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A reader points us toward a seemingly innocent Aston Martin V-8 story in yesterday's Times by writer Jerry Garrett that, for some reason, struck us as a little, um, inappropriate. Of course, it could be your typical dad/daughter/Aston Martin love essay, but it reads a little bawdy either way:

My 13-year-old daughter carefully eyed the new Aston Martin V-8 Vantage in our driveway and, in a tone befitting an heiress in a family with more blue blood than our own, proclaimed, "You will drive me to school in this."

The teenage years are a time when it is seriously uncool to admit you have a father, much less be seen in public with him. This appeared to be an opportunity to elevate my status with my daughter to something higher than "dork."

"Sweet," she said as she flipped out the flush-mounted exterior door handle. "I thought it was broken." The passenger door opened up and out, to more admiring nods.

"Those are called swan doors," I told her, "because they open like wings. It keeps them from scraping a curb or whatever."

She slid into the hand-stitched, form-fitting Vogl leather seat just right for a trim teenage derri re.

We're not sure if Garret's going to elevate himself from "dork" status in his daughter's eyes with the car, but commenting on her "trim teenage derri re" in the Gray Lady is probably not going to score him any additional "cool dad" points. Just a hunch.

Aston Martin V-8 Vantage: Polish for Your Persona:$120,000 [NYT]