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winner, winner, chicken dinna

1962 chevy impala

this guy asked about my pictures, and asked that i don't forget to take a shot of his and his friend's cars. not sure which car belonged to who, since i didn't write it down; but for sure it belongs to one of them. i'll add the other, a sixty three, in a little while.

after another hectic week at work, we made it out to the fair yesterday. great day, great weather. would have been perfect for a car show...like the white wall nationals. but a girl can't be everywhere at the same time, and my better half was sort of on call to go in to work, so we went to costa mesa.

second day the fair was open, and we wanted to go see my stuff hanging in the photography building. found the first, a picture of one of the dancers blessing the cars, from the dia de los muertos car show back in october. no dice, i mean no ribbon. still looked good hanging there.

then over to the where the transportation pics were...same area as last year...in the corner. there's an impala, there's a fleetline; nope and nope. and there's a nineteen fifty two chevy hood ornament. yes! a ribbon! and not honorable mention! third place. good enough. never have done better than a mention, so yay, right?

and then there was one more picture to find. and we both had a brain fart, and couldn't remember what we were looking for. lol. so, while my better half called his mom to tell her the news, i had to search my phone for the entry tag, since i just couldn't picture what it was in my head at all. finally found it, and took a few minutes to locate it, but there it was, a lighthouse, in the landscape section. and nope.

so, one bigger ribbon out of five pictures hanging on the wall is good. better half's mother was overjoyed, but they're both just that type of people. i called my mom. my dad answered gruffly; he was waiting for a call from an air conditioning repairman. heat makes you pretty grumpy. my mom got on the phone quickly, and she was happy about it, but had to get off the phone quickly.

my dad doesn't have the best of hearing, and i don't have the best communication skills. i think i'm out of his auditory range most of the time, so it's just easier to let my mom translate info to him. apparently it didn't translate all the way, as he sent an email at some point in the afternoon, asking if i'd sent a picture of the first place shot and ribbon, so he could get bragging rights with the relatives. no dad, just third place. don't be too disappointed.

1963 chevy impala

sunny

1936 chevy

as usual, working my way through a few promised pictures, not going in any particular order. going pretty slowly: the time spent in traffic, the workload, my constant state of not quite fatigue, and my better half preventing me from having time to work on my pictures. better half simply reminding me that its already late and i should get some sleep. maybe i have insomnia. i have a hard time falling asleep, unless i'm completely exhausted or completely relaxed. i guess i will be posting when i post for a while. all i need is time, and its on the short end for a while.

firme bombs plaqueby the time i got to this car, the sun had burned through the clouds, and was climbing pretty quickly. it is purely by chance that you are where you are as the sun rises and you see how the light is hitting things. just have to shoot what's in front of you in that moment.

i remember the way the sun was hitting this car and the one next to it, from the other side of the car. it was nice, but there was also a pop tent behind them, and i just couldn't get low enough to get it out of the shot, and time was a-wastin'

as i've said before, turn around, look the other way. there might be something interesting you won't notice if you don't look.

so this was a better angle for this car. the trees framed it better. and i like how they sort of filtered the sun, keeping it from flaring out or just being a white blob in the clouds, adding some definition.

thanks

chevy deluxe

just a quick thank you to the guy and his friends that let my better half hang out with them for a while, as i spent time taking more pictures. the sun came out, it got hot, and he was done. i hope you enjoyed his jokes.

and thanks to the imperials guy at the gate, who let us go early. i know the show didn't officially start until eleven, but it really is the best time for shooting pictures. always cross my fingers that we'll be able to get in, versus being out on the sidewalk shooting the cars driving by.

been a long day, another hard week ahead. gotta get to bed.

Update

on 2016-07-13 00:49 by kathy

edward [owner] writes:

A weekend with the wife turned into a purchase of this car; instead found this vehicle, a gentleman from San Francisco had just purchased it from an estate sale. The man had it running— keep in mind stereo-type project car—picture this, all primer beige with red stock rims, black front grill and rusty, missing outside moldings, etc. and interior 2 bench seats with torn headliner...not a nice sight but a nice canvas to start with.
The owner at the time had a 1964 Chevy Impala that needed interior work to be done to complete his own project, which was why he was selling the 1952 Chevy Styleline Deluxe.
My wife is a trooper, my better half—lol. She has been through it all with me she and loved the car. She gave me the Green Light to make the purchase but under one condition: that I started the vehicle and didn't stop until it was completed, because she didn't want it to go through the process, then stop in the middle and let it sit without completion... Oh, also I owed her a real weekend get away in San Francisco again. LOL
A 4–5 year build but well worth it. My wife and I enjoy the shows, the cruising, and the stories told...Thanks again to Kathy and her Husband. See you again out there—good times!

old times

1956 pontiac wagon

yes, i went to the imperials show this morning. yes, i took a lot of pictures. yes, i have filled my hard drive to the point that i cannot do anything at the moment. typical. takes about six months to fill the internal drive, and now its seven. imagine if i'd gotten out more, like i used to, i'd have had this problem a lot sooner.

so, i am doing some shuffling of files to various backup drives at the moment. will have to wait until later to really get a good look at what i shot today. maybe it will go faster and without a hitch, than i think it will; or i will overwrite files i shouldn't. it is the most dangerous part of taking so many images—their fates literally depending on a length of wire and an external box of whizzing, whirring, electronics.

not sure which is more reassuring: the old rolls of film and print hard copies, or the ability to backup without loss of quality, zillions of images, that may never be seen, save by my better half and/or his mom. then where to store all of these black boxes, much less worry about what happens to them when i am gone. my kids won't necessarily give a rat's ass about them, aside from family pics. well, i won't be around to care.

here is art's car from the bombs magazine show a couple of weeks ago. no one was hanging in their pop tent at the time, so took the shot, and kept moving on.

time to move some more files...

florence

motorcycle

made it out to mooneyes open house today, relatively early. sun didn't come out from the overcast for a couple of hours, but it did feel humid. way fewer people in the way at this show if you get there early.

its a popular show, but there really isn't anywhere for people with cars to park. they jam into the lot of the hamburger joint on the corner. there were other business lots that were taped off, that weren't last year. the lot of a flooring showroom on the other side of the intersection was taped off, but cars were parking in there—one of the other photographers i talked to figured they must know the owner. that, or they said they would make him an offer he couldn't refuse.

other cars parked along the side of the street, or in what other parking lots where businesses seemed to be closed. some parked on the street, but didn't pay attention to the no parking signs, so cops had to find the owners to move them. only option for anyone else was to keep cruising up and down the street until a spot opened up, or they got bored and left.

we started shooting at the burger joint, walked down past mooneyes, then back to the burger joint. same bunch of cars there, so we crossed the street to shoot a blue truck i'd seen passing by, and also found a few others parked in that lot with him.

then, crossed at the light with another photographer with a huge lens, who seemed interested in shooting video rather than pictures, at least that's what my better half said.

found this bike in the lot with the flooring store. tavertine. carpeting. tile. didn't need any of that today, but they appeared to be open for business. now if they had been selling some water, i'd have bought that.

took a couple of shots of this bike, then went to shoot a purple truck. while waiting for some people to move out of the shot, the owner of the bike came over to ask where he might see a picture. gave him a card. here it is. wish the goober on the left wasn't just standing there gawking. i think he followed me around for a little while. haven't looked at a lot of the other pictures closely, but i wouldn't be suprised to find him hovering around in them too.

found a shady spot nearby, that actually had a nice, cool breeze blowing through, where we took a break before heading down this side of the street and back to the car. better half insisted that i take a swig of his drink.

he likes diet snapple, which i do not like, and which was not cold, but it was wet. he'd rather i choke that down than have a heat stroke. he also said, "39jimbo wasn't there to give me a cold one." i argued that there was a case of water in the car, but he argued that i wouldn't make it back to the car, so...gagged down half a bottle of the stuff. warm rasberry. i'd give it a warm rasberry.

imperials show tomorrow. and dam, it's after ten, so i better get to bed.

horny

chevy hood ornament

sometimes i have nothing to say; other times i have a running dialogue of random thoughts in my head all day long. today was the latter, but unfortunately, the mental blog post in my head didn't get jotted down, so i've got nothing.

i know i was going to mention the pasty white guy that was out for a jog early this morning, while i was out for a walk, who tripped and fell on his ass right after he passed me. i was going to humorously relate it to that scene in memoirs of a geisha, where the girl had to distract a man with just a look, and one just happened by on a bicycle and crashed it right after looking at her.

ya that's not my story; she was a geisha, and i'm just a middle-aged potato.

or i could have also been thinking about this weekend, and having to wake up early both days, to get to some awesome car shows before the sun. supposed to only be in the eighties, so crossing my fingers...

i know there were several other items that floated in and out of consciousness in my murky pea brain, but they're gone.

i just wasted over half an hour, trying to set up a banking app, only to realize i was blocking their cookies on my ipad. would have been easier to just accept cash. and now i've run out of time to really work on a car picture vs just using one of my macro shots.

i haven't posted a hood ornament in a while. how about this chevy hoodie? apparently this is one from a car with the hood up, because i didn't also shoot the car. the angle is also a hint, since i'm kinda angled up to shoot it. love these ornaments, the graceful curve of the horns on the stylized body of the animal.

i have one of the same type that's going to be hanging in the fair...seven days until that starts. wonder if i'll get another bridesmaid, i mean honorable mention ribbon to add to my collection this year. got one three years in a row, then nothing last year. its more fun just to see my stuff hanging on the wall.

stuck in traffic

chevy truck

took me almost two and a half hours to get home yesterday. checking the map now work is done for the day, before jumping in the car, i see both freeways are fucked, so no better for me than yesterday. having a terrible stomach ache for no good reason, so i'm just turning around and staying at my mom's tonight.

shame that some of the clubs are trying to get the wednesday evening shows at the broiler going again, and that i just can't get there, without taking a day off work. traffic sucks.

saw this truck somewhere else, i just know it, but a quick search of this year's pictures didn't show it. found it here, at the bombs magazine show, sort of not jammed between other cars, and it is a different color combo than i usually see, so took a quick shot. the neon felix plate is kinda ruining it though. i should change the color, but i'm not at home with my computer, and that's the way it was, so i'll just wince a little and ignore it.

hit the floor

1948 chevrolet fleetline

i am not familiar with the tovar family or their cars. i have a feeling that i just haven't been at the same shows they are at.

i always wonder about why certain cars are strategically located under their own tents. i don't know the stories, and many times, i find that there are just cars with the wheels off and on pedestals with parts spinning above mirrors, and hoods up, and shitloads of chrome. sure, they're awesome, but they usually just don't attract me.

i walked past this tent initially, because it was at the front, near the entrance, and there was a lot of traffic passing by, and people polishing the cars under the tents. i rounded back a bit later. there were fewer people around, and the hood wasn't up on this one yet. now or never.

guess i caught it early enough, that the paper was still under it, and now i know the secret of how it got on the white carpet without any tire smudge. didn't stick around to see how they ripped the paper out from under the tires for judging.

guessing with the carpet there, no problem dropping that puppy right slam down on the floor, without worries of scratching the paint or chrome.

beautiful car.

memories

1948 chevy fleetline

today, i'm waiting for my car, getting an oil change and tire rotation. hoping they don't find some other thing wrong with it, which seems to happen every time. sometime during the past week, while driving with the little maintenance light on, and the service message showing, my car hit two-hundred thousand miles, and passed it. i do a lot of driving, but not bad for a ten-year old car, right?

kept my last car for more than thirteen years, until every service was costing me close to a thousand every time. even after one of their guys fucked up and dropped a bolt somewhere in the engine and killed it. they gutted it, and had to put in a whole new engine. idiots.

that car went to my ex for a while, and now it sits mostly unloved in my parents' driveway.

my better half likes to talk about a thirty-nine master deluxe he saw for sale once at a car show. owner had fixed it up for his then wife, put automatic transmission in it, power steering, air conditioning, stereo system, etc.--it was modernized, with a beautiful shell outside. he was upset, because she had changed her mind, and didn't want to drive it. he was having a hard time selling it, since it wasn't original anymore.

sometimes, i think i would enjoy something like that, a hybrid, with the classic look. i hear the old cars are hard to drive, since they don't have power steering. i will need another car eventually, so i half keep an eye open when i'm at shows or the swap meet.

meanwhile, i wait to hear what the damage is with this car. also hoping they run it through a car wash. they remodeled, made the waiting area less comfortable, and management changed not too long ago, so maybe they got rid of that perk.

this car seems to have been waiting on tap here for a while, so i'll post it now. i've been so busy with my work / life lately, i've had little time for my pictures. so far behind doing anything with the last few shows' worth of shots, and hoping they don't join the many years' worth of pictures that will never see the light of day, because there is never enough time, and never will be.

between a master deluxe and a fleetline, i think i'd go with the fleetline every time. i just like the lines and curves of the car more. ask me tomorrow and i may say the same about the other.

saw this one at the crossing foursquare show last month. been there a few times; never sure which clubs will show up, or where they will park. these guys got the back yard. thought i heard someone say they were going to put dukes back there, but i never saw any while i was there.

there were some pesky port-a-potties, that are always fun to shoot around. they add so much to a picture. not. this shot, one was to the right, out of the shot, but still found it's way into the picture in the reflection. just ignore it, now that i've pointed it out.

what are you gonna do? when you gotta go, you gotta go.

especially deluxe: la green eyes

1942 chevrolet special deluxe

sitting uptown in a small eating establishment. no one dining here except me for a long while. i guess since the college kids are gone for the summer... now if they would just turn on the air conditioner, i'd be extra happy. its late enough, just having the front and back doors open, is bringing in a cool enough breeze--as long as i sit still.

better half is at home taking a nap. he's had an exceptionally busy week at work, and had expected to stay late tonight. he said the team he was waiting on said work from took off to treat themselves to dinner, and didn't invite him. they never do; easy to forget the lackey producing all the artwork when he sits on a different floor--out of sight, out of mind. so he promptly said forget you, and came home. he'll do it tomorrow, or at worst work from home.

sorry, no time for a long story. this evening. unless you want to hear about how many biscuits it takes a dog to eat before it blows...and my kid sends a snarky text message thanking me for having to clean up after it at four in the morning...nah. i didn't think so.

seriously, there were several shows advertised last weekend, but the one sponsored by bombs magazine, was the one we went to...they had me at bombs...

got there early, but still too late when the sun seems to be rising at five-fifteenish in the summer. was a hell of a hot day to spend on blacktop. my better half gave out before i did, but no shocker there. i was having fun, even toward the end, but those last couple of rows really tested my endurance. thanks to 39jimbo for that bottle of ice cold water, or i think i would really have had a heatstroke. got to the end of the last row, stood in the shade for a few minutes, and used up the last bit of energy i had before i melted, to get back to where my better half was waiting.

sorry if i took even less time to chat or say hello. i was overheating quickly. maybe i'll just break down and wear shorts for a change. just more skin to burn, but cooler.

still, the sun high in the sky does make cars glow just so, when the light hits them right. saw this fleetline on the way out, and quickly took this shot of it. just, a beauty...

owner says he bought 'la green eyes' in 2014, delivered in 2015 after new years. out for a face lift and back just in time for this show at chicano park in 2016.