time is fleeting

i went out this morning with about four hours to hit car shows before i needed to be home. i had for sure three on my list to hit up, possibly five. 

started out in tustin at enderle. haven't been there in a long time because i don't drive north past it much any more on sunday mornings. didn't get there until a little after ten. same old same old: after the prizes are awarded, people bug out. must have just missed it, and most people were gone or in the process of leaving. i got a couple of shots before leaving.

from there, headed over to original mike's. also haven't been there for a while. cadillac kings were there in force, and all of their buddies it seemed. two aisles of caddies. should have made me happy, but i just wasn't looking for cadillacs today. 

i liked the paint job on this one. the sky was wonderfully cloudy, perfect for pictures. can kind of see them reflected here too. 

i didn't stay long at this one. kind of not what i was looking for either. 

figured everyone was at the floral park home and garden show. i kinda didn't want to deal with the crowd, so drove over to where the viejitos usually have their show last sundays of the month. nope. no show. what gives? well, maybe next month.

there was a ford show over by knott's berry farm, which was only a few minutes from where i parked momentarily to decide what to do. at that point, i just didn't want to zig back down to another show in westminster or zag up to lakewood, so i headed home. had that pesky work stuff to do anyway, which was probably what was back of mind gnawing away at my fun anyway.

i did get this one, which is really what i was in the mood for, so at least i satisfied one craving:

no show

so the year is going out in a whimper. drove over to the viejitos show this afternoon. a block away were some of those look at me, look at me, small package guys with their new big ass trucks, with doors that open upward, hoods that flip up and all their blingy stupidness.

drove past. they were in the lot i usually park in. thought maybe they might be overflow from the show. but no, where the nice cars were supposed to be, nothin. well, there was one viejito, seemingly just arrived, climbing out of his nice old truck. perhaps he was as mystified as we were as to where everyone was. we kept going, but probably should have stopped and shot his truck just for the heck of it. i suppose it was cancelled for the holidays, and the weather...cold and windy. didn't think/realize it was supposed to rain.

we weren't far from disneyland, so stopped there to pick up some of the sourdough bread for my mother-in-law. wasn't as crowded as you'd have thought, but busy enough we weren't going to stand in the soup line. fortunately, they have a cart outside, that they were just opening for the day, and got some there.

the skies were looking increasingly gray, so we decided to skip eating there, and headed for the little sandwich shop hiding in the hotel there. no long line in there. as we sat down to eat, it started pouring rain outside.

by the time we finished, it had mostly stopped, and we headed directly to the car. sprinkled a little on the way home.

so it sucked that there was no show, but my better half reminded me that i didn't really have space for more pics anyway. but i would have shot them anyway.

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i haven't decided yet whether to drive in to work tomorrow, or work from home, now that i've been enabled to do so, thanks to the IT department. pretty sure i'd be one of the few in the office, as i was last week. it was nice and quiet, even with the few other die hards working in offices elsewhere sending me work. i can think of only one person who might send me something to work on, and after that, there'd be no one to approve it, so really, wondering what to do.

probably the clincher will be the weather. if its raining, i'd be less inclined to drive in, and then fight the traffic coming home.

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found this car at one of the summer shows out at enderle. i'd never seen one before, so of course i had to shoot it. interesting tail lights, i think.

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oh ya, for christmas, i gave a few people a small book of hood ornaments i've shot over the last couple of years. a few have asked for copies for their friends. if you're interested, i've put it up for sale here, or you can preview a few pages from it anyway. no words, and i kept it simple. thought i'd let the images do their own talking. there's a small book of flowers, if that's your thang as well.

got balls?

i'm plugged in to my ipad, watching old reruns on netflix, and zoning in on my pictures, headphones blocking out the world. family is in the background throwing up xmas all over the front room. mother-in-law does go a bit over the top, and she is putting the kids to work putting up the tree and wrapping a zillion lights on the poor thing. not little twinkly white lights; the fruity colored led things they have out now. pfft. sure it looks fine, but just too fruity. no particular theme this year. just seems to be traditional ye olde fashioned stuff. and balls. big ones.

so i actually took this shot a couple of years ago, over at enderle plaza. i remember taking it. guy didn't get the clue to close the hood, so i didn't shoot the front, but really couldn't pass by the back end. lots of circles going on. they come in all sizes. just like the balls on the damn tree.

stormy weather

wishing for some really crappy weather, even more than this dismal overcast. storm clouds make pictures so much more cool, even if fewer cars come out from fear of raindrops on their shiny, shiny babies.

this was a big car. i've only seen a couple rumbling around. nothing else special about it, except that i'm yearning for some rain. and some sleep...just now.

hell week

i am glad the week is over. hope the next one isn't so busy. i'm so tired.

started off last friday driving a big ass diesel moving truck. moving the last bits of my life's debris outta my house. you know it's a weird thing to be in a house still full of furniture from your past life, but your personal debris is out. almost like the house is somehow deflated and sad. still my house, but now my son lives there. while he goes to law school.

figured i'd save on paying a mortgage and his rent by moving him in there for a few years. and hey, a unique idea: i'll move in full-time with my better half. married almost five years now, might as well see how much of me he can take. lol.

was fun driving the big ass truck on the freeway. pretty much had to just go for it, once i decided not to stay on surface streets. really hated that this truck had the steering wheel that was more horizontal than vertical, like a car. didn't like feeling like i was driving on the disneyland teacups at 70 mph.

the rest of the week was spent doing several 11 and 12 hour days at work for some annual tradeshow coming up in another week. interesting to see how many people wait until the last minute to decide they need brochures and datasheets.

oh, and then following one of said long days, went to the oc fair for several more hours to listen to the judges walk around and expound on their reasoning behind how they picked images they liked. almost like being back in college, listening to the professors babble on about technique and vision and bullshit.

the group i was in never did get around to where my images were, but i gathered enough to know that someone of them thought enough of one of my pictures that they gave it a ribbon. kind of an atta boy. close but no cigar. my better half likes to break down the odds of entering and even getting stuff selected for display, and so on, so it's ok.

someone even filled out an interest in purchase card. ya, he's interested in the picture, but doesn't really want to pay that much. he also wants me to shoot his car. told him we'll be at the show in uptown whittier next month, so maybe we'll see him there.

anyway, i've been bleeding out money this month, so it's looking like vacation won't be anywhere exotic this year. and that's still several months away. i so need one too. maybe we can sneak away for a long weekend, but we're both so busy, i doubt that will happen either.

looking at the list of car shows, thinking about going to some show in san fernando tomorrow. might as well go to magic mountain as long as i'm up there. i do have other stuff i gotta do, so maybe i'll just end up squeezing in lakewood in the evening instead.

ugh.

which way to in-and-out?

another weird summer here in so cal. when i was a kid, it would be hotter than h-e-double hockey sticks by may. the last few summers have been relatively mild, compared to the rest of the country. it's almost july, and really, i've had to drive all the way to riverside to find some real heat.

this one was a couple of weeks ago, overcast, but not raining. can't remember if the gloom burned off in the afternoon or not. great weather for shooting cars without harsh shadows. only spent an hour here before going into work on a sunday afternoon.

didn't notice at the time, but i like how i caught the reflection of nearby palm trees on the car. makes me think of the drink cups at in-n-out, with the little palm trees, and i almost want to look under the car for the john 3:16 they hide on the bottom rim of the cups.

eddie

quick post. it's late, but i've missed my cars. been dealing with a bum water heater, which now has to be replaced. time out of the office, and work is piling up, so i must make up for the time.

made a quick stop here in tustin before heading to work on a sunday, at an annual show at enderle center. seemed smaller than last year, but there were still a good selection of cars. unfortunately too many with their hoods up. ah well.

it's the front bumper on these things that really mark the car, so i've focused on it here. don't know why edsels have a bad name, or so i've heard. they look well enough to me.

off to bedski...

beware of bulldozers

ahhh, a stephen king fan. my fav.

finally got her where i wanted her. this one is always, always jammed between other cars, until this day. i think i got there late, the awards and raffle already going. for all i know, she had been pulled for an award and moved off to the side.

what ever the reason, i think i got a great shot of her, and the creepy overcast skies just make it more awesome. now if that radio had started to play on its own or that antenna had moved...

junk in the trunk

there were three of these cars at enderle earlier in the month. i think they said there are maybe 6 in all of california. kinda rare. wish he'd closed the hood, but the back is pretty interesting on it's own.

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ever had one of those weeks? ya, well i'm having one. drove 2 hours to see my kid play baseball and then they didn't play him, since he'd played three games over the weekend. busy busy at work, and that makes me happy, but they keep me hopping. supposed to rain this weekend, so there won't be any car shows to worry about missing. ehh, i have other things that keep being put off, i guess i can attend to for lack of excuses. lol.

maybe next week will be better.

would smell as sweet?

this old ford gets around. i've seen it at a few shows in various places. the aged finish and pitted hood ornament and grill make it more interesting when i process it.

the name on the door proclaims it to be of penrose machine shop out of compton, ca, but i can't find it on google. and i can't believe there isn't another picture of it out there either.

is this penrose an "impossible object" popularized in the '50s by the mathematician roger penrose, who describes such objects as "impossibility in its purest form?" [no, i'm not a geek...found it on wikipedia] how can it be explained otherwise?

addendum: (thanks denny) There was indeed a 'Pensose Machine' in Compton, CA. He was a dealer for small industrial engines and parts, such as Wisconsin, Continental, Kohler etc. I sold him product in the 60s thru mid-70s. Another 'Penrose' was" Dick", who was at one time working for Continental Motors, before I was, and he was 'Sherm" (I presume Sherman) Penrose's son. Sherm had a small engine and lawn equipment distributorship in Long Beach in the 60s. I believe 'Penrose Machine went 'unde'r in the early 80s with different ownership. The Ford in your picture was most likely sponsored by Penrose-Compton.