Just In Case You Came Here From "The Free Press"

We have 4 million words to read... WAIT, COME BACK!

the author, a very serious man of letters

Cue up the Hall&Oates, because earlier today The Free Press made my dreams come true. I’ve been writing for publication since 1991, when Jill Bable hired me to write “One Racer’s Perspective” for Bicycles Today, my work has been translated into maybe a dozen languages worldwide, and I’ve found myself everywhere from a McMegan article in the Atlantic to an absolutely lovely Malaysian automotive broadsheet called Wheels Weekly, but getting the shoulder tap from Bari Weiss — her sister Suzy, actually — is perhaps the biggest thrill of all. The Free Press is the brightest light in American letters, all the more so because it is deliberately centrist and because it is explicitly designed to unify a divided country through humor, intellect, and traditional shoe-leather journalism.

But wait — you know all of that! What you maybe want to know is: Is it worth reading anything else this fellow has to say?

We do things differently here at Avoidable Contact Forever. Twice a week we have open threads on topics ranging from Seventies funk to computer science to motorcycle restoration. My community of 3,300 readers drives most of the discussion. Wednesday threads are always free to read and to comment. Sunday threads are a bit more in-depth and/or controversial; those are reserved for paid subscribers. But you can join our community and talk to everyone else today, for free. Between four and six times a month I do articles outside our open topics, as well.

A little bit about me: I’m the father of a 15-year-old boy. I’m a Scorpio, I’m six foot two and not handsome, I’ve been racing something for forty long years, I’ve sat in a jail cell and I’ve worn $15,000 suits in million-dollar cars. (Not at the same time.) I live on a twelve-acre hobby farm next to the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course with twenty-seven semi-feral cats, a half-dozen race cars, and so many motorcycles I can’t actually write the number because my dad reads this, too, and he’s always telling me to stop taking unnecessary risks. I was selected as the 2024 Driver of the Year by the Ohio Valley Region SCCA, and I drive the invincible Radical SR8 prototype sports car while wearing Costco socks.

I am a Christian and I’m trying to be a better one but my readers are from all over the world and espouse every faith imaginable except for the one “Seals and Crofts” were really into, which is a shame, because I’d like to know more about that.

If you’re kind enough to stick around, however, you’ll see that my extremely modest appeal is a small part of what happens at Avoidable Contact Forever. Our regular commenters fly the F-22 Raptor and fix old Volkswagens in East Los Angeles. They are famous published writers in their own right, they are astoundingly wealthy, they are a hundred bucks away from bankruptcy. They’re engineers for every auto company and more than a couple tech giants. They advise politicians and crash Mustangs. Collectively speaking, they’re some of the best the world has to offer.

I hope you stick around. This little corner of Substack is very different from the glossy machine that is The Free Press, just like my nondescript corner of flyover country is very different from the New York City in which I was born — but we like it here, and you might, too.

also, did i mention that I know jenna :)