what's up?

inconvenience

so there’s this virus going around…

torn between staying here in whittier or in oc with my mother. better half is giving me the stink eye, since i am out and about in the world, and he’s at home 24/7, and in “protect his mother” mode. will probably start packing my shit, and go stay at my mom’s for the duration. he disagrees with my laissez-faire attitude on the whole situation. he’s exhausted, and i don’t want to say anything else stupid here. dark clouds are moving in, and it will be raining again soon.

would be a good time to hide in my condo, but it’s currently being renovated and is in no condition for anything to live in it.

my office hasn’t shut down yet, and as of now, i wouldn’t be able to connect into the network and keep working from home.

was supposed to go on a cruise with my mom and brother, but that finally got cancelled—mom didn’t want to go anyway. they may reschedule to later in the year, since the cruise line doesn’t want to refund the money. see if they are still in business next month.

my current problem is that i took a week off for that cruise; was looking forward to time off from work, but by then, we will all probably be quarantined and not going anywhere anyway. i guess i’ll just cancel the time off and work if i can.

seeing more car shows being postponed or cancelled, so i’ve postponed making my annual reservations for chicano park day and others. so take my listing of car shows with a grain of salt, as i’m not out and about at shows, and not totally sure if some of them are cancelling or hoping for the best. i’m adding notes or deleting as i see info online. maybe i should just take the page down for now. i dunno.

here’s an old pic. pomona swap meet, from a couple of years ago. i guess no new shows, means i can dive into all the files from past shows i never have time to revisit. and i have a quite a bit to choose from over the last ten years.

two years ago, this was just primer. no idea if they’ve painted it or not. still a pretty cool car as is.

just makes me kick myself for not getting out of bed a couple of weeks ago and heading to pomona…

wind down

this vacation has been fun, and it has been hell. fun, because we’ve seen so many things and places i’d only ever seen in art history books and documentaries. wonder if my old professors are still kicking...now i’d understand more of what they blathered on about.

hell, because this has basically been a french/italian boot camp—going from zero miles a day to ten or more, when moving to a new location also with suitcase strapped to my back like a backpack, and bag of cameras in my hand.

all of it is winding down. two more nights. one more time to pack the bag. my inner clock is confused, as i still find myself waking at two a.m. here, which is about dinnertime back home. work will suck on monday, if i can stay awake.

will be nice to see my better half. and my dad, who has been in hospital/medical facilities since before i left, and has provided my mother a few scares that i know of.

old pontiac from a bbq meetup at legg lake. the other side of the park, which i’d never been to, or i’d have planned better for parking and arrival time.

wonder if they will go for a full restoration and paint job or call it a day in this primal glory.

a little sunshine

1937 chevy

so i've spent a lovely week hanging out at a courthouse, doing my civic duty. don't know how that happened, as they usually look for the most ignorant jurors possible. they didn't even ask me any questions, and i had no other excuses to be unable to serve.

love how all the jurors of a certain ethnic group, with only one exception, pulled the i don't speak english very well or acted like they completely didn't speak english at all. i call bullshit, but i guess if i was the one sitting next to the lawyer at the table, i wouldn't want them on the jury either.

i won't bore you with details, but it was an interesting experience. i got to use my best assortment of bitch faces sitting in the jury box, glaring at both lawyers, and so they could not guess which way i might be leaning for or against the defendant.

freaking freezing in the courtroom and deliberation room. was great if i had climbed the stairs or had a hot flash. otherwise, had to remember to bring a sweater.

back to work and a more normal schedule to whine about, and freeways to sit in a slow roll upon, and think up topics i might posit here.

caught this pistoleros car at the viejitos summer show in anaheim a couple of weeks back. its not finished, and i am making the assumption that they will eventually paint this car. but even if they decide they like the primer look, though i cannot understand it, you can see the beautiful lines of the car. the small details you'll never find on today's cars.

i liked how they dropped it to the ground under this tree, perhaps in anticipation of shade later when the sun got to doing it's thing in the sky, but at this time of morning, there's just that kiss of sun on the back end, through the trees out of the frame.

maybe that isn't something that you get worked up over, and sometimes random shadows on cars bug the hell out of me, but here i like it, and that it is hitting the skirt that doesn't match the rest of it. stupid, but that's how it was, and i liked it at the time.

beater

got out this weekend. thought we were racing the clock before the rain came. stupid weather app kept saying it was imminent. so we went to the closer show first at the community church.

that was busier than we expected. don't know why. it was sold out. but the promised rain did keep a lot of cars away. and mostly the cars we really wanted to shoot. so, after our fill of 1930s ford hot rods, we headed over to the swap meet.

unsuprisingly, parking was easy. clouds keep people away from swap meets. and it was still pretty early. turns out the car show was on the other side, so we had to walk through, get the bags searched.

was only about a dozen cars at the time. made the best of it, and shot some of them. some had their hoods up, some had too many people around them. chatted a bit with a couple of owners.

was fun, but then the getting up too early caught up with us, so we bailed.

liked this one, for all of it's wonderful messiness. maybe they'll leave it alone. i hope so. it's more fun like this.

didn't rain until last night. pfft.

big mike's chevy

so i've been home being sick for last couple of days. binged on game of thrones the first day, since it was so warm i couldn't sleep, and then worked from home today, to spare my coworkers from my cooties.

got a few more pictures i promised to post up here from the viejitos show. just be patient.

i was walking past this one, and this big guy comes over and asks if i'd taken pictures of his car yet. nope, working my way around the show, but hadn't shot it yet. says his name is big mike, and points to this car. sure, i'll shoot it and handed him my card. buy a print here, if you like it.

planning to go to san fernando on sunday, before it gets too hot outside. only if i'm feeling better, of course. better half is hoping to go this year, too.

they've let me in pretty early the last couple of years, so i'm keeping my fingers crossed. promise to stay out of the way. really.

winter

winter is a time of desolation and cold. a time of sleep and anticipation. less sunlight.

pfft. it was in the 80s yesterday. tomorrow maybe 65°, followed by rain tuesday and wednesday. california is just a confusing place. seasons are all screwy here. but i don't think i could ever go back east to live anymore, though it might be fun for one year.

but then, i wouldn't have so many choices of car shows to visit anywhere else either. i would truly have to hoard up cars for the winter if i lived anywhere else.

well, i'm no squirrel, though i may be nuts, and i already have so many cars to choose from in my digital garage, i sometimes wonder why i keep looking for more.

i saw this one pulling in last weekend in lakewood as i was packing up to leave. the primer covered ghost. i hadn't gotten a shot of it then. i figure that many of the cars i see at the smaller shows i frequent, eventually will be back. or i will find it at another show. or i will be haunted by them, as i drive down city streets, and often see stuff driving the other way. here it is a week later, at the hooters show in anaheim. glad to have given this show another try. there were plenty of cars to look at, a plethora if you'd prefer.

i imagine in the spring and summer, this location is a bitch to get to and/or park at, being in the backyard of anaheim stadium and down the street from the pond/honda center.

not sure if it is any one particular model of car, or chopped up pieces of things. i kinda think its something of a '48 chevy or so. i guess i could have asked the owner, who was hovering around nearby (not literally, or he would be the ghost). he never said a word, and eventually went somewhere else. this was my favorite of the shots i took. no people walking through, no posts sticking out randomly. the bare, stripped down trees, behind the bare, stripped down car. makes me look forward to the spring, and seeing this car again, as they continue to work it up, to a spring of its own. i suspect it may take a bit longer than it will for the trees.