ghetto blaster

getting late. almost time for the fat man. guess i'll head to bed. 

worked from home, made cinnamon rolls and pan de elate. making some taffy for my dad tomorrow...didn't feel like burning up my hands pulling it today. he likes it fresh anyway.

quick post. i think this is a cadillac; i didn't pay attention, i was just looking at the pinstriping.

now, in my sleep-deprived delirium, all i can see is an upside down angel that took a nose-dive onto this hood. and on that deranged thought, i'll wish you all a merry xmas, and that you get what you want in the morning.

reflecting

last day of vacation. i walked around uptown. thought i'd try to find a red dress. my better half has been commenting on all the red dresses in the shop windows. trying to remind him, i am no longer the same size as the mannequins, but he doesn't care; he likes my curves.

i looked in every clothes store in town. i did not like any of the dresses i saw. probably just me. i hate clothes shopping, and i haven't had to shop for girl clothes in a long time. good old casual dress code at work, only really need to wear a sort of business casual shirt, i.e., polo, and then jeans are now ok, so no reason to shop anymore.

back home, playing with my pictures again. thought about going to a car show, followed by a few hours at disneyland. there's an elvis impersonator performing tonight and tomorrow...young, bad ass elvis, not chunky butt elvis. but meh, i was tired. maybe tomorrow night.

my mom's bday is on sunday. there's also a car show at legg lake on sunday. i can pull off both.

then back to work on monday. not looking forward to the work that waited for me, and more new jobs. already getting a headache, so i'll push that thought out of my head until then.

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one more tonight. i like the back end of cadillacs. this one is like an xmas present—the colors, the pattern, the glitter and shine.

got to the show early early, and managed to wade through all the waiting cars, and found this one stuck in the frozen river of cars.

braces

this cadillac kinda looks like its smiling, but it has braces. and the big bullet things are the big metal things that hook up to the head gear.

wishing that guy behind the other caddy could have kept out of his cooler and out of my shot.

keeping to the other side

one of my favorite cars, since i started playing with the camera again several years ago. don't see it very often. aside from the fact that i haven't been going out to as many shows, he tells me that he's mostly keeping this one on the other side of the 605 freeway now.

just happen to know his club goes to this particular show, so was happy to run in to it there. jammed between his other club cars, but still worth a shot, or two. always trying to get a good shot of the freakin' ghost flames. i think the overcast sky helps a lot, cuts back the reflective glare. someday, i'll get a ladder. just one more thing to drag around, right?

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been busy at work, and taking care of some medical stuff. i really don't like needles at all. really, really hate them. anyway, got to get stuck a couple more times in the next couple of weeks. so, i'm going to not think about that right now.

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so how about a couple more shots of the car?

weathered fine

i was awakened at five in the morning by some a-hole playing some crap rap music at max volume outside. went on for a while. i looked out the window trying to figure out where it was coming from. two houses across the street had the lights on, but the way the sound bounces around in the early hours, couldn't tell where it was coming from. sounded more like the house up on the corner.

guessing the elderly neighbor called the cops, because one eventually showed up. parked next to a car just nearby. he left. the music shut off. some stupid kid gets out and walks across the street and down an alley. stupid jerk.

since i was up anyway, i decided to go out to pomona's swap meet. woke the better half up, since he had mentioned he'd like to go sometime. after waiting forever for him to get ready, we didn't arrive until about the time the sun was already rising. and we were already late...the lot was pretty damn full.

his first time there, so he was pretty impressed by all the cars there. he took time to walk down a few rows of the swap meet stuff too. i haven't even done that. always taking pictures until it gets too hot to continue.

he said the pavement is pretty broken up there, so that i should spare my roller bag with my cameras in it. bouncing is bad for the sensor, or at least shake the dust onto it.

blah blah blah. found this old caddy in the sea of cars. for one, i love the back fins on this year, with the funky lights. but hell, look at that peeling paint. lots of texture. the chrome is kinda crap too. weathered. i think they like to call that patina, right?

behinds

back from vacation. went to dc. was fun, weather was perfect. even ended with a lightly rainy day. better half lost his iphone six plus, then after a dramatic story, got it back. what are the chances of that? should have bought a lottery ticket.

day after we get back, hey, dia de los muertos show up the street. the past few years, about a dozen cars have been there. this year, wow, maybe fifty, maybe a hundred are down there. i basically was there most of the day. still tired from the trip, but had fun. then had to drive down to my mom's. just been going non-stop since...so first time back with my pics.

and i'm off again...so here's a quick shot for some dude who asked about my photography. like i said, love the back ends of the old caddies. all about the fins.

sunshine, on his shoulder

the uptown show yesterday was pretty good. this year it was well run, and started on time. even had the staging start on time, as advertised, which i'm sure pleased everyone involved with last year's debacle. guessing maybe three hundred cars showed up.

i knew by five-thirty in the morning that it was going to be a hot day. sun was already coming up, sky clear. last couple of years the morning had been overcast and cool, and allowed me to enjoy the show for a couple extra hours before it got too hot. this year, it was rush and get what shots i could while the sun rose, the light changed, the cars were sitting and waiting in staging. i can't take the heat. fortunately, with this show, i live here. i know where to go to get out of the sun, eat, and can even go home and take a break. hey, gotta download the pictures off my memory cards, so i can go back out and fill them up again, right?

after shooting some of the lucky cars that were able to get in early, my better half and i walked up to the staging area. lots of cars, three lanes wide, just sitting ducks for my camera.

this guy sitting in the cadillac, was first to notice and ask where he could see the pictures, so i'll put a couple of his car up first.

i could make up a story about the text messages he appears to be sending, the "OMG! this chick is taking pictures of my car!," but i'm not going to do that. i'll keep my freaky demons in my head.

anyway, if he happens to want to buy a print (what a concept), he can find them here.

this one has a little too much lens flare, but i like it anyway:

a tad too much

i've seen this car a few times now. i do appreciate the detail and engraving. really, it can be impressive. the interior reflected this exterior, if you can imagine...apparently, i didn't take any pictures of it.

but like women and jewelry, ya gotta know when to stop. although, some women would probably argue with me on that point, but i'm not like them anyway, and i can do without the bling.

cadillac, in my head, as the advertisers have pummeled into it, envisions high living and good taste, perhaps a hint of extravagance...and i'll leave it at that.

the nerve

mother's day. got the call from both kids today. still have to make my own call to my mom. had intended to drive down to see my mom, then stop at disneyland to hang with my bro and his family, but i woke up with a pain in my back, and it hasn't gotten any better, so i'm just hanging out at the house with my better half and his mom. 

no idea what i did to make it hurt. must have just slept on it wrong. gonna go take a hot shower after i'm done here and see if that helps. happened a couple of months ago, and worked itself out after a few days. hope it does the same, or it will mess up my plans for shooting next weekend, both days.

anyway, my better half built me a better puter to play with my pictures on. it is much faster, but i have spent a bit of time transferring files from the old computer instead of playing with pictures. he calibrated one of my monitors...says not this main one, so even though i think it looks darker, he says it isn't anything he did. guess i'll have to go look at the picture on another computer to see if it's the monitor or my eyes.

anyway, he was looking over my shoulder while i flipped through possible pictures to post and this was one he really reacted to, so i'll use it for the first picture on this new puter.

he said he saw this same cadillac at the san pedro show last year, parked in front of the light house. i vaguely remember it, but maybe there were too many people in front of it for me to shoot it. i'll have to go look at what shot that day.

its just a big, long car, and so shiny; it was awesome. a whole lot of green going on here, but it all kinda works.

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: