark moonless night. 2. He forgot that his parents had just painted the garage door ...."VERY Dark Brown". 3. Aforementioned newly painted dark brown garage door was closed.....not open....4. Very dark brown garage door "looked open" "when closed" at night.
Full tilt on his Schwinn Sting.....BLAM!!! He crumpled up, and fell down into a wad, .... like a sack of potatoes....never even touched the brakes!
OF course the motion lights on our houses were different back then, they didn't come on until someone detected the motion of the walls in the house shaking from impact, then they would get turned on manually. (an 80's motion detector light if you please).....(Come to think of it, I think his older sister was the one that came out to see what happened...probably a good thing too as I recall, lol)
You're right.....the 80's were a confusing time....
Of course there was a few lessons learned that night. Among others, always make sure the garage door is open before racing into it, even if you can see that there are no cars parked inside it.
I'll never forget his response to "what the heck happened?"....."I thought the stupid door was open..."
.... 
