dead birds?

2017 has already seen one painful death for me…

…my favorite east austin tire spot.

back in 2000 when i was working for star tickets i walked out to by white 1991 beat to shit (thanks to a neighbor who t-boned it) chevy cavalier to see the back tire looked like the sidewall was birthing a golf ball. i freaked out and showed my boss who advised me i needed another tire before i attempted the journey home. when i told him i couldn’t AFFORD a new tire that close to payday, he responded, “fuck that new tire shit – you take 7th street outta town, right? just hit a used spot on the east side!” the last one out was bird’s used tires, and i got hooked up with a tire that lasted almost a year for thirty bucks.

and so it went.

nowadays i buy their more expensive tires, but that still only meant paying around a bill a pair, mounted and balanced. every tire i put on that cavalier, and the malibu i had after that, and the camaro i had after that, came from bird’s. the first few tires for the bmw came from across the street from bird’s, because my factory bmw wheels took a different kind of balancing weight than bird’s regularly used…but once i got the black wheels i was back at bird’s. we got all the ufc’s tire needs taken care of there as well. but we recently needed to get a flat repaired (which turned into just buying her a new set for the front due to internal damage) and was told something that really sucked – good ol’ gentrified austin had struck again and their building had been sold out from under them. they were closing. when i went back and got one last pair of run flats for the bmw i was told they might just be moving out near COTA, but that was still being worked out. the next time i went back they were closed. that really sucked, ’cause they were good folks, where you could get good tires at a good price with a side of warner brothers copyright infringement:

well, if they ever wanna do copyright infringement properly, i got their back:

and on a completely unrelated note, happy b-day ME! hope you hadn’t blocked my number after the holiday group text debaucle so you got the e-card (no pun intended) i made and sent! in case you did, but still read this, here it is: