Christine

I'm sure you'll find me as endlessly fascinating as I find myself.

[David Burge @iowahawkblog]

It's a melancholy day at Dave's Car ID Service, as we bid farewell to one of our most frequent and valued contributors - Andrew Wimsatt.

I won't belabor the terrible circustances of his death, which have been discussed in depth online recently. I am as angry and upset about his murder as anyone, but my car ID threads are designed as a sanctuary from the woes of the contemporary world. I would rather spare that anger for a different forum and choose here to focus on Andrew Wimsatt, the human being. He was a relentlessly cheerful and positive soul, I hope you will respect his spirit in your replies.

I think our mutual friend @AnnaZ perfectly summed up Andrew as "everybody's biggest fan." His various fandoms include countless bands, visual artists, podcasters, @wethefifth, @reason, @uaustinorg, and @TheFIREorg. And I am humbled that one of his fandoms was Dave's Car ID Service.

You may have noticed from reading the various tributes to him over the past few days his adjectives: kind, generous, warm, positive, never had an unkind word about anyone. All true. But he seldom spoke about himself, despite having a very distinguished career as a civil engineer in road materials research. He was far more interested in talking about you, with zero expectation of anything in return. He was the least transactional person in a hyper-transactional world.

If you were lucky enough to have Andrew as a fan he was generous with his time and support, and in my case, that support included loads of his old family photos with mystery cars.

I can't fully repay my debt to him for that. But I'd like to dedicate this episode of Dave's Car ID Service to him, and use those photos to illustrate the life a genuine mensch.

[Austin Justice @AustinJustice]

Andrew Wimsatt spent his life figuring out how to make things last longer.

Roads, bridges, tunnels, pavement, friendships.

He held three civil engineering degrees from the University of Texas at Austin, spent 18 years at TxDOT, ten of them as Fort Worth District Pavement Engineer, and in 2006 joined the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, where he eventually ran the Materials and Pavements Division and its $9 million annual research program. He worked on ground-penetrating radar, nondestructive testing, asset management.

Describing the work once, he said the real challenge wasn't building new things; it was making what we already have last longer.

Andrew made what we already have last longer.

He was an obsessive live-music fan who would fly across the country to see a band. He loved Slowdive. In 2023 he was recommending "Souvlaki" and "everything is alive" to anyone who'd listen, singled out their cover of Syd Barrett's "Golden Hair," and admitted that when he heard them play it at FYF in 2014, he teared up. In 2016, when bad weather killed Levitation and Slowdive threw together a surprise show at the Scoot Inn, Andrew happened to be sitting at his computer and grabbed two $7.50 tickets in the roughly two minutes before it sold out. Then he recorded the entire set on his iPhone for a friend.

He made music too. He'd been in bands with Karl Rehn since high school, engineered their home cassette recordings in the early 1980s, and in 1990 released "Reflections" under the name the Andrew Wimsatt Ensemble, cut at Sixth Street Studio. He and Rehn made music videos that ran for years on Austin's ACTV, and contributed to the score of a 1994 documentary about Barton Springs.

Then there was the archiving, which is maybe the most Andrew thing about him. He clipped television. Constantly, expertly, for free, for people he admired. The Fifth Column crew (@wethefifth) called him "Busty Wimsatt" and, in their newsletters, "ever-alert," "indefatigable," and at least once "American hero." @MattWelch called him their most devoted cliphawker. Andrew painstakingly uploaded old episodes of "The Independents" so they wouldn't disappear. He clipped @KatTimpf's Fox appearances for her Locals community. He sent @walterkirn clips of Kirn's own jokes.

"Boy did I feel special," Kirn wrote today. "Not many strangers will go out of their way to give another that kind of encouragement."

He was not, for the record, employed by any of these people.

He contributed old photographs to @iowahawkblog's Dave's Car ID Service. He was a fixture in Austin's science fiction community and once drove Howard Waldrop home from Worldcon. He was an executive producer of Penn Jillette and Adam Rifkin's "Director's Cut," and appears in it, briefly, as "Greeting Cop." He hosted a regular libertarian beer gathering at the Johnny Cash-themed bar Mean Eyed Cat. He was, per @JTLonsdale, one of University of Austin’s (@uaustinorg) original small donors. He bought a camouflage "No Step on Snek" hat at a Texas gun show this summer and his friends heard about it.

The man lived.

He lived in Cambridge Towers, a 1965 midcentury modern building near the Capitol. Punk rock, pop surrealism, midcentury furniture, a gentle Southern manner. He loved salt to a degree his friends used as a unit of measurement.

He was, by every single account, one of the kindest people anyone had met.

@greggutfeld: supremely gentle, willing to do just about anything for another person.

@PlanetTyrus: always positive, physically slight, with a monster laugh.

@NancyRomm says he once gave her the jacket off his back when she was getting hypothermic.

A friend of 13 years and dozens of concerts tells me he never once heard Andrew say an unpleasant thing about anyone.

Both his parents were English professors. His father, James, was a Chaucer scholar at UT Austin who died in 2023 at 96. His mother, Mary, took her doctorate at Duke, ran the Society for the Study of Southern Literature, held an endowed chair as McClintock Professor of Southern Letters at South Carolina, wrote the first full-length study of a nineteenth-century novelist almost nobody remembered, and spent five years on a public radio project designed to get ordinary people reading Faulkner and Welty.

His parents spent their careers recovering things other people had stopped reading. They taught their son to make things last longer.

His mother now has Alzheimer's and lives in a nursing home in Round Rock. Andrew helped care for his father at the end, and then her. His routine was to drive out, walk with her, and then take a second walk alone.

He photographed what he saw on his walks. His Instagram is herons -- wading, fishing, one caught mid-wingspan over the water -- plus hawks in bare branches, a squirrel wedged in a tree hollow, a snail on a brick wall, bluebonnets, and a lot of Texas sky at the second it went orange.

Two days before he died, he was at a friend's house for movie night, watching Mystery Science Theater 3000 do "The Crawling Hand."

He spent his whole life trying to make things last longer, and he was good at it, and he was doing it right up to the end -- the second walk of the morning, until he sat on a park bench in the morning sun.

He is survived by his siblings, Alison Ross and David Joseph Wimsatt. And by his mother, who he walked with that morning, and who does not know he isn't coming back next week.

[Diamond Joe @ItsDiamondJoe]

RIP Andrew Wimsatt, a big part of #Gutfeld and #RedEye. @GregGutfeld

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

I never met @ajwimsatt in person, but he was the type of person who made you feel like you truly mattered to him when you spoke. Such a sweet man. I can’t believe this has happened. My sincere condolences to his family and loved ones. RIP Busty.

[Matt Welch @MattWelch]

Andrew Wimsatt was a beautiful, gentle, generous man. Absolute, no-contest #1 fan of @wethefifth, and also @KatTimpf & @Gutfeldfox. We are reeling, and remembering him with fondness and gratitude.

[Ileana Knollenberg @IleanaAlmog]

Busty was incredibly competent, accomplished, and knowledgeable, yet in conversation he mostly asked others about themselves. He was heavily involved in raising and caring for his much younger brother, and cared for his ailing mother to the very end. He traveled all over the country to be with people whose company he enjoyed, without fanfare. In @wethefifth circles, we just expected him to be there, and he usually was. He gave his time, energy, and effort to various groups of people just because, and I don’t think he realized his contribution was unusual or extraordinary. We met in person less than a dozen times, yet he remembered details about me, and would ask about my daughters and my work as if he were personally acquainted with them. He never missed an opportunity to offer genuine appreciation, and he had a special way of making one feel important and loved instantly.

All the tributes I’m seeing from people who were tangentially connected with him make it clear that his goodness was transcendent, independent of tribal, geographical, or familial allegiances. Having met Andrew has made my, and many other people’s lives, richer. That’s a legacy to aspire to.

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

@IleanaAlmog I just heard. I can’t believe it.

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

Following up on this from yesterday since I haven’t heard back. I’m happy to provide my order number privately if someone from @LivingSpaces can review the $180 cancellation fee. I cancelled Monday at 1 p.m. for a Wednesday delivery and was right around the 48-hour cutoff.

[Vala Afshar @ValaAfshar]

MIT professor delivers a brilliant masterclass on how to best present your ideas with clarity, high impact and purpose

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

.@Airbnb A shower door shattered during normal use, causing cuts to hands and feet. The host acknowledged a “track failure” and sent maintenance.

You’re still charging for the damage & won’t explain why.

Can you review this with the actual evidence? [CLSF-05724519] [HM2XS9A459]

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

@TheFigen_ The way he deliberately grabs the smaller swing. ❤️

[Henry Winkler @hwinkler4real]

I know this man ..I have traveled with this man ..I have worked with this man ,, He is ONE OF THE BEST , Sincerely ..HW

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

@kittypurrzog Are you able to send an advance review copy? I manage a podcast (avg 8k weekly downloads) on which I think you’d be an EXCELLENT guest; I suspect you’d reach a new audience. The host always reads her guests’ books in their entirety; ensures a good fit and a great interview.

[Ricky Gervais @rickygervais]

One of my all time favourite news headlines 😂

[Witch @Space_Bunzzz]

Back in my day there was so much toilet paper and so much eggs that we gathered at night and threw them at the houses of our enemies.

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

@BrentScher @JustineBateman @realDailyWire The writing/editing is pretty poor on this piece; way too many paragraphs start with, “She even…” (even two in succession) and, “She also.” It reads like a first draft. If you’d like to hire a talented writer or editor, DM me.

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

@CryptoKevvvv @elonmusk …your car’s extended warranty…

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

@allenanalysis @RealFrankyDog “Without a plan” = strawmanning

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

@BasedMikeLee Parents claimed me as a dependent w/IRS until HS graduation. To be considered financially independent you cannot be claimed by others for 4 consecutive years. So their income was considered in my financial aid applications even tho they don’t give me a dime.

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

@BridgetPhetasy Same from med school.

[Christine @ChrissieMathias]

@FrankLuntz @FarmBureau If you add enough butter for this gathering- just BUTTER- and you’ll see the total increase by at least 10%.