I am a firm believer that conflict with people should be settled in an adult, face to face manner. Getting revenge by means of damaging personal property has always seemed cheap and cowardly. When I discovered the identity of the person responsible for a key mark all the way down my car door, I could not understand how a person could be such a gutless invertebrate. I retaliated with strait up brute force; I beat his ass bloody, as would any self respecting man. No cheap shots, no hits below the belt, just strait up knuckles breaking face. After he healed up, I saw him out and I did it again, re-breaking his freshly healed nose. Hopefully he wets himself when he hears my name. What I can promise is that it is very unlikely that he will key somebody’s car again.

That being said, there are times when a stealthier revenge must be committed. Many years ago, a friend of a friend (who happened to be the son of a Deputy Sherriff) accosted me in a manner that still fires me up to this day. A physical beating was deserved, but I wasn’t interested in a “get your cracker-ass beaten daily in county jail for assaulting the deputy’s sissy son” sentence. Instead, I sealed a whole 1 pound mackerel in the door of his car.

One pound of rotting fish is potent enough to be smelled by a human from 40+ feet away. Contained within the confines of a car, this odor will turn a vehicle into a fucking toxic disaster. Rotting fish causes a human to uncontrollably vomit, and the pungent smell will attract flies and other animals to the car. In my experience, hundreds of flies found their way inside the car to get some of the good stuff. But the fun doesn’t stop there. Oh no.

Upon bringing the car to a dealer/mechanic to find the smell, 1 hour’s of labor will find that nothing had crawled into the engine bay, trunk, and/or car’s interior and tragically died.

The next step will be to check the cooling/vent system for some animal that has somehow gotten into the vents and died. Because the fish is in the bag, the odor will be very strong within the car but difficult to locate. The door is an unlikely place for an animal to die, so a mechanic will not be inclined to remove a door panel.

Checking the vents can be extremely time consuming and thus very expensive. Exposing air passages often involves removing of the dash and other front interior panels to expose vents for cooling and heating. Removing part of the engine side firewall to expose these vents (the fan is often found here) may also be required to check all vents there. Accessing the firewall entrances and fan often require some removal of engine components like vacuum lines, intake components, and other assorted brackets and sensors.

The mechanic was unable to find the location of the smell, tearing apart most of the car. The smell was so awful, I am told, that the decision was made to junk the car.

Even still, I would have preferred to beat his ass. I’ll settle for uncontrollable vomit, a hefty mechanic bill, and an abandoned car I suppose.