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1948 chevy fleetline

i liked this car. i think i entered this picture in the fair last year, but they didn’t select it for judging. maybe they’ve had enough of my pics, and let someone else use the wall space.

it rained off and on that day, only it was chilly. had to cover the cameras once in a while.

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i find myself sitting here in chicago, at o’hare airport. weather outside is sunny and about eighty. in here, it’s very cold, and i like it.

i have three hours to kill, until i board to my next destination. the city is so close, yet just far enough there is no point in leaving the airport.

would love to get a pizza at lou manalti’s or any number of smaller, out of the way pizza slinger shops.

wouldn’t mind visiting a certain piece of sidewalk on dearborn street, and spitting on it. didn’t bring my camera, so i wouldn’t be able to take the sunset picture by the river better half had been looking for.

didn’t have a chance when we were here in may. i think my better half would rather not revisit it anyway.

now i’m here on my own, which isn’t as much fun as when he’s with me. better half doesn’t fit in airplane seats; the rows are too tight for his long legs, and he refuses to fold into a birthing position.

watched a quiet place 2 on the plane. interesting. room to continue in another movie, if they choose to do it. at least the little kid nearby was busy watching cartoons, and laughing as only kids can. the monsters would have scared him.

better half would have watched a pixar movie.

i guess i’ll take a walk for a bit, before i sit some more, and sit some more.

where i’m headed will be a hot, humid place, and the rain that is expected will make it even more yuck. is that better than a hot and dry yuck at home?

i like air conditioning. it’s my favorite.

tic tac

here’s another beautiful car from an old memories club show in los angeles earlier this year. sprinkly goodness on the mirror finish.

what to talk about? would rather share an interesting story i’ve overheard at a car show, but haven’t been to any lately. people watching, there weren’t any people misbehaving either. just a good time, guys squeezing big cars into small spaces. always a wonder to watch how organized they can get, but understandable that they don’t want to bump into each other.

what did i mention in my last post? ya, more of the same. more tests in my future. probably a nerve being pinched. treat with meds to calm the nerves.

if that doesn’t work, physical therapy.

if that doesn’t work, they’ll look at surgery of some sort.

as a side note, something small, aside from my brain, was noted in my noggin, but they do not seem overly concerned. size of a tic tac. i prefer orange over mint.

my better half has been taking good care of me, especially on days when i’m more unsteady, which is most every day. i can manage to get around, but he doesn’t mind holding my hand at all. he’s the best.

as a designer, i still am trying to decide which serif font “L” i see when i look in the mirror. more for lucky than loser, i think.

this thing isn’t going to fade away anytime soon. i guess i’m ok with it.

could be worse.

improving

here’s a packard we saw at a fundraiser in los angeles back in march. it rained that day, off and on. still some sprinkles on the fenders of this one. didn’t rain hard enough to scare us away, but did bag the camera a couple of times.

small show, but some lovely cars were there. space was tight, and some cars had a difficult time driving in, or for a few that had to leave early, getting out.

been a while since i looked through recent photos. two weeks since i bonked my head on the pavement. glue still holding my forehead together, but should be disintegrating little by little. still have a few appointments lined up, to be sure everything else checks out, but i am very lucky, it could have been so much worse.

vision is a little blurry, but i have a big monitor, so it’s not so bothersome. my arm is a bit weak, so carrying a camera and tripod around isn’t going to happen for a while. missed out on huffarama yesterday, so bummer.

my daughter has been working at the texas state fair for the past month, doing henna painting. today is the last day. she is so over it, and ready to come home. hopefully she made enough money to make it worth it, but i think the experience was worth it at least once. her birthday is coming up, but she’ll still be on the road with her friend, her dogs, and her tarantula. safe travels and happy birthday, my girl.

shoes

here’s a bright light on a cloudy day. it’s really, really orange. like fire. like fluorescent. it cuts through the gloom. it’s a fuckin’ beacon in the dark. everything is more drab because of it. i loved it.

and then it drizzled on it, and it kept on burning bright.

shoes on the wire above it, though you don’t really notice the dirty, dull white things so small in this shot, the car keeps your eyes’ attention.

rain or shine

i saw a flyer the other day about a fundraiser for yet another person that had passed away. i asked my better half if he was interested in going as we had nothing else going on on a sunday afternoon. he said sure and got his camera ready and picked out his lenses to use for the day.

It had been gloomy and wet most of the week, and there was a chance of showers. the show didn’t start till ten; we left about ten-thirty, heading north to east los angeles.

about the time we hit the 710 freeway, it started to rain. decided to wait it out and get some shopping done at the costco off of firestone boulevard. What a mess that parking lot was, jam-packed with people looking for places to park, the lanes very tight together, and blocked off for construction. I’ve never been to this location, but I got lucky and turned left, finding a spot at the very end of the lane, but not before pissing off an old guy with a handicap hangtag. he was thinking he could make two-hundred and seventy degree turn into that angled space going the wrong way, and with other cars aleady in the aisle sharking for spaces. I could see he was calling me a bitch when his lips moved. i already had three or four cars honking behind me, so i don’t know why he thought that would be a smooth move. i did not realize what a primo spot it was, being so near the entrance, and fully expected him to key the car while we were inside.

by the time we were done, the rain stopped, so we continued on to the car show.

we parked across the street, at a market, and walked over. better half went to the main table to make a donation and give our sympathies for their loss.

clouds looming, we got busy taking pics right at the front entrance of the parking lot. better half was wanting to shoot the same cars, and we kept getting in each other’s shots, so i moved a bit farther down the row.

it wasn’t long before it started to sprinkle. we continued to shoot. it was a tiny lot, just two rows of cars. when it did rain a little harder, we covered or put away our cameras to wait it out, as they aren’t waterproof. it started and stopped several times, not lasting longer than ten minutes. we got wet, but the cameras not so much.

I briefly took a break to watch someone trying to leave, in a old chevy truck. the way they were sardined in there, it was iffy on how he would get out without taking off a fender or two, save for a lot of help from the other guys.

The owner of this car came over to ask if there was someplace he could see a picture of his car, so i handed him my card and took a few more shots as I was leaving just in case the initial shot didn’t come out. nice old deluxe.

i think it was fixing to rain again, so we packed up and headed over to whittier, our old hood, for a late lunch.

what do you say to a cousin, that you haven’t really talked to since you were a kid?

well, i only think about it now, as i heard she’d had cancer. she had rung the bell, that it was in remission only a year ago, but it had come back. she’s done with chemo, there’s no point. she has weeks to months left.

i’m pretty sure i can remember seeing her twice since moving to the west coast in the seventies: once when her family came to visit my mum the following year, going to local amusement parks; and again a few years ago, on a trip through gettysburg, pa, when i traveled to a museum near to where she worked. my bro called several other family members to track down her number—he is a social butterfly, and can search out people from his past and just start talking up a storm, as if no time has passed. we met up with her for lunch. for me, as ever, it was a bit awkward, since i’m quite the opposite. she’s family, but a stranger mostly.

she seemed suspicious why we had contacted her, though my brother just said we were nearby, we’re family, so hello.

she’s closer to my sister’s age, so about all i can remember from my childhood is visiting my aunt’s home, playing the organ piano there, and sneaking to my cousin’s room and looking at her record collection, especially elton john’s album captain fantastic cover. it was so weird at the time. very hieronymus bosch to a kid.

i just don’t know that it would matter after all this time. and she will be just a memory in one of my mom’s photo albums.

thunderous bday wishes

is it a coincidence that the moment i started singing happy birthday into my phone, to make a recording to my daughter, lightning flashed, thunder roared above the house, and it started pissing rain from the skies? granted, it was just around six in the morning, and i was the only one up in the flickering light of the kitchen table, is it a sign? i texted my better half that "they moved the headstones, but left the bodies," it was the feeling of that scene from poltergeist.

and, the song didn't record as singing, just a lightly typo'd text message, where it said her name was danny. sent the message; she was awake, day off from work, so at least she got my last words before whatever the thunderous rains portend.

my sister-in-law and my bro, freshly coming down from the parrothead party at the jimmy buffet concert, texted from the airport, heading home, "happy giving birth day," as she does every year. she hadn't belived me when i said it was going to rain in sunny southern cali, but at least not until after the concert.

i'd hate to be taking off into that deluge. i've watched planes get hit on the runway in vegas, with no damage, but the thought is kind of disorienting. safe trip to them...

lunch is almost done, so i'll just put this one up. put it on instagram yesterday, so its just an afterthought here, isn't it?

beautiful car. was hard to get a shot without people in it. figured i'd just do a different view of it, to mix it up from the usual angles.

1940 buick woodie convertible

sun up

1950 chevy deluxe

from the first show of the day. we got there a little late; i'd snoozed the alarm a couple of times, having gone to bed late, then the third time i'd accidently set it to a weekday alarm. duh. just happened to wake up about six.

still arrived just about roll in time, so we still found parking and had stuff to shoot. really nice cars and many clubs showed up. tried to make the most out of the sun, which was already coming up. most of the beautiful light was hitting the back parking lot, where there were only regular cars still parked at the time, so that was unfortunate.

out here in the front, the host club's cars—old memories eastside—were still in the shadow of the building. had to go over to the far side to find something with some light hitting it.

this one turned out ok, though the camera sensor really didn't like it. had to blur out some horizontal lines, that i could otherwise not explain.

apologies to the club guy who had spoken to my better half about getting a picture of the club, then sent him my way because he wasn't carrying the right lens. we had to leave after a couple of hours, so maybe another time, when your group is already gathered.

armando’s bel air

armando is one of a very few car owners that will stop and chat with me, even if i look busy, or pissed, or whatever you want to say my face looks like. i'm not pissed. usually just have sun blazing into my eyes. hate wearing sunglasses taking pictures.

he usually drives a thirty-nine pontiac.

this show, i see him, but i dont' see the pontiac. he walks over to say hi, shakes hands with my better half and myself, and points out this bel air. oh, and that they've made their plaque fancier.

never did mention whether this is his other car, or if he got rid of the pontiac.

this is nice, but i see them all the time. pontiacs are harder to come by.

feeling dizzy

still have more from this show to work on. only stayed three or four hours, but still took over thirty gigs of pictures; pretty typical. stayed until my side started hurting more than i could ignore it. doctors don't know what it is; i'm thinking i've pulled some muscles walking my kid's dog, or is it him walking me? i can think of no other reason. took some follow up xrays, and the cracked rib seems to be healed.

anyway, was out and about today, side still hurting. stopped by the classic oldies toy drive show, so i'll stop with this one for a few days, and post some of those up.

walked up to the post office and took a longer way, several blocks out of the way home, and just started feeling dizzy. no reason. made it home, and still feeling wobbly and overheated. maybe too much sun today?

i do like the rainbow building in the background, so i may be over posting it too much lately. lots of color and texture of the building playing off the silkiness of the cars is just enticing to me.

parking a fleetline in front of it, just makes it better. love me a fleetline...

pop’s car

i'm getting a little lazy recording which car belongs to which club. i jumped around from one side of the street to another, from car to car, so even if they are parked in groups, i don't necessarily remember which. and then some cars don't have a plaque anyway.

i'm not seeing who this car might belong to, but i do remember a guy asking where he could see the pictures, because it is his "pop’s" car.

i shot the back end too, but i'm not too jazzed about it.

still need to decide if i like any of the pictures i shot of armando's bel air...