1960
Feeling flesh inside me again made me complete, being driven out of the factory had not been nearly enough. Humans suppose that metal hates meat, that we only want to cut and tear. Nothing could be further from the truth. We are tools. We were made to be used. We long to be used.
My first started slowly. That was fine. He tested the weight of my clutch and the resistance of my brake pedal. He looked under my hood. I felt excited and exposed. He touched my engine and a thrill ran through all my wiring. There were only a dozen shorts. I preened when he refused to notice.
The test drive was one long shudder of ecstasy. He knew what he was doing with my shifter. I knew he could tell my clutch was tight. I accelerated to push him further into my seat. The warmth of his buttocks, the subtle shifting weight of his testicles. “Take me home,” my engine softly roared. “Put me in your garage,” I groaned as the vent spews were ground off my tires by the rough surface of the street. “Or even a carport. I’ll be a wind-spattered dirty girl for you.”
“Yes,” he told the dealer, “Yes.”
I went home with him, giddy as a short bus. He died a year later. In his bed with his wife. I didn’t even get to see him one last time. She sold me in the winter, the worst time to showcase my virtues.
1962
He was a terrible owner. He never changed my oil or watered the intricate folds of my radiator. Why couldn’t it be like the first time? I felt used and neglected. His wife had a baby and he traded me in for a station wagon, four headlights give it a mutant stare. He drove away with a frown, but his wife was smiling. Cunt. I knew a bitterness in my carburetor no solvent would flush away.
1967
The summer of love. A young man bought me, haggling with the dealership. I watched his muscular arms and hands as he paid cash for me. Cash. I got a funny feeling in my muffler. He whooped as he vaulted into the driver’s seat. My ignition felt tight for the first time in a long time and my accelerator pedal rose to meet him eagerly. “Vroom,” I purred, “Vroom,” as he tore out of the dealership.
He drove me fast and hard and took me home and cleaned all of my user-serviceable parts. He washed my engine. Can you understand how long I had been since a man had done that for me? And wax, luxurious wax all over me. It made the wind slither across me on the freeway.
We drove to the beach and to music festivals and to buy weed. I waited patiently in his garage as he worked, ready to go back to carousing. I cushioned him as girls rode him in the dark of canyon roads. I took on his musky scent: pussy, weed, Brut, Marlboros, and beef.
When I clipped the telephone pole, I barely felt him leave. With my remained headlight, I could see him in front of me. His head was all wrong, a deep V impressed into it. Various things were leaking out of me. I’m sure at least one of them was tears.
1972
My first year in the junkyard was the hardest. My fender hurt for months from being towed. Strangers took my seats and exhaust system, my steering wheel and truck lid. I hated being picked apart. I felt like carrion.
I was still young. I was only on my second water pump. I wasn’t ready to just be thrown away.
1980
“Classic! It’s a classic!” I heard someone say.
“A classic piece of junk, maybe.” Another voice. Deeper. A smoker and cynic.
“The frame is fine and most of the engine is there,” the first one said. I looked around lazily, my one cracked headlight half-filled with water. Tall, skinny, nervous.
“It’ll restore it. I can make it perfect again,” he said.
“It’s an MG-A Twin Cam,” the heavyset one said. “It was never perfect. Hell, even brand-new it barely worked.”
“It must be mine,” skinny said. I felt a burst of love run through my wiring harness.
1982
I am born again.
The last sun visor was clipped on and every spark plug was properly gapped. He put the top down with the hushed reverence of a farmer’s market. He slid the key in. It was smooth. He had polished it. It was the little things that made me love him. And I did love him. I wanted him in me. I wanted to be driven. Driven hard, engine roaring, tires squealing, drinking hi-test, and shitting leaded exhaust.
Highway 33. He’s promised me Highway 33. He presses down my clutch and I shudder.
We pull out of his driveway and my tires squeal in delight.
Sugarfree… Thursdays?
With auto eroticism.
…and we’re done here.
I actually had that joke in my first draft and I decided against it… but I’m not sure why.
… and sticking it in crazy.
New genre?
With auto eroticism.
No Narrowed Gaze could spoil the perfection of this for me.
That’s it. I’m calling a lid on further replies. Surly’s work here is done.
I would never narrow gaze such a work of art.
So good.
I was only on my second water pump.
The surest sign of an MG owner.
“It’s an MG-A Twin Cam,” the heavyset one said. “It was never perfect. Hell, even brand-new it barely worked.”
*outright, prolonged laughter*
And, yes.
WANT.
I had a ’62 MGA Coupe in my wanton youth. It never ran, but I doubled my money on it even after eBay’s fees.
I kind of miss that car even though it was only good as housing for wasps.
The numbness in my feet has spread so I can no longer gage the pressure on the throttle. The one joy in life I had control over, driving, seems to be gone. A smarter person with a support structure might call it a day and finally get a diagnosis. But I’m
old andalone, so a’crashin we will go.Neuropathy in the feet is a symptom of diabetes. Get tested. Heck get a glucose monitor from the drug store and self test.
My A1C Has never tested high. My dad’s MS started with numbness in his feet (well, first his hands for single exacerbation)
I can see your reticence to go then. I hadn’t heard of a genetic component to it though. If God forbid it is that, there are a lot of new medicines and even diets like the (Dr. Terry) Wahls Protocol.
Avoiding diagnosis is no cure. You will hate yourself if you skip possible time to fix what ails ye.
There is no throttle finesse. The throttle should be either on or off.
What are you, a NYC cabbie?
Move bitch, Git out’ da way!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cEuU64Zt4B0
Give it a minute…
Please go to the doctor.
Seconded.
Look on the bright side: instead of diabetic neuropathy it could be alcoholic neuropathy…
I’ve been thru quite a bit of that over the last few years, so if you have questions on routes to take in getting a diagnosis, I’m here.
And even though I play
adoctor on the internet sometimes, I will not attempt to diagnose you myself.Good one.
I was really cautious reading this, looking for any signs foreshadowing any psychopathic murders, but at the end I thanked the Elder gods that they had overlooked this one.
Don’t be crazy, it’s not a VW.
Subaru has that line covered.
Subaru-swapped VW’s are extra evil.
Fuck, I mixed up my cars. I can’t help it if Germans always seem a little sketchy.
I was waiting for the twist of the knife at the end.
Made whole again. Ready, waiting, desperately longing for long fast sunny-day drives on winding roads, only to be locked away as a piece of stationary garage jewelry.
There were only a dozen shorts.
Only a dozen shorts? In a British car? Someone at the factory was slacking off.
shitting leaded exhaust
I liked this final touch.
That’s only the shorts. There are opens too.
Our first new car was a ’65 Austin-Healy Sprite. The Positive-ground electrical system left a tad to be desired; if it got below freezing we had to park on a slope to jump the thing. Some masochistic streak in me wishes I had it back.
It reads like a Prince song. I liked it, thanks for sharing.
The radiator purifies itself in the waters of Lake Minnetonka.
Obligatory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAoSknxwd-k
Feeling flesh inside me again made me complete
Thought this was SugarFree at first.
Your instincts are correct, it is L’homme sans Sucre
The car of Theseus.
God damn. That is a masterpiece.
Very nice. I really enjoyed this, as my main form of entertainment these days is watching classic car revivals on YouTube.
Welcome, Tulpa!
Thanks!
*waves*
Hawt.
Wait…nothing died, not even the car?
1967 dude.
…right. “Dude”.
It’s a British car. Delivered by Dr. Lucas. It was still born.
I loved my ’64 1/2 candy apple red Mustang convertible. It didn’t love me. Finally sold it for $400. Boy, did I get screwed.
I once had a ’67 white Mustang convertible. It also didn’t love me.
Jesus Christ, SugarFree never disappoints, no matter the subject.
OT – I haz confuze. Normally, I would greet this news that SCotUS didn’t just stupidly back the police – but talk about bad cases making bad law. And worse, the voting block.
Is the constitutional provision against seizure or attempts at seizure?
Logically, it should apply to the latter, who cares if the police succeed at it or not? So, I think I agree with the majority.
*sniff* Must be hard to drive if you anthropomorphize your machinery.
Not if you’re a “potential rapist.”
(Andrea Dworkin and Catharine MacKinnon wave “hi!”)
You can’t fool us, this is far too wholesome and endearing. Who the fuck are you, and what the fuck have you done with SugarFree?
I hop SF is watching.
Peter Doocy: “Somebody shouted out to Biden ‘how are you getting ready for your press conference’ and he said: ‘what press conference?’”
I can see his handlers in the background, frantically trying to figure out why the remote isn’t working.
Ah, man. Joe didn’t even challenge him to a rasslin’ match.
“with the hushed reverence of a farmer’s market”
Perfect!
We must go to very different farmer’s markets. Mine sounds more like the Casbah in an Indiana Jones movie.
We can’t afford to go to the farmer’s market.
Actually, it’s that here the farmer’s market has 3 farmers with overpriced not-great produce and the rest are all food and craft vendors. Disappointing.
That seems to be the trend for most suburban farmers markets these days. Especially the smaller ones. 14 different candle makers selling $20 candles, one produce seller, one meat seller, and 10 art sellers.
???
The Williamsburg Farmer’s Market is god-awful expensive. It’s a social event, not a market.
They must be going to one of those hipster markets.
Isn’t that just called “Whole Foods” down your way?
Tried one before. I was not a fan.
Never been in one (they only exist in B.C. [really, just Vancouver] and southern Ontario in Canada).
Rape-n-ho is bitching about her pay.
Rapinoe repeated her claim she was not making as much money as the U.S. men’s soccer team, even though the team continued to win trophies.
“Despite those wins, I’ve been devalued, I’ve been disrespected, and dismissed because I’m a woman, and I’ve been told I don’t deserve any more than less because I am a woman,” she said at the White House.
Women’s sports doesn’t draw anywhere near the revenue that men’s sports does and you get beat by 15 year old academy men’s squads. If you are disrespected it is because you are a whiny, ungrateful cunte.
And they lost their case on equal pay because for the contract timeframe they made more than the men. It really boiled down to “if we had chosen the men’s compensation option (which we expressly did not), we would have made more” combined with fucking FIFA makes (and pays) more on the Men’s WC.
This was what gets me to laugh. “Well if we had known how successful we would have been, we would have taken the riskier compensation pack that would have gotten us more money. But we didn’t. They wanted to get paid off a contract that was base off of risk but not bear the risk?
The driving principle of feminism is to protect women from the consequences of their own choices.
Plenty of people in show biz wish too they’d taken the percentage.
O.F., is this the source of your shark’s teeth? https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0341743
Either that or Shane MacGowan.
Nah, much nicer than Shane’s. So you didn’t ‘shop it yourself at any rate.
Women can change their mind at any time is the only absolute.
As usual, the Bee is on the case.
Cant they just base the salaries on the revenue from ticket sales snd broadcast deals? That would be pretty directly indicative of the public’s preferred entertainment.
Salaries Not based on equality, not set by a committee with an agenda; just salaries dictated by the simple math of what people are willing to pay.
“What does the ‘W’ in WNBA stand for? Worse NBA?”
(HE, you both look so cute there: happy and peppy and bursting with love.)
You’d have to throw in some percentage of other revenues – typically clubs/teams earn money from tournament purses as well.
The only reason the WNBA still exists is that the NBA is willing to absorb tens of millions in losses every year to keep it afloat as a living virtue signal.
This.
Were it not for wanting to fly their virtue flag high, the WNBA would not be a thing.
And it’s god awful. Middle school boys basketball is about as exciting.
When I was in high school, the college girl who lived down the street brought her college women’s team basketball player roommate (who was a senior) home to visit.
She challenged me to a game of 1-1 in the driveway.
I never played organized basketball in my life.
I beat her 12-2.
Doesn’t the men’s team chase people like Messi around the field?
You single folks out there, I hope and pray that someday you meet someone who loves you as much as Megan Rapinoe loves herself.
One of the biggest narcissists I’ve ever seen.
Only because a large number of people encourage it.
Our social reinforcement of assholes is a significant part of our problem.
amazing
“Despite those wins, I’ve been devalued, I’ve been disrespected, and dismissed because I’m a woman, and I’ve been told I don’t deserve any more than less because I am a woman,” she said at the White House.
Not because you’re a woman. Because you’re an obnoxious self-obsessed attention whore asshole.
She’d have a better argument that the men were overpaid.
I have the weirdest boner.
OT: Biden’s press conference is starting.
Odd on:
It goes off without a hitch
He forgets a name.
He forgets his name.
He gets a question tougher than “What’s your favorite flavor of ice cream?”
He gets fact checked.
He strokes out on live television.
He blames Trump.
It goes off without a hitch – 0%
He forgets a name – 50%
He forgets his name – 5%
He gets a question tougher than “What’s your favorite flavor of ice cream?” – 10%
He gets fact checked – 0%
He strokes out on live television – 5%
He blames Trump – 100%
10%
40%
1%
0%
0%
2%
100%
My God, this is a no-shit fiasco. The engine’s running but there’s no one behind the wheel. He’s just reading off of notecards, and he can’t even do that without stumbling over words and losing his focus.
The guy who was in the Senate for 35 years claimed he doesn’t really know the details of Senate rules. Bravo.
I expected him to embarrass himself and yet he’s still performing much more poorly than I expected. And that’s with a laughably obsequious press corps tossing him gentle softballs.
Still won’t make me watch it. I’ve gone the last 10 years purposely avoiding what presidents say, only to watch the hilarious highlights.
Look for the part when he starts yelling out sentence fragments about taxes
I’m saving my blood pressure and just reading the live feed on PJ Media.
I had to turn it off. I can only take so much scripted, emotionally manipulative*, dishonest horseshit.
*Not that I am malleable in that way. But I know that is the intent and it really grinds my gears.
I watched Siraj Hashmi on Twitch. I had it muted and just watched his facial expressions.
I believe we have a Tulpa pending.
Ah, fresh meat!
Man Flesh
That’s what I say before every bowel movement.
Former VP Biden: “Election integrity is un-American.”
Dems are really going hard with the “Jim Crow” messaging.
Keep calling all opposition to our policy proposals racist! It’s working!
If by working, you mean making Scruffy irritable and prone to outbursts if anyone intimates that he’s wrong because he’s racist or vice versa, then yes.
The “Jim Crow” messaging is so blatant to anyone who isn’t head up the ass in DNC propoganda.
So you know a minority of Americans.
Dems are really going hard with the “Jim Crow” messaging.
Well, they know it so well.
This photo was taken last week! https://media.npr.org/assets/img/2011/05/05/bus_wide-f13e57e3f92b16d247641468d85b9c2029fcaedb.jpg?s=1400
HEY-OH!
My father had one of those. He was going to give it to me when I turned 16 but the brakes failed massively and he went sailing thru a red light as a result.
Having not died, he promptly sold it off.
This guy is such a mendacious, dishonest asshole.
You can’t be mendacious if you can’t recognize the truth anymore.
His Speach Writers are mendacious, dishonest assholes. Are we sure this guy even knows what he’s saying?
Do his eyes have a blank, non-comprehending look when he’s speaking?
Yup.
The entire thing is scripted and he’s openly reading the script. He doesn’t call on the reporters as in a normal press conference – he looks down at his notes and reads off a name.
Heh.
Yup. I tried watching it for a couple minutes. It made me angry and sad at the same time.
Biden, or SF?
Well I just got rear-ended.
Unfortunately for the other guy, I’m driving a ’96 Suburban with a tow hitch. So while I might need a muscle relaxant tonight, he’s going to need an entire front end assembly and radiator.
Oof. Glad your safe.
Sorry.
Sorry, dude. In the last two minutes?
About two hours ago. I got off easy, I saw him at the last second and took my foot off the brake.
I did find out how much trash was hiding under my seats though.
A few years back a kid rear-ended me in his parent’s Acura. The front of it just missed the back bumper of my Silverado and took the hitch receiver right into the grill and hood. I had a little paint on the receiver and the trailer electrical connector housing was bent a little.
Well, if you must get rear-ended, that’s the way to do it. Glad you’re okay.
Years ago a teenage girl rear-ended my old Granny car. She was shaking and about to cry. I said, “Eh, no big. It’s an old car. Don’t worry about it.”
The lady who rear-ended my Tacoma in 2019 was the same way, halfway into a panic attack. I suspect that she’d never been in a fender bender before.
I just checked to see if he bent my hitch assembly. Nope.
I took a picture of his license and the vehicles and said “see ya, don’t worry about it”
Sorry dude.
Was it a hot chick?
Some guy with a job as a chef. He’s having a bad day, but at least he hit someone that’s not interested in suing him.
I thought about pulling my shirt up over my holster when I got out just for funsies, but decided that wouldn’t be advisable or cool.
Ooooh, yeah, that could have been a brandishing charge if the guy went to the cops about it.
You mean Asian, right?
rear-ended
I might need a muscle relaxant tonight
ehm…
In your scenario, the muscle relaxant comes first.
Legit LOL
Sorry to hear that; glad to hear it wasn’t worse.
Uh oh, President Applesauce lost his place in the script. Gets asked a question abot guns, gives an answer about infrastructure.
Paging Frederic Bastiat: Biden shrugs off concerns about what happens to oil workers by stammering that they’ll make as much money capping wells as they did digging them.
because people love to pay to destroy wealth.
You’re shitting me, right?
Nope. It’s exactly what he said.
I can hear all the Austrian economists at the Mises Institute screaming from multiple states away.
Here, from Stephen Green’s liveblog at Instapundit:
And then they’ll uncap them, and cap them again, over and over until they retire.
I’m thinking more Hazlitt
“The art of economics consists in looking not merely at the immediate but at the longer effects of any act or policy; it consists in tracing the consequences of that policy not merely for one group but for all groups.”
I am starting to notice people wistfully recalling their private and business lives under the Trump administration. They quickly cover with “Ya know if he hadn’t been a racist misogynistic orange man, or course. I mean clearly he had to go, but…the economy was better.”
So the brainwashing message of Trump Evul stuck in their heads, but they still possess observational tools that tell them the Left ain’t got it all right either.
Oh yeah. Ya’ll know i wasn’t fond of old OMB… But at least he didn’t intentionally send gas (and therefore all) prices skyrocketing.
Always pick the lesser of two weevils.
I don’t have time for you and your damn hobbies!
I will grind whatever grist the mill requires!
Price of almost everything is shooting up. Groceries are definitely up. Lumber is obscene – we have a 9X9 back deck on our house that is ancient and decaying. We’ve gotten four quotes on replacing it and the cheapest was $7K.
Trex.
Swissy might be on to something.
There has to be some realization that while US citizens were locked down, tested, masked, socially distanced, quarantined, and told to put our lives on hold for a year, people are allowed to freely cross the border with zero testing, quarantine, or any of those other mandates.
Yeah… No. I don’t think there will be.
Your business folded, you’re out of a job, your stimmie checks were spent months before they arrived, your savings is gone and you’re close to foreclosure, your favorite watering holes and mom and pop stores were shuttered or burned down last year, you’re looking at years of stagflation under a lunatic administration commandeered by millenarian cultists talking about packing the Supreme Court and admitting new states to pack the Senate to ensure themselves a thousand years of uncontested rule, but, you know, Trump’s tweets and stuff.
If we’re gonna blame a social ill for all these shootings, maybe this one deserves a long look.
Joe paused mid-sentence, didn’t finish, went to a new sentence and then walked off.
Pudding time!
And.. by… uh… pudding… mean.. FINNEGAN
/ BIDEN SMITH
Pudding time you say?
Amazing. Amazing.
Forget ‘It’s Happening’.
We Did IT!
That’s one thing I did like about Trump. That guy enjoyed going one on one with the journalists and he also had Press Secretary’s who were always prepared and ready to rumble.
“You know, you are a piece of work.” ?
+1 Hamlet.
Heh.
Oops: “really a piece of work”.
Nothing was scripted, and all the questions were “gotcha” questions. Do that to Biden and he won’t remember his own name.
Well, I mean, asking him his name is a ‘gotcha’ question.
Heh really?
OT
Sci-Fi Short Film: “FLOATERS” | DUST
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpfHRsyNfDM
i liked it.
At one point I was thinking this might be *Christine* from the car’s point of view, but it’s weirder than that.
So is this the British version of Christine? When will the MG start trying to kill, only to have the ignition coil fail?
Bravo SF. This article made my day. I’ve been having a whopper of a week.
I find that there aren’t too many problems that can’t be solved by simply nailing a rat to someone’s door.
Certainly discourages the other rats.
“Either way, if any milk of human kindness had ever run in his veins, it had curled to sour cream long ago.”
I’m watching the Crowder drinking game/live stream of Shotgun Joe’s presser. I’m drunk by the “(Republican voting rules) make Jim Crow look like Jim Eagle” line. Ugh…
The thing they don’t tell you is that all the Republicans want to do is undo the sketchy voting laws just recently put in place to steal, er, fortify the election.
RIP, Jessica.
She was sublime.
“No thanks, I need to get back to rehab.”
Damn, that’s a shame 🙁
Well damn. She was a very funny lady.
Funniest person on a really funny show.
Yup.
That sucks, she was great
Her?
Oh man, she was awesome and will be missed. “But the joke’s on her because she doesn’t know how little I care for Gob.“
“How much can one banana cost?”
An all-time great line
Damn.
I’m wondering how Archer is going to deal with that.
Malice is like a kid at Christmas.
https://twitter.com/michaelmalice/status/1375161032642076678
Holy crap….
America is such a land of opportunity that even a corrupt, senile old coot can be president.
OMG ?
https://twitter.com/michaelmalice/status/1375154329695498246
I don’t think you could cut A joe Biden speech and make i look worse than the real thing.
And this is what a leftie friend of mine posted on FB:
So…we aren’t seeing the same guy.
Yes.
There was a link in there but it disappeared.
Well i can clearly see why your Friend loves Biden, he’s just like her.
That’s pretty astounding.
Says it all.
They couldn’t care less who the figurehead is, they just want PROGRESS.
I am offended at bigots who are still criticizing him for having a stutter.
C-c-c-c-c cram it up your ass, Nancy.
BULLYBIGOTStopping in the middle of a sentence and then wandering away is not a stutter. Saying you have been in the Senate for 120 years is not a stutter. “The best way to get something done hold near and dear ear eer eerrr” is not a stutter.
“Shut up shut up shut up!”, he replied.
This is a Stutter.
I imagine Joe has had many nights dealing with whiskey dick.
Also acceptable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjN5uHRIcjM
Which one of you Glibs is “Cthulpa” commenting on that thread?
It’s Agile.
Y’know, I look at President Puddin’ Cup and I think to myself, “Poor Americans,” and then I look at The Hair That Walks Like A Man™ and think “Poor me.” ?
I absolutely loved this , SF. Bravo. If it were a Miata, what part would be pixelated during these scenes?
This story made my day. The last line.
I read a different version of this story that quotes the former boss as saying “It doesn’t matter, he got paid, that’s all that matter. He’s a fucking weenie for even bringing it up.”
I happen to think it’s a dick move. Like, how much trouble would you have to go to what for getting the whole amount in pennies, then delivering them to the man’s driveway while also dumping a load of oil on them? I think the oil may mean he’s liable for a tort claim for cleanup at least. Perhaps the weenie has the last laugh, or perhaps they will just move on with their lives like reasonable adults.
Magic 8 Ball says: Doubtful
Oh yeah, it’s a dick move, and probably indicative of being an asshole in general, and certainly not in control of his worse impulses. It’d be one thing to think about it and laugh, but to actually do it is pretty shitty.
It seems like you did get a real payment.
are pennies even worth keeping in circulation?
A shit-ton of Dawn, a rake, and a garden hose would be much faster than cleaning them one by one.
I find that there aren’t too many problems that can’t be solved by simply nailing a rat to someone’s door.
Okay, Martin Luther.
I believe you’re thinking of Martin’s younger brother, Willard Luther.
Ben
Ben was the rat; Williard was the human.
Kinnath totally misunderstood that Michael Jackson song.
Ahh yes, founder of the ill-fated Willardites. Their obsession with rats led to the entire eradication of the sect during the Black Plauge.
https://twitter.com/michaelmalice/status/1375165027636875271
A re-casting of a joke I heard on the old Spitting Image out of the UK back in the 80s:
V.P. Harris, with President Puddin’ Cup and their Secret Service entourage in tow, decide to go out for lunch one day to one of the few D.C. restaurants still operating.
They are seated and are immediately seen to by waitstaff.
The waiter, traditionally solicitous, first asks the V.P. what she’d like for her main course. ”I’ll have the steak,” she replies.
“Very good, Madam Vice-President. And for the vegetable?”
Harris glances over at Joe and says “He’ll have the steak as well.”