BUSF#CKER!!!

Here is the first version of the script, roughly* as performed in the ComBase on Dec 6, 2005 as my Solo Performance worth 15% of 3XX3: Post-Modern Performance in Action

For this performance I played all of the “characters”. I lined up eight pairs of shoes, one for each , at the back of the performance area on a little wooden riser/thing. Between each bit, I scurried back and changed shoes quickly and then got back into the game, pedally transformed into a totally different character. It went much better than I anticipated. I hope that there is more in store for BUSF#CKER!!! and if you (yes, YOU!) have any of the drawing skills, I would love to see your take on him.

*as in, more with the ad-libbing and less with the strict memorization.

So without further ado:

The well-dressed host who’s paid to be more excited by things than he really is:

There are tales of a man. Tales filled with wonder, excitement and relevance. A man who has become more than you or even I, or me, or myself. For many years this man’s legend has grown to the point where nearly every man, woman and child has heard of his exploits. But those who have actually seen him and lived to tell the tale number far fewer. Indeed I could likely count them on my extended family’s right hands. Using each finger to represent ‘one’ and including thumbs, and then multiplying the total by ten sevenths, which is roughly 1.428. That may sound like a lot, but consider the number of people on this bluish white planet of ours! We humans number at least in the hundreds of thousands, do we not? And then turn to yourself, and ask yourself, in a quiet voice so as not to disturb your neighbour or neighbours, if you have seen him and lived to tell the tale? Have you? … Have you??
Because these (points over shoulder) people have!

The weathered working man taking time out on his lunchbreak:

He wasn’t as tall as you’d think. Probably a few inches shy of six feet. But he was bigger than that, you know. Not that he was.. physically bigger. He just had this presence. He might as well have been fifteen feet tall. No one who saw him could just, you know, continue what they were doing. You had to just stop and stare. Wide eyes. Jaw all hanging open. And then, when you got over that, got control of your body back, if you hadn’t had a heart attack yet… you ran. Unless you were on a bus. If you were on a bus, you’d make peace with whatever god or gods you believed in as fast as you possibly could, then …you just had to wait.
…That’s BUSF#CKER!!!.
…He really doesn’t like buses.

An over enunciating, aging academic who has nothing interesting in his life, except the study of BUSF#CKER!!!:

The most widely accepted accounts of BUSF#CKER!!! describe him as an older man. Maybe in his forties, but weathered by his dangerous and very … unique lifestyle. His clothing is said to be worn and leather. His hairline is receeding, and his hair is grey and white and not often cleaned. Personal hygiene was never a primary concern. He is very strong, but the visibility of his muscles is often disagreed upon. A more recently popularized account sees him as small and almost slender, his muscles coiled tightly under pale skin, his clothing one size too big. There are constants, though. He always rides from quarry to quarry on a battered but very powerful motorcycle, which one witness described as “literally like a million horsepower.” He is never seen without his bike. Nor is he ever seen without his weapons: a sawed-off shotgun slung over his back, and a pick axe in his hand. His motorcycle driving skills are so advanced that he rarely needs a free hand to operate his vehicle, allowing him to make use of his weaponry even while on the move.

The grunge kid who hasn’t been told that grunge is dead. Which is good, because then he’d be the emo kid:

BUSF#CKERRRRR!!!! Yeah man. That guy’s so rock and roll! Me an Jake were writing a song about him, like for our band. But then Jake fuckin’ stole my girlfriend so I stole his Stratocaster and beat him with it. Repeatedly. We haven’t done much recording lately.
But BUSF#CKER!!! deserves a rock song because BUSF#CKER!!! is all man. He’s the man’s man, man. Man, I heard he has like thirteen penises, like, all on different parts of his body, and seven of them are erect at any given moment. That’s hardcore. He has trouble fitting onto buses because his dicks are all sticking out at weird angles. Not that he would ride buses. Oh no. Cause buses are for pussies and fags. BUSF#CKER!!! knows that. That’s why he hates them. Man, BUSF#CKER!!! sure hates buses. For real. I hate buses, too. All driving around, and stuff. Like, get a car you douche. Fuck.

The elderly and frazzled asylum inhabitant:

I seen him! I seen BUSF#CKER!!!! Oh Nelly, I swears it! It was a Wednesday I remember. I was driving the 32C over the hill when I done chanced to look in my rearview. And there it was! A great big beast of a motorcycle tearing up towards me. The fella on it was lookin’ straight into my eyes. He raised a hand and motioned me, as if he wanted me ta pull over. I panicked. Oh Nelly, it was all I could do! I slammed the gas down to the floor and swerved over, tryin’ ta force BUSF#CKER!!! into the way of the oncoming traffic. Right then everybody on the bus started to scream, for they musta seen him too, all at the same time. Now I was a good driver, all the boys back at the depot said that of me without reservations. But it was mighty hard for to keep my eyes on the road and on that bastard all at the same time at such high speeds. And as I saw him takin’ a little egg shaped metal thingie from his belt, pullin’ out some kind of a pin, and lobbin’ in straight towards me, I lost control of my vehicle. My old 32C skidded sideways, its hindquarters raisin’ up above the street. And then there was a terrible BOOM. But he musta missed! I saw, out the corner of my eye, a bus-shelter hurtling up towards the sky in a geyser of flames. But when I looked back, it was then that I lost all my hopes in the world. I seen BUSF#CKER!!!’s bike raise up onto its back wheel… and then comin out from the front wheel is these big mean blades.. all nastily curved and bloodstained. And then that wheel… it started to spin. Like some demonic, bus-hatin’ table saw… on a bike. On BUSF#CKER!!!’s bike. And he revved that thing up, and then it started toward me. And… all I remember after that was sparks and smoke and screams like I never heard before and never heard since.

The moustached, fairly wealthy skeptic:

(Stares for a while, twiddles. Looks back at audience.) What? You believe that shit?

The overzealous teenaged gossip-box:

People sometimes wonder why BUSF#CKER!!! hates buses so much. I mean besides the obvious reasons. Well my friend told me, cause he actually saw it all happen. And I’m pretty sure it’s true. Russ isn’t one of those people who would lie just to make a better story, ya know?
So the story’s like this:
BUSF#CKER!!! wasn’t always a biker. He used to be this skinny nerdy kid. For real. Glasses. Dressed by his mom, ridiculed by his peers. Spent the weekend in the basement playing dungeons and dragons with his four only friends. He had a stubborn streak though, and when all the football players mobbed him, he never ran away. He rarely went more than a week without a broken bone somewhere in his body.
So one day he’s waiting at a bus-stop.. and the bus drives on right past him. Whatever. He’s always late for class anyway. And then the next bus stops, but as BUSF#CKER!!! is about to pay the fare he realizes he doesn’t have any money because Bif the Jock beat him up and stole his allowance. He explains this to the bus driver, makes himself seem all pitiful and exploited, but the driver still won’t let him on. So BUSF#CKER!!! walks off the bus. He’s a bit cranky at this point, so he kicks the bus as hard as he can and turns away to leave. Then there’s this creaking sound. He turns back, and it was like in slow motion: the bus… the bus is falling over sideways! And even then he had a huge pair of balls. He wouldn’t run! He just stood there, and put up his dukes.. like to fight. This shrimpy little fourteen year old. Then SMASH. The bus is on its side and the kid’s nowhere to be seen. And no one saw him for a long time. Until.. well.. you know the rest of the story.

God:

The most important fact about BUSF#CKER!!! is that he is 12.7 thousand times more hardcore than Chuck Norris and Vin Diesel combined. Once the two of them saw BUSF#CKER!!! at a bar and they were so afraid of him that they bought him all the alcohol in the whole place and gave him surgery to permanently cure his indigestion right on the spot. BUSF#CKER!!! was a bit hung-over that day so he didn’t bother killing them. Vin and Chuck felt so relieved they were still alive that they went home and burned all their bus ticket stubs and built a 824 foot tall pyramid in BUSF#CKER!!!’s honour. When BUSF#CKER!!! heard about this he realized that since pyramids are traditionally tombs, the bastards were implying that he would die sometime in the future, so he willed both of them dead. And they died.

The thin, lonely and emotionally fragile middle aged woman:

I loved BUSF#CKER!!!. I really.. loved him, from the bottom of my heart. My skin, my blood, my … hands. He was magnificent. I’ve never met a man like him; before, or since. I think what drew me to him, was his passion. These days, people just go through the motions, get on the bus, get to work.. spend their day in a dull job that means nothing to them, and then waste the evening “relaxing” in front of the televisions being fed drivel packed up by the corporations in an attempt to brainwash us. BUSF#CKER!!! challenged the norms, and he was so dedicated to what he did. I’ve never known anyone who was so sure of their goals and what they wanted to do withtheir lives. A lot of people don’t understand that about BUSF#CKER!!!. But nobody knew him like I do. He was so brave! My knight on shining steel… such passion and such courage. I mean, I don’t know if any of you have tried to fuck a bus before… it’s not easy! But just imagining him–one man on a motorcycle, alone against one of those huge metallic monsters… Oh! It’s so inspiring! I don’t think we’ll ever see another man like him.

The well-dressed host who’s paid to be more excited by things than he really is:

There you have it. BUSF#CKER!!!. Man or legend? I can’t make up your mind for you. There is considerable evidence to suggest he truly does exist: from the stirring eyewitness accounts you have just seen to the vast bus graveyards of Nova Scotia, which you have not just seen. And yet there will always be sceptics amongst us. But one thing is for certain: What BUSF#CKER!!! represents to our society is nothing less than the abolition of inadequate funding for private sector cosmetic dentistry. In a way, the truth is inconsequential. Because the core of our experience reveals that… we are all BUSF#CKER!!!. And so, he will never die. Goodnight.