The Autopian has existed since April 1, 2022 (well, March 32nd, technically), and in its ninth month on this green and blue sphere known as the internet (?) it has amassed a total of 2 million monthly pageviews (we think that’s a great number), and it’s all because of you, dear readers who believe in this site’s core mission of championing car culture. Thank you!
This article is really just a thank-you. Tomorrow I’ll write an update on our harrowing roadtrip from Detroit to LA, I may create a how-to Shower Spaghetti guide (I will not), and I’ll post a list of the best articles The Autopian wrote in 2022. Currently I’m in California snowboarding with a new friend of mine, and I won’t lie: the blog-guilt is getting to me bad. So I have ducked into a cabin to write this little thank you post. Should I really be furnishing my apartment and getting internet going so that tomorrow I can write the article I just promised three sentences ago? I mean, what do you think?:
That’s basically a pool-float on the floor of a small apartment with no wrench-able garage.
I am deeply concerned about what will happen to me over the next 48 hours. I’ll already feeling a bit clammy, and I can’t stop shaking. I tried fixing my friend’s bicycle yesterday, and the shaking stopped for about five minutes. I need to get my Nash Metropolitan project going, and then I need to do my EV conversion, and my overlanding build. Where exactly will I do all of this? I have no clue. I’m still not moved out of Detroit; I’ll be sort-of living in The House of Misfit Jeeps until mid February, and there will be a big farewell party for anyone who wants to come.
Anyway, 2023 is going to be bigger and better than 2022. Obviously, you’ll be getting lots more west coast coverage, including insight into low-rider culture, plus you’ll start to see more videos since I now get to work more closely with the talented video team out here, and you’ll read more from our illustrious partner Beau Boeckmann now that he and I can work together on ideas. Jason’s working on a massive research project involving Nazi history, Mercedes will be restoring a fiberglass camper, Thomas seems to have a new project car in the cards, and the site is planning to keep hiring incredible freelancers who have been such a big part in this site resonating with so many of you. I plan to crank up the nerdy technical content, so expect to keep learning how cars work from some of the most talented engineers and designers out there. Oh, and Jason wants me to mention our video of The Best Driving Foods (the video involves the two of us trying to drive a slalom course in a Scion xB whilst covering ourselves in burrito juices and pizza sauce and hamburger innards; it’s bonkers).
We’re also keen to keep having reader meetups, and to find more ways to build this community. Plus, we have lots of changes coming to the commenter experience. Next year will be grand! See you all tomorrow, when The Autopian is working its regular business hours; Happy New Year!
Ya’ know, if you’re jonesing for wrenching time, I’m sure Beau will put you to work at one of the shops as their “imported from Detroit” rust specialist. It doesn’t even have to be a decrepit Chrysler 200 to qualify for import status.
Seriously, thank you for all your efforts! It’s been a delight to waste time with y’all in an honest, quality way. Looking forward to more adventures and insanity in the year ahead…
Congrats on 2 million. That’s pretty impressive. Glad to count myself as 30-60 of those.
You have regular business hours???
I thought one of the pluses of a move to Los Angeles was access to the Galpin Ford World Headquarters for wrenching and related shenanigans, rather than your front yard or that spot where a dining table might go. Or is Galpin too far up the 405?
However, glad you made it! Do we get snowboarding content too?
Congrats on the new place. I must admit that I am fascinated to see how a renowned parsimonian like yourself is going to furnish Michigan West Headquarters. I ask this as a guy who has a nice place in the suburbs and no bedroom set as of yet.
Hope you find new friends and great places to eat. Even maybe a Yoko Autopiono?
Those white cupboards aren’t going to know what hit ’em. I look forward to the content, and offer my services as a Detroit liaison since I’m still here. But I’ll also be sure to say hi when visit my dad in Orange.
You’re welcome, The Autopian, and thank YOU! 2023 is going to be another great year here. I look forward to seeing all the zany hijinks you get into.
On a side note, David, your mention of your final February departure from Michigan is bittersweet for me, despite never having had the chance to visit. I’ve been a loyal reader since the very beginning and I feel as though I got to know you and visit your Misfit Island in Troy many times. All the videos of your finds, your wrenching triumphs, and slumps – it always seemed like your backyard was, well…in my backyard, a neighbor.
It’s possible that I’m even more nostalgic about this chapter transition in your life than you are. But with big changes, come great big new opportunities. This will be good and you’ll do good. Just make sure to invite your excellent landlord to the farewell party.
So I had a couple of questions about the whole shower spaghetti thing..
1) Where is the cutlery kept? Bathroom or kitchen?
2) Where are dishes washed? Is this like a ruthless efficiency thing where you’re also cleaning them in the shower?
Sorry.. this haunts me.
That is gonna live rent free in our collective psyche until we all depart.
I just assumed it’s like a shower beer. You either bring it with you or a kind housemate offers it to you while you’re showering. It leaves with you as well.
As sad as it is, this is the internet automotive content that BEST REPRESENTS ME. Not Smoking Tire or Autoline or Jalopnik or even RCR – this nonsense. Well done, people.
Obviously we are all ravenous for content, but I feel that this could have waited until both shoes were off and the pool float had been inflated.
That was saved for the newly launched onlyfans page. Do you like rusty oil covered jeep parts because DT is a dirty dirty boy.
I thought the wrenching was going to take place at Galpin, since that is where the cars are stored?
Or you could just do what my neighbor does, which is to perform an engine tune and tire swap at 6AM while parked on the street directly in front of my bedroom window.
Glad to hear you made it to CA and are voluntary enjoying snow sports as opposed to being stuck in the snow at some seedy motel making an emergency repair to limp the Mustang to LA. Congratulations on what you and the entire cast of characters here have accomplished since the extended end of March, I can’t wait to see what you all do this next year!
DT apparently has the aspirational goal of a lifestyle one social caste below that of a third world country war refugee.
We are so relieved that you made it. So, now, aside from everything being up in the air with your life, you are sick. This is not the time to push yourself to get shit done. If you are going to be effective going forward, you need to heal from your abusive trip out there under those miserable, unhealthy conditions.
Do some self care, see a Dr if you can, but get some damn rest, boy! Good hydration, real food, sleep. Tell everybody to leave you alone for a couple days, so you can get your strength back. Then you will be fit for duty, ready to kick ass.
The only Dr he can afford to see right. Now is probably Dr. Pepper.
Dr. Pepper recently raised her rates. David’s going to Dr. Thunder now. lol
You should also do a monthly blog on getting used to LA. And then that goes for all writers: move to a new city and offer a monthly update on it.
Hey, at least you have a fridge. Lots of apartments in LA don’t come with one. The things nobody tells you before you move…
HE’S ALIVE!! The rustmaster has made it to Cali!
After no updates, I (and likely many other readers) were getting concerned.
However, there is no word on the fate of Jason and Otto. Are they in the land of milk, honey, and earthquakes as well? Have they flown back to NC?
Or, with no other information available, should our imaginations just run wild? Was the Wagoneer not enough to keep them safe? Did the Golden Eagle attempt to take flight, sweeping the SUV containing our intrepid pair with it? Is David just trying to avoid mentioning anything in hope we will all just forget the mighty Torch duo?!?
WE SHALL NOT FORGET THEM, DT!!!
I’m still calling “alternate reality where the Torchinskys have lived in LA the whole time.”
I see that refrigerators still don’t come with apartments in California, same as they did 40 years ago when I moved to San Jose.
There is a refrigerator there.
It’s in the right corner, looks stainless no less!
I know San Jose a bit, as I had a transatlantic thing with a girl there for about six years.
Would love to be a regular contributor if the freelance opportunities grow.
this green and blue sphere known as the internet
A sphere? I was led to believe that the internet comprised a series of tubes!
It’s flat
I think Dead Elvis is thinking of Super Mario…
Just like time, a flat circle
Pretty sure that’s the cleanest that apartment will ever be.
Cleaner than any of the ones I ever moved into, by far. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was costing $2,500/month.
It can’t be THAT bad.
Signed,
Traumatized by Austin 2023 rent prices
Based on where he said he lives, quick search for apartments, referencing photos in this post and photos of apartments for rent, it’s $1795 – 2195.
David – Not sure if you care\don’t care if people know where you live, it wasn’t very hard to find.
#MaleLivingSpace intensifies
It’s been a blast contributing terrible van content and I hope to embark on even more terrible van adventures this year!
Don’t worry, we’ll make sure he at least puts up a Pulp Fiction poster or something.
That looks like rental-grade vinyl flooring.
…
Have you considered rebuilding a Type 4 in your living room? Because I can assure you, this is a thought that has haunted my dreams ever since I moved into my current place. There’s just a concrete slab underneath. The first thing I did was run R/C cars across the floors, just because I could. If I put down a tarp and brought in a nice engine stand…
Glad to see you made the trip without issue, and that you do in fact have functioning electricity.
You don’t actually need to buy furniture. An old wooden door was the best mattress I ever used, unwanted cinder blocks plucked from a vacant warehouse made usable chairs, a cardboard box of the right size/strength makes a good computer stand or TV stand, I’ve used trashbags as dressers, cheap plastic storage totes can store all your stuff(games, books, documents, ect) and function as a dinner table, and there’s always places where people are dumping unwanted furniture to the curb anyhow if you insist on obtaining such(just make sure you check thoroughly for bedbugs before bringing it in).
Now regarding that EV conversion, please feel free to email me or call me with any questions. There are a lot of options out there today for how to go about it.
Trash bags as dressers? Mr. Moneybags over here not using the floor.
That particular place was roached out before I moved in, otherwise I’d have considered the floor as an option.
You were lucky! When I was a lad we lived in a paper bag in the middle of the road.
Luxury! We had to get up in the morning at ten o’clock at night, half an hour before we went to bed, drink a cup of sulfuric acid, work twenty nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work. And, when we got home, our dad and mother would kill us and dance about on our graves singing “Hallelujah!”
But you try telling the young people of today that and do they believe you? Noooooooo.
I see you brought your lampshade. That’s all you really need. And this chair…and this and this ashtray.
Don’t be a jerk!
That’s all he needs.
The new phone books are here!!
Just stay away from the oil cans, I hear they are defective.
No wrenchable garage (yet).. but you aleast have a dish & parts washer right?