As everyone is already pointing out, we are barreling towards the futures of 1984 and Fahrenheit 451 but in both those books the idea is that purity culture and general disgust means people aren't having children, when in the real world we are simultaneously growing into a puritan culture while also being encouraged to have babies we can't take care of.

infodump time, because if i've spent 2.5 hours not sleeping to the point that im gonna have a bad day tomorrow, at least my followers will know slightly more about Cars (2006).

So, the quote "piston cup, here we come" may sound familiar. however, YOU'RE WRONG!!! this quote never occurs in the movie Cars (2006). the original quote is "California, here we come". But it's been misremembered so often that THE CARS FANDOM WIKI MISQUOTES IT AS THE FIRST LINE ON MACK'S WIKI ENTRY. mack also says this line in the movie video game, apparently, but i wouldn't think that had enough impact to cause this kind of a mandela effect. so idk what happened there. i'm pretty pissed about the wiki being wrong, though, and SO prominently. mackheads we can't let this stand if i remember my fandom password i'll edit the page myself

why, you may ask, do i feel so passionately about this? well. because when i was a child, my younger sibling and i watched Cars (2006) every single day for AT LEAST a year, and definitely longer than that. when i was like 8 or 9 i could quote Cars (2006) line for line. alas i no longer possess this skill though i could probably relearn it pretty quick. anyways, along with WATCHING Cars (2006) we also had a ton of merchandise from Cars (2006) (and some from Cars 2, which was also out by the time my younger sibling reached the phase of being obsessed with cars and trucks, and wanted to watch Cars (2006) so often) mainly consisting of Hot Wheels and other toy cars. One of these was a Mack (Lightning's tractor-trailer/chauffeur) toy of some size, that when you pushed on his hat he said one of his Famous Lines from the movie: "quiet down back there", *snoring noises*, and most importantly "piston cup here we come". we also had another mack toy that did NOT say "piston cup", it said "california". this difference was very obvious not only because i heard ONE OF those lines every day on our Cars (2006) rewatch, but also because they were such similar lines. and let me tell u my sibling and i LOVEDDDD those toy cars and trucks where you could push a button and it would make a noise. we had a bunch of caterpillar construction vehicles that would make engine starting noises and back-up beeps and they all had a voice that said "CATERPILLAR" in a very macho and ridiculous way.

so, the delivery of "piston cup, here we come" from that mack toy was melodic and catchy enough to stick with me to this day. it's still one of my vocal stims, though i don't say it as often as some others, and well. today the autism struck hard. i can't get it out of my head.

so i did some research. the mack toy i can remember most clearly is some version of the "mack truck playset" - if i had to guess, it's from the original run (before Cars 2), since i don't know that all the extra bits were included in Cars 2 releases of the set. here's what it looks like:

which is, of course, cool as shit. look how much stuff is in there!! you can make the little platform lightning sits on hop around, for some reason??? it's great.

now, i didn't own this version. first of all i was not buying Cars (2006) toys in 2006. second of all, none of the lightnings we had looked like that, with the weird smirk? but i did have this playset, from a later release. i read on the wiki (which has already proven itself untrustworthy, but ive nowhere else to turn) that the feature where you press on his hat and he talks is a walmart exclusive. looking at the very few reviews for the walmart-exclusive release of this playset from between 2006 and 2011 or 2012 (i could maybe go later, again i don't know if this playset was still released after Cars 2), the only one i could find that actually demonstrated the voicelines had it saying "CALIFORNIA HERE WE COME"!!!!! WHAT THE FUCK!!

so. is my memory just shitty? i mean yeah probably. but then where did i come up with the version i now have as a stim? did i make it up based on a misremembrance or misapplied past fixation? did the version i remember come from an entirely different mack toy i can't recall?? is the "piston cup" voiceline found on some releases of this playset, and "california" on others??? to be honest, all three of these possibilities are equally likely. my only hope now is to dig up as many reviews as possible and search manually, OR to find the toy i originally had. but i think we gave it away or smth. which would suck. i'll steal it back.

I love venti