Travelers on an East Tennessee interstate were forced to brake for workers — and drones, perhaps even a queen — when a truck carrying about 1 million bees crashed Friday.
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
Sunday, April 19, 2026
most clever news reporting writing I've read in a while
Travelers on an East Tennessee interstate were forced to brake for workers — and drones, perhaps even a queen — when a truck carrying about 1 million bees crashed Friday.
Saturday, March 21, 2026
Jimmy's Aunt Lurleen deserves recognition for being the only person in Pecos County history to treat a transmission like a suggestion rather than a mechanical necessity.
she drove everywhere with the throttle half pressed and the brake lightly engaged, which caused the Oldsmobile to move through Fort Stockton like a confused tugboat.
The transmission eventually surrendered.
Most people would repair the transmission.
Lurleen simply continued driving the car in second gear for the next four years.
She said it simplified things.
I once asked her why she didn’t get it fixed.
“Well Jimmy Don,” she said, “it still goes forward, and I ain’t planning on racing anybody.”
fun to read movie review, Thanks Doug!
MOVIE REVIEW: It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
By Jimmy Don Ventura
The cars in Mad World serve as a metaphor for temptation. Everyone begins the film in a respectable vehicle, driving along with their normal lives. But the moment money enters the conversation, those cars turn into escape pods for human decency.
The accelerator becomes a moral decision.
Friday, July 04, 2025
Tuesday, June 24, 2025
Friday, May 30, 2025
"with a hearty scoff in the chamber, ready to lay snide critique" are the words the Autopian.com's new writer used in an article about the LaJolla Concours, which he described as being held on "a big patch of shabby lawn". Scoff, and snide, indeed.
He did pick a good range of cars in the show to highlight on the Autopian.com
https://www.theautopian.com/im-a-designer-who-attended-a-fancyish-car-show-here-are-the-cars-that-stood-out-to-me/ and either has some in depth knowledge of them, or, is also good at researching the ones he finds interesting.
It's too bad his editor is blind, and that he doesn't use some spellcheck software to ask about errors... this was a challenge to read.
"I love me some coupé utility trucklets and this funktastic El Catalina" is quite the odd choice for a writing patter. But, when I read "dramatically sculpted hoof concealed" I realized, no editor was awake at the computer to rein in (no pun intended after that mention of a hoof) this guy's writing.
"With its Kamm tail aerodynamic and only 1,370 lbs to move it pushed this sexy beast to a top speed of 152 mph. During its three years of production, TZ2s took class wins in the 1000 km of Monza 12 Hours of Sebring, the Targa Florio, 1000 km of Nürburgring,6 Hours"
That is an example of no proofreading taking place at all. From a teacher, among other things. I mean - he's a teacher, not that I am. I'm a proofreader. That's not the only example of not using a space after a comma, or not using a comma when needed, or a space after punctuation: "background in various aspects of design strategy, spatial design, branding, graphic design, production and project and team management, in small to large budget projects.Resume includes" https://cms.artcenter.edu/about/get-to-know-artcenter/people/detail.html?breadcrumb=565f1aae4d9b6fce4bd8c5f2&accdID=0110221
" As an articulate concept generator, I conjure the Big Idea but never forget the importance of details." Really? Seriously?
You forgot to proofread before or after posting... so... yeah, not so much on the importance of details.
Why does it bug me? Well, I'm over here, just being a car guy, reading about a car show I like, and I guess I got a bit defensive over the "scoff in the chamber, ready to lay snide critique" and figured if he can state that's his status, he can sure as hell can take in what he dishes out.
I vote for the Autopian.com to get a proofreader, and less Pasadena snobs in the car show reporting. If they want to be droll about 911s, and other similar boring snob cars, fine. But writing for a car enthusiast website doesn't seem to me to be a good fit. Especially for someone who can't spell "Peterson Museum" correctly.
Wednesday, March 19, 2025
Funniest thing I read today, from Bam Bam the Trucker
I looked at that high-tech monstrosity and thought, Let’s fuck myself up today. So I did. French vanilla. Seven shots of espresso. Because moderation is for cowards.
First sip? Brilliant mistake. Only idiots and truckers put this much espresso in their coffee, and lucky for me, I qualify as both. The Yeti mug was a necessity because my hands are shaking so bad, the coffee would've just launched itself into orbit. Pretty sure the cream in the fridge turned to butter just from being near me.
Most people in the office just sighed and accepted their fate. But the new hire? She’s clutching her phone, ready to call 911. I gave her a thumbs-up, but I think it came off more like a distress signal.
Effects so far:
✅ Can hear WiFi signals
✅ Can see the future, but only 30 seconds ahead
✅ Floating slightly above the ground—contact is optional now
✅ Office plugged me into the power grid, and I’m currently running half the building
✅ CB radio? Don’t need it. I am the frequency now.
Regrets? None. Next time: 10 shots. Let’s see if I can break the sound barrier before my shift starts.
Follow up the next day:
But this time, it wasn’t just coffee. It was some new shit that broke the laws of physics. My neighbor (who I now suspect is a Vietnamese coffee dealer of destruction) handed me a pack with a smile that basically said, "This… wake you… up."
Well, mission accomplished, buddy.
See, I didn’t know how many packs to use, so I did what any rational person would do: I guessed. Turns out, five was not the right number. Five was the number that rewrote my DNA.
Current status:
I can see new colors. Specifically, the color of sound.
Time is actually going backward. I think I just high-fived my past self.
I can now thread a needle on a running sewing machine.
My coffee mug self-stirs because I am vibrating faster than molecular cohesion allows.
Sleep? Irrelevant. I’ve got five marathons to run today.
My truck is too scared to start out of respect for my newfound speed.
I have officially met every god from every religion. Buddha, Odin, Zeus—we’re all besties now.
Final rating? I have become Death, destroyer of caffeine tolerance.
If you need me, I’ll be somewhere between the astral plane and the finish line of my fifth marathon, contemplating why this coffee tastes a little too good.... suspiciously good
Tuesday, January 21, 2025
another fun example of why my favorite current auto writer is Ezra Dyer
You can pretty much name any car from 1975, and it'll be slow .... into that grim era roared the 930 Turbo with 234 horsepower stuffed into a car that weighed about as much as a Coupe DeVille's hood ornament ... outrageous acceleration combined with whoops-you're-dead handling
Sunday, October 13, 2024
irony, is, two articles that come out in the same week, that are contradicting each other
they guy that last week I posted about, who was freaked out that Harleys are loud, is at it again.
He must feel he needs to rage bait people to read his column. Hell, for all I know, that works.
Opinions are like...buttholes. Everyone has them, but not everyone needs to hear them.
He must feel he needs to rage bait people to read his column. Hell, for all I know, that works.
But over at RideApart.com I read an article https://www.rideapart.com/news/736926/lane-filtering-paris-law-change that was coincidentally written about the same time, that points out how the issue of letting motorcycles out of the lanes of traffic to avoid being re-ended by car and truck drivers who don't see them because they aren't large, is a good idea.
The very next day, the author on RideApart.com heard about the guy who writes the hater articles, and replied https://www.rideapart.com/news/736905/arizona-citizen-motorcycle-lane-filtering-mesa-tribune-opinion/
Thursday, March 07, 2024
the new editor-in-chief of Road & Track deleted a well-respected journalist's 5,000-word article about power and wealth in Formula 1 that was briefly published online.
Kate Wagner attended the United States Grand Prix in Austin last October.
Only hours after the story was published, it was removed from the Road & Track website.
It's in the archives, here https://web.archive.org/web/20240301170542/https://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/a46975496/behind-f1-velvet-curtain
The subtitle is "If you wanted to turn someone into a socialist you could do it in about an hour by taking them for a spin around the paddock of a Formula 1 race. The kind of money I saw will haunt me forever."
Yup, that hooked me, now I've got to read that article
Then Wagner wrote the article, "Behind F1's Velvet Curtain," a compelling scene report. It examines how the obscene amounts of money flowing through F1 can warp reality, as well as the propagandistic way F1 is covered by subservient press corps.
There was no explanation to readers as to why a 5,000-word feature suddenly vanished.
It's in the archives, here https://web.archive.org/web/20240301170542/https://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/a46975496/behind-f1-velvet-curtain
Yup, that hooked me, now I've got to read that article
Friday, September 01, 2023
funniest thing I've read today so far, a writer's bio
Mark Vaughn grew up in a Ford family and spent many hours holding a trouble light over a straight-six miraculously fed by a single-barrel carburetor while his father cursed Ford, all its products and everyone who ever worked there. This was his introduction to objective automotive criticism.
Magazines folded like socks, wacky wavers, origami stocks. A few switched to long form coffee table book style higher quality (Rodders Journal) and others tried, but didn't have the various factors needed to stick it out until they could figure out how to succeed (Motor Trend Classic)
I like to point out good writing, and good writers, because all of us experienced the best writers and writing, and APPRECIATED them.
But they grew old and either died or retired. The market changed, car magazines fired staff, shut down titles, and didn't figure out how to excel at doing the only job they existed for during their 100 year run (1905 to 2005) because they'd only ever had one trick, rely on the income from advertisers, and suddenly, there was no reason for corporations with advertising budgets to pump the money into propping up magazines with mediocre results.
Magazines folded like socks, wacky wavers, origami stocks. A few switched to long form coffee table book style higher quality (Rodders Journal) and others tried, but didn't have the various factors needed to stick it out until they could figure out how to succeed (Motor Trend Classic)
Tuesday, June 20, 2023
Damn it... this banner would have been perfect for fathers day
but then, neither my dad nor my step dad give a shit about the fact that I have this blog, nor take any satisfaction from my existence or accomplishments.
In fact, neither will read this, nor hear of it, from anyone I know or am related to.
Simply, Father's Day... something for other guys to enjoy. My fathers don't.
If your dad is around, and wasn't a drunk, didn't take off many states away to avoid paying child support in the old days before the internet and laws the revoke drivers licenses for deadbeat dads, then - show up unexpectedly and share a couple cold beers with him.
If your ol dad was more than Baskerville's nickname, and taught you all the games, the skills, the ways of the world and how to date girls, (and because there are 2 women that read this blog, if your dad told you how to get the good guy from all the assholes among the boys out there, and chose the right kind of guy to be a great husband, and father to your kids) shake his hand and thank him for putting you ahead of the pack on the path to success.
If your dad gave you the love for good books, good baseball bats, the right deodorant, told you to not use cologne, showed you to shave with the grain unless you're going on a date - then against the grain for the smoothest skin your girl can enjoy kissing without whisker burn, and helped you figure out the damned wiring mess the last owner of your neat old 60s car.
If your dad shared a love for good music, gave you the family record player and albums, made sure you appreciated the variety from Johnny Cash to CCR, Little River Band to Loverboy, Hendrix to Judas Priest, Chuck Berry to Beastie Boys, ZZ Top to AC DC, Guns and Roses, Zeppelin, and the Scorps, plus appreciated good old country like Dolly Parton, Willie Nelson, BoxCar Willie, Hank Williams Sr (fuck jr's bullshit) Marty Robbins, and pointed out that Elvis was gospel AND rock, and surf movie goofy.
If your dad showed you how amazing movies can be, and got you hooked on Peter Jackson, Spielberg, Lucas, Indiana Jones, Star Wars, Princess Bride, Iron Man, Grumpy Old Men, Thin Man, Hitchcock, John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart, Audrey Hepburn, Katherine Hepburn, Arsenic and Old Lace, Saving Private Ryan, Tom Hanks, Spencer Tracy, Disney, Pixar, Glenn Ford, and Dean Martin
If your dad made sure you knew how good a Louis Lamour or Zane Grey western is, and a Tarzan adventure... plus, slipped you some change for comic books so you could get into the Avengers, Batman, and all the crazy other stuff out there in graphic novels...
If your dad let you ride in the back of the pick up, took you to the lake on hot days for a swim - then followed that up with a root beer float and Tombstone pizza, or went for the picnic thing but without the mushy sandwiches..
If your dad gave you Boy Scout upbringing, and a jack knife, taught you how to sharpen it so well you can shave the hair off your arm (without cutting into your veins!), and showed you how to tell an oak from a maple, what the birds, fish, and critters names were by sight, how to jump rope, play checkers, and cribbage....
Extra points if your dad bought you the Farrah poster, a BMX bike, skateboard, guitar and showed you some chords, good winter jackets, made you a theme bedroom, took you to a good sledding hill with a long plastic sled, or better yet, helped get you into a job mowing lawns or something that would earn you some bucks, so you could go in half on a snowmobile an outboard, and showed you where to go fishing.
If your dad started you out with a good used set of Craftsman tools... but by taking you to a swap meet for the good stuff, and made sure you understood to avoid the chinesium... not just handing you a credit card and dropping you off at NAPA
If your dad put you through college, bought you a car when you were in high school, taught you to use a tractor and earn a living, keep the family farm going, or passed onto you the family business - providing for you and his descendants the means of earning a living, and never wondering where your next paycheck will come from, never knowing what hunger is, never being unable to pay the bills...
then you are fortunate indeed, and owe a lot to your old man
If you're that guy I'm describing that was that cool dad, that paid for the wedding, the university education, had the talk with your new son in law back when he was a nervous first date and you met him at the door cleaning your shotgun and making sure he understood you'd bury his ass where no one would ever find it if he hurt your girl, showed your kids how play cards, win at rock paper scissors, sink a free throw, do a lay up, and dribble a basketball in the driveway using the garage as a backstop for the hoop - then damn it, you did good.
If you got your kids cell phones, I pads, and kept them from the ugly side of the internet, but still showed your kids the fun aspect of old black and white tv like the Munsters, the Honeymooners (hello ball!), and Roy Rogers... if you got your kids to laugh at the 3 Stooges, Abbot and Costello, and Laurel and Hardy...
Happy fathers day. I hope you watched a John Wayne movie, ate some BBQ from the grill, took a ride in your muscle car, and smoked the fucking tires for fun.
Would anyone like to add to this list of what a Dad ought to do for their son or daughter, OR add what you've made a goal or list of accomplishments in your kids development?
Thursday, November 17, 2022
reading the book Hot Rod Magazine, 75 years... and the first thing I notice they screwed up, was spelling Burt Munro's first name correctly
Why doesn't anyone have the sense to have me proof read their book if it has anything to do with what I've focused on for the past 16 years ?
By the way, it was written by former Hot Rod editor Drew Hardin. You'd think he'd get legendary people's names right, OR get someone to proof read his book, that knows how to spell BURT not BERT. Book editors in some New York office don't know shit about Burt Munro.
But this wasn't the only easy to find error of a someone he should know the spelling of, Elena, a Hot Rod staffer, also was misspelled:
and the well known people's names weren't the only spelling errors that those that rely on Spellcheck missed:
and they misspelled chassisied
and how do you forget that you're talking about the J2000, before the end of the paragraph?
Monday, July 04, 2022
Now, THIS is GREAT writing! Sean Dietrich, author of 14 books, columnist, etc about Mendon Missouri ... thank you Steve!
Mendon, Missouri. Population 171. There’s really nothing here. The tiny town is located off Route 11, just south of Yellow Creek. You’re three hours west of Saint Louis, two hours east of Kansas City.
It’s quiet. No attractions. No major landmarks. Nobody famous ever lived here unless you count Vern Kennedy, right-hander for the White Sox, circa 1934.
If you’re looking for entertainment in Mendon, your main option is Busch Light. But you’ll have to drive all the way to Brunswick to find a liquor store.
“We are just country folk,” said Mendon native Carol Ann Wamsley, “and that’s what makes us a special place.”
At its heart, Mendon is a railroad town. The first iron tracks were laid in 1887. Within a decade, a town sprang up. You had a few dozen storefronts, a school, a newspaper, and a couple churches with steeply conflicting views on eternal damnation. Most of that is gone now.
Today, the Atchison Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad line still passes the northwest side of the community, only now it’s the Southern Transcon Railroad.
The Amtrak Southwest Chief runs through town regularly. On summer afternoons you can see the Amtrak locomotive in the distance, racing across the prairie like a polished chromium bullet. But the train never stops here. It just keeps moving.
Until last week.
It was a Monday that will live in infamy. The Southwest Chief made an unexpected stop near Mendon, of all places.
The Chief was traveling 87 mph, bound for Chicago. There were more people aboard than there are living within Mendon’s city limits.
Up ahead a dump truck was on the tracks. The truck was obstructing the crossing of County Road 113. This was not a small truck. This was a vehicle about the size of a Sonic Drive-In.
The train never slowed.
The sound of the collision could be heard from as far away as Westville. It was the noise of two General Electric diesel locomotives and seven Superliner cars plowing into a mass of Dearborn steel. The train was derailed.
Ron Goulet was riding coach.
“…I was airborne. Everything was tumbling. People on top of people. The train rolled on its right side—the entire train, except for the front locomotive.”
Carry-on bags went everywhere. Elbows collided with craniums. Shoes crashed into jaws. Children clashed against the ceiling.
“When I climbed up and out of the train…” said Ron, “I was stunned that the entire thing was lying on its side. Not in a jumbled mass, but all laid over on the side.”
The story made national headlines, of course. Reporters from national newspapers visited. They photographed, videoed and wrote. Cable news anchors wore frowny faces and mentioned the wreck, just before cutting to commercials urging elderly viewers to reverse mortgage their livers.
But somehow, the bigger story about what happened in Mendon was lost. Somehow, you didn’t hear about Mendon’s magnificent people.
Sure, you heard about the wreck itself; the 150 injured, and the four fatalities. But you didn’t hear about how the residents of Mendon—nearly every single resident—rushed to the scene of the accident.
Throngs of ordinary townspeople arrived before first responders even knew about the crash. There were volunteers crawling out of the wallpaper.
“It was a wonderful problem to have,” said school district superintendent, Eric Hoyt, “but we probably had too many volunteers show up.”
People came from all over Chariton County, riding beat-up Silverados, ATVs, or arriving on foot. They came from Sumner, Marceline, Cunningham, Brookfield and Indian Grove.
Two Boy Scout troops dutifully helped injured victims from the wreckage. Local high-schoolers were fashioning bandages out of bandannas. Old women recited the Lord’s Prayer alongside strangers in blood-stained clothes.
There were farmers, off-duty nurses, truck drivers, soccer moms, Little League coaches and grade-schoolers. They were doling out food, first aid, bottled water and, most importantly, phone chargers.
Victims were taken to local homes, fed, bathed and bandaged. Weeping passengers were embraced by rural preachers. Passengers using wheelchairs were lifted from the rubble by young men in ropers and camouflage caps.
Local schoolbus drivers transported the wounded to hospitals. Northwestern High School staff members triaged victims in the gymnasium and fed people in the cafeteria.
One resident said that Mendon didn’t feel like a 171-person town anymore. “It was like 671 people came together.”
And the most unusual thing about all this is: None of this is unusual. At least not within the national tapestry that is The Great American Small Town.
Although we rarely hear about such acts of compassion and lovingkindness within our society, believe me, they happen. Every day. Every hour. Ordinary Americans will astound you with their goodwill. Sadly, ordinary American journalists aren’t interested in being astounded by such things.
Either way. Now you know the rest of the story.
Sunday, December 19, 2021
my friends, dear readers, and car lovers.... allow me a moment to ponder on all the magnificent vehicles, lost forever, because of divorces.
this was one.
Sold because of heartless lawyers, bitter ex wives, and (that son of a bitch) Murphy's Law.
Sometime soon, while it's on your mind, I hope you stand silent, gallant, and drink a very cold delicious beer with a toast to the marvelous cars that terrific men have had ripped from their garages and drive ways.
Yes, the past century of the legal system (not called the justice system for a reason) has penalized car guys, and the harmony between them and their internal combustion engine powered machines, which has been the reason the tunnels reverb, and the drag strips shake, and the drive is worth the price of gas.
I'm talking about the sundering of a marriage being the unstoppable force that puts a stop to enjoying your good old truck, or your sports car (imagine how many Ferraris have been lost this way) or that motorcycle you rode with your best buddies. The muscle car you and your dad fixed up, that commuter you brought your kids home from the hospital in, your first car you bought in high school with lawn mowing and wood splitting money.
Loft a frothy headed beautiful blonde drink in a mug, and if the feeling of anger overcomes you, swear like the old Scotsman in the John Wayne movie "The Quiet Man" (Barry Fitzgerald) with Tourette's syndrome stung by hornets. (That's as manly a reference as I could conjure up, a John Wayne movie character in a swearing apoplectic fit) because that is how frustrating the situation is - when car guys are forced by divorce, to lose the object of passion that made them happy, never had a headache, is always ready to leave on time, doesn't care if you test drive another car, and doesn't care what time you get home.
It's a bit like this song about beer...
This has been a public service announcement, results may vary, batteries not included, and if someone out there can write a better piece about the loss of cars due to divorce, you better believe it, I'll post it!
a clever piece of writing
Then there is a car which was a Black Hawk 2p speedster with a HC prefix engine, which was used as a gimmick by a big circus here in Australia. Sometime in about the 1940's it was gutted by fire, and a new hard-top coupe body which had a couple of traces of its origin made by Martin and King in Melbourne. ( They made a lot of Rolls Royce bodies, and their style and craftmanship we do not universally admire.)
By the late 1950's it had sunk through the hierarchy, and a man I know bought it from a clown who had an urgent and expensive thirst.
Friday, October 29, 2021
“The (Auto) Pound and the Jury (or Quentin Gets His First Parking Ticket),” by Louisiana Philharmonic clarinetist Allan Kolsky
In 1989, William Faulkner’s niece founded an annual contest to parody her uncle’s distinctive writing style. It ran for 16 years, with the winners published in United Airlines’ Hemispheres magazine. Here’s the winner from 2001,
For the fifth time in as many minutes, the bright shapes slowly passed us through the somnolent dust, each moving left to right, each in its ordered place. As we (once again) passed beneath the grim and merciless statue of the confederate soldier (that still unravish’d sentinel of quietude, his implacable marble hand forever shading the inscrutable carven eyes) our hearts sank a little deeper, not because we now realized that our quest was futile, but because it always had been, because we now seemed doomed forever to circle this postage stamp of land like slow planets orbiting some inescapable star.
‘Well well well,’ said Ratliff, ‘I reckon thats the fifth time weve been around this square and I still aint seen no parkin space. Why dont you just pull up in front of that fire hydrant — its only for a minute, anyhow.’
And now the musty smell of old leather—the thick, bound books containing what Father once called the sum total of mans ignorance: ceteris paribus and tempus fugit and caveat emptor too, and Oliver Wendell Holmes with Saint Francis himself, who never had a parking ticket and first thing lets kill all the lawyers and i father i have committed grand theft auto and he this looks more like a parking ticket to me and i but are they not the same and he you would take a perfectly common automotive error, an inevitable consequence of operating a motor vehicle and you would make it monstrous and i but it IS monstrous and he its only fifteen dollars, its not exactly the end of the world and i but i have still failed and he arbitrary lines delimiting segments of tarmac, the sum total of mans folly reduced to lines drawn ceteris paribus on some cosmic concrete chalkboard and i but did you ever get one and he of course and i how many times and he you want me to Count—NoCount would ever satisfy you and i but dont you believe in sin and he sin quentin was a term coined by those without courage to describe the actions of those who did indeed possess it and i but then our lives are just and he our lives are just so many tiny clumsy sandcastles before the godless oceans angry tide.
I took the ashtray from the table and I placed it on the floor. Then I realized that I had forgotten the gasoline and so I had to open the cabinet and take the can and remove the cap. The gasoline stung my nostrils as I poured it into the ashtray. I replaced the cap and I put the can back in its cabinet. I placed the parking ticket in the ashtray and I soaked it well with the gasoline. Then I remembered that I needed a match, but my hand had already found the matchbook in my pocket, and so I didnt have to open the cabinet any more.
Tuesday, August 10, 2021
Wednesday, July 21, 2021
the title of a tractor pull, engine destruction video:
Engine- I don’t wanna be expensive no more
https://www.reddit.com/r/AbruptChaos/comments/onkobd/f_this_im_out/
Friday, April 30, 2021
good writing in a Road and Track article by Mark Vaughn
In the beginning, there was the 3, the 5, and the 7.
Wait, hang on a sec, that was the middle. Anyway, there was the 3, the 5, and the 7, and they were good.
The people did drive them, and there was much joy on the apexes and lo, also along the straights.
There was much rejoicing throughout the land, particularly where there were many good and twisty roads.
But then came the Time of the Styling, and the people did cry out and gnash their teeth, and there were threats to never buy of the Bimmers again. But the people did buy them, and the Bimmers did multiply throughout the land.
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