45th annual chicano park day

took the train down to san diego this weekend. then the red trolley thing down to barrio logan. annual chicano park celebration and car show. 

was supposed to have sold out within two days, but since it had rained the night before, and was supposed to rain at some point saturday, there was a big empty space on the front lawn, where there is usually wall-to-wall cars. they tried to disguise it by making a circle of vendors in the empty space, but still...

still there were many, many cars, enough to keep me in my happy place.

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it's getting late, and i gotta get up early, so i'll just stop here for now, and continue on my next post.

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and it didn't rain during the show after all...

betty boop

hard to pass this plymouth by, it being so red and all. i stopped. i saw. i took a picture. well, actually a few.

i liked this one best. shows the sky, the car, the bridge, the mural...what the show is all about...and the location. or maybe just because it makes me laugh because the guy in the painting looks like he's about to write all over the car. furiously.

magic carpet ride

glad the week is over, but the work isn't done. will probably end up working in between bouts of relaxing, which should cancel each other out. that's the theory anyway. 

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computer is misbehaving too. hoping you can see the pictures and not just boxes with red "X"s.

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wondering the why of the carpet, except that it matches the color palette of the car, and defines the space and environment boundaries. no other purpose really. i see mirrors on the ground often, but there's a reason for them, usually involving a lot of chrome and hydraulics under the car.

i like the simple pinstriping on most of the car, but the big shape on the back wheel probably would look better on the trunk, not necessarily so big, and leave this part clean...if it were my car, as a matter of speaking. but it ain't, so don't listen to me.

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brain is mush. what else can i say about chicano park? let's play bitch and moan / sunshine up your...

• not as many cars as last year / loved the cars that were there
• whose *brilliant* idea was it to move the show to easter weekend? / everyone will be in town to enjoy a day of festivity on a holiday weekend
• "we have a permit for an event" / it's great they want to maintain the integrity of the show rules 
• some people are rude / people were enjoying themselves
• lemme just sneak in front of you to get the same shot you're taking / photography is a great hobby
• it was overcast :(  /  it was overcast! :)
• being facetious / being facetious

chicano park

busy weekend, but fun. tired now, so i'll be brief.

even better, my better half got to go with me. his sister got out of the hospital, and she was well enough to take care of their mom.

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we got to the park around five-thirty in the morning. there were already cars lined up in staging to go into the park. so we decided to go over by the stage thing and unpack our cameras on the steps. within a minute of unzipping the camera bags, we were approached by an older woman who wanted to know who we were with, what were we doing...etc. we simply said we were just unpacking our cameras to take some pictures. she said the whole park is reserved for an event, they were setting up and that we had to leave. we replied that we were here for said event, and repeated we were just unpacking. she persisted, so whatever, we'll move somewhere else and unpack and do exactly what we planned anyway...to go back over to where they were staging the cars.

honestly, there wasn't anything or anyone there on that piece of the park, and we weren't intending to get in the way even if there had been. going to bite my tongue here, because i like the show, and want to go back again next year, but get a grip. even the cop in the car in a neaby parking lot wasn't going to bother us. hope she had a nice day. 

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took so many pictures. the weather turned out to be perfect, overcast with bouts of sunshine. never really needed a jacket, even so early in the morning. i liked this picture because it seemed to represent the show and location well.

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and as we left the show for the day, i was waiting to cross the street, when my better half started laughing. i turned around and he pointed at this painting. and OMG, it was the lady who had told us to leave in the first place. took some searching, but i've figured out who she is, and why she had the authority to ask us to leave. we still found it funny that we started the day with her and here she was again, on our way out...