#it's a newfangled way of stealing cars but definitely has a sort of finesse that the smash and go tactic doesn't have

[world-of-fire-and-flight]

I'm DYING😂 Jared is the folk hero we don't deserve but so desperately need and just the dig of how they can't report the thefts, they're not ensured, and they can't follow Jared because he put the time and effort to train himself to be a good and subtle car thief is simply beautiful✨️

Cowboys

Jared missed the way things used to be. There was no finesse left in this world, or so it seemed - back when he was coming up, stealing a car had been a finely skilled profession, the work of masters of a craft to which he had devoted many years of his own study, but it sometimes felt that time had made a fool of him. In today's game, any cowboy with a crowbar felt themselves qualified for a little grand theft auto, and all of that careful practice had been rendered almost obsolete.

It had been harder, back in his day. More important to do things right. From the careful jimmying of the windows, to the deft hotwiring of the ignition, he'd brought a sense of elan to the proceedings, completing each job with minimal fuss and in complete silence. Not so the car thieves of today, whose primitive smash-and-grab tactics set off every alarm in sight, left the tarmac strewn with window-glass for anyone to trace, and even damaged the very thing they were supposed to be stealing.

But they got away with it. That was the most frustrating thing, in Jared's view - other than the dozen other ways in which they drove him up the wall. When he'd been a child, neighbours might have left their doors unlocked, but they'd also kept an eye out for each other. They'd kept an ear out, too: without landlines of their own, they'd listened for the ringing of the phone box on the nearest corner, and rushed out to take any call that came in. It didn't matter that it wasn't their business: they would find out whose it was, and pass on the message to its intended recipient.

That had all changed. Today, the phone boxes were gone, and a car in the lay-by could be blaring for ten minutes with barely a twitch of the curtains from the house next-door. If the neighbours bothered to acknowledge the alarm at all, it was only as an expression of annoyance, focused on their own suffering in the face of such a dreadful racket. They did their best to block the siren out, failing to consider that its awfulness was purposeful, and that it might have been designed to cut through their concentration for a reason.

The cowboys didn't even have to worry about leaving a trace. The cops didn't care, any more than the neighbours had: on arriving at an empty driveway, they just filled out an incident report, and gave the victims a reference number for their insurance. The thieves could drop their wallets at the scene of the crime, leave the car's GPS location on, and offer it for sale on social media, and the police would still say there was nothing they could do.

It was driving Jared mad - and, more importantly, it was driving him of business. Skills which used to be prized were now useless, and he was finding he could no longer compete with the cowboys now flooding the market. Quantity over quality. That was the modern way. It was the Wild West out there, and all of the old norms had gone out of the windscreen. There was nothing he could do to turn back the tide.

Of course, he could still go fishing.

He'd followed them, sometimes, when the alarms kicked off. Jared had trained to avoid that sound like a death knell, so he was still sensitive to it, even if nobody else was, and it called to him whenever they were working nearby. He'd started turning up to the scene of the crime - at first just to watch, to scoff at the amateurs and throw his hands up at their inexplicable success, but then he'd started taking it personally.

That curiosity had not been easily let go, and he'd wondered what other bumbling mistakes the group had made, how easy it would be to tail them home - no trouble at all, it turned out - or what exactly they were doing with all their clumsy loot. Things like that. He hadn't expect them to lead them to a parking lot chock-full of cars, all corralled together like a herd of cattle, a hundred head of sheep in a single paddock, without a single padlock holding them there.

Jared guessed that these thieves, if they'd even thought that far ahead, had figured they'd be safe from being targeted themselves. They knew to listen for the alarms, the smashed glass, even if most bystanders didn't bother - having only learnt their own way of doing things, they fancied themselves immune to it. They'd never had the benefit of Jared's education. They'd never learnt what he could do.

It was slow work, one car at a time, but he began to sneak in every night - rustling their herd by inches, taking back what they'd taken from others, what they'd taken from him. It might still be subtle by their standards, but it was the easiest work of his career: like a walk in the car park, falling off a Leaf, or taking Camrys from a baby.

The beauty was that he enjoyed all of the same advantages. They couldn't call the cops. They weren't insured. They couldn't follow him, or at least not as easily. Jared knew the old ways - how to keep a low profile, how to cover his tracks, how to steal a car and make sure that it stayed stolen. He might be nothing but an old, washed-up thief, equipped with a misplaced sense of honour and a certain set of skills, but he could be more than a match for the arrogance of these cowboys.

One car at a time, he could sprinkle a little finesse across the world. One car at a time, with gear-stick wedged firmly in reverse, he would show the world the way things used to be.

[ambiguouspuzuma]

#oh how the tables have turned#greatest car thief in the wild west#i could rant about car thefts but i'll just go ahead and digress early on#i also feel like Jared would be interested to know about range extenders#it's a newfangled way of stealing cars but definitely has a sort of finesse that the smash and go tactic doesn't have#“back in my day we actually took pride in stealing cars and were careful with the machines we stole”#“treated em like gold. you youngins just don't appreciate the craft”#ok ok i'm done.....i think😅 I promise not pull another Chicago

That's exactly it!

I could probably have done more research about modern methods, but I didn't want to be put on a watchlist!

Cowboys

Jared missed the way things used to be. There was no finesse left in this world, or so it seemed - back when he was coming up, stealing a car had been a finely skilled profession, the work of masters of a craft to which he had devoted many years of his own study, but it sometimes felt that time had made a fool of him. In today's game, any cowboy with a crowbar felt themselves qualified for a little grand theft auto, and all of that careful practice had been rendered almost obsolete.

It had been harder, back in his day. More important to do things right. From the careful jimmying of the windows, to the deft hotwiring of the ignition, he'd brought a sense of elan to the proceedings, completing each job with minimal fuss and in complete silence. Not so the car thieves of today, whose primitive smash-and-grab tactics set off every alarm in sight, left the tarmac strewn with window-glass for anyone to trace, and even damaged the very thing they were supposed to be stealing.

But they got away with it. That was the most frustrating thing, in Jared's view - other than the dozen other ways in which they drove him up the wall. When he'd been a child, neighbours might have left their doors unlocked, but they'd also kept an eye out for each other. They'd kept an ear out, too: without landlines of their own, they'd listened for the ringing of the phone box on the nearest corner, and rushed out to take any call that came in. It didn't matter that it wasn't their business: they would find out whose it was, and pass on the message to its intended recipient.

That had all changed. Today, the phone boxes were gone, and a car in the lay-by could be blaring for ten minutes with barely a twitch of the curtains from the house next-door. If the neighbours bothered to acknowledge the alarm at all, it was only as an expression of annoyance, focused on their own suffering in the face of such a dreadful racket. They did their best to block the siren out, failing to consider that its awfulness was purposeful, and that it might have been designed to cut through their concentration for a reason.

The cowboys didn't even have to worry about leaving a trace. The cops didn't care, any more than the neighbours had: on arriving at an empty driveway, they just filled out an incident report, and gave the victims a reference number for their insurance. The thieves could drop their wallets at the scene of the crime, leave the car's GPS location on, and offer it for sale on social media, and the police would still say there was nothing they could do.

It was driving Jared mad - and, more importantly, it was driving him of business. Skills which used to be prized were now useless, and he was finding he could no longer compete with the cowboys now flooding the market. Quantity over quality. That was the modern way. It was the Wild West out there, and all of the old norms had gone out of the windscreen. There was nothing he could do to turn back the tide.

Of course, he could still go fishing.

He'd followed them, sometimes, when the alarms kicked off. Jared had trained to avoid that sound like a death knell, so he was still sensitive to it, even if nobody else was, and it called to him whenever they were working nearby. He'd started turning up to the scene of the crime - at first just to watch, to scoff at the amateurs and throw his hands up at their inexplicable success, but then he'd started taking it personally.

That curiosity had not been easily let go, and he'd wondered what other bumbling mistakes the group had made, how easy it would be to tail them home - no trouble at all, it turned out - or what exactly they were doing with all their clumsy loot. Things like that. He hadn't expect them to lead them to a parking lot chock-full of cars, all corralled together like a herd of cattle, a hundred head of sheep in a single paddock, without a single padlock holding them there.

Jared guessed that these thieves, if they'd even thought that far ahead, had figured they'd be safe from being targeted themselves. They knew to listen for the alarms, the smashed glass, even if most bystanders didn't bother - having only learnt their own way of doing things, they fancied themselves immune to it. They'd never had the benefit of Jared's education. They'd never learnt what he could do.

It was slow work, one car at a time, but he began to sneak in every night - rustling their herd by inches, taking back what they'd taken from others, what they'd taken from him. It might still be subtle by their standards, but it was the easiest work of his career: like a walk in the car park, falling off a Leaf, or taking Camrys from a baby.

The beauty was that he enjoyed all of the same advantages. They couldn't call the cops. They weren't insured. They couldn't follow him, or at least not as easily. Jared knew the old ways - how to keep a low profile, how to cover his tracks, how to steal a car and make sure that it stayed stolen. He might be nothing but an old, washed-up thief, equipped with a misplaced sense of honour and a certain set of skills, but he could be more than a match for the arrogance of these cowboys.

One car at a time, he could sprinkle a little finesse across the world. One car at a time, with gear-stick wedged firmly in reverse, he would show the world the way things used to be.