what's up?

thinking

thinking of which show to go to tomorrow.

...probably both.

thinking of what to do for vacation.

...home, north, south, east?

thinking of how to get through the next two weeks until vacation.

...no fuckin' idea. just will.

just finished sorting and stacking pics i shot on friday evening at a couple of shows i haven't been to in a long time. had my cameras with me, so i stopped on the way home. now it's late, and i should get to bed if i'm actually going to get up and go to a show in the morning. and it's so tempting to just keep the blinds closed and hide from the world for one more day.

guess i should have gone to manny loco's today...i've seen some excellent pictures on insta, but i didn't so i won't dwell on it.

i suppose i'm just burned out from work, and need to recharge. just gotta make it two more weeks...

not sure if this is a mercury. can someone tell me? here i'll show you the sideview, with the suicide door. does it help?

splintered

anytime i haven't been out shooting regularly, it takes a few shots to get into the swing or rhythm of setting up, framing up and firing off shots. i don't expect the first few to be good.

this was the first car i shot the other day at workman high school' fundraiser. was already overheating.

it's a little distorted, but i like it anyway. it pops a little. and i love the hood ornaments on these cars. wishing the little palm tree head wasn't behind the yellow reflector thing on the hood, but oh well.

reaching for a cooking pan in the lower cupboard, trying to not force my better half to move away from the sink, i tried to reach through a slightly open cabinet door. it's an older house. the cabinets have layers of paint and wobbly pull handles. and rough edges on the bottoms of shelves.

so yup, my knuckles slide up along the bottom of the upper shelf and i got the pan and several long splinters in my finger. one i pulled out with my fingernails, just because it was sticking out of the skin. the longer one seems to be just under the skin, with either a smaller third beyond that, or just a cut.

i don't like digging for splinters. probably had one as a kid that my mom went after rather unpleasantly. so i'll just put a band-aid on it and let it work itself out.

didn't hurt at first, but within about five minutes, it started hurting like a mofo. oh well. hope it isn't lead paint.

meet the palms

honestly, this was an accident, but it does make me laugh. beautiful cadillac convertible, trying to find any angles to shoot cars and not have a basketball hoop or pop-up tent in it.

to do so, many times, i have to get the tripod down lower. the first twenty minutes i was there, i could not loosen the screw on the center post, couldn't get a good grip on the twister. almost felt like when my better half tightens up all the bolts on the thing, and i can hardly move the legs. he is the brute squad, and doesn't know his own strength sometimes.

at some point, i finally was able to loosen the damn thing and to get it down fairly low, but not as much as i would like. palm trees and cars were preferable to the hoops.

did not purposely, nor did i realize i'd lined this one up so mr and mrs palm are in the front seat, and the twins are in the back (or is it triplets?). lol.

having a hell of a time deciding what to do on my vacation week. everywhere i'm thinking would be interesting is about to be snowed in, or it's raining. was considering a road trip back east, but i don't want to drive in that by myself.

i will either end up in san diego, san fran, monterrey, or just sitting at home. anywhere is fine, as long as it's away from work. need to clear my head.

nice to see you again

so, in spite of not feeling too great (again), i went out for a short while, to the fundraiser at workman high school.

for fuck's sakes, man, it's winter. why the hell is it in the eighties in march? and the cars are on blacktop. it was in the forties and raining a week or so ago. i really hate california sometimes.

photo courtesy of jim diaz—thanks jimbo!

glad i brought my hat. sometimes i worry it may be too offensive with it's pinstriped message on the brim, but then i hear the lyrics of the music being played, and it seems rather tame in comparison.

took a quick round of the show, then went back for a few more particular cars.

i think this was the second or third car i shot. the owner is actually just peeking into view behind it. he came over and re-introduced himself, saying we'd met at a previous show. guessing that would be one in covina, back around halloween.

told him i'd post his car; i try to keep my promises, if i can keep my memories straight. so hope he likes it.

my head got swimmy soon enough, so i packed it up and left to find lunch. pretty sure i'll faint at a show one of these hot days. i do hope someone friendly will watch over me and my gear until i wake up.

hangry

still sifting through old pics. recently got the call for entries for the fair, and can't decide what to enter.

this one's nice, it seems to pop enough, but i don't know that it's in my top ten. that's the other thing--if i enter as many as i usually do, i end up with several being selected for showing. then after, if they don't sell, i'm stuck with them.

this is fine, as i really like what i shoot, and enter; the problem lies in the lack of enough wall space to display them all. and also the money spent framing that could have been used elsewhere.

maybe i should post them for sale. i'll think about it. they're just taking up space in storage otherwise.

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i've had such a rough week at work. the pace has been brutal, and in spite of more outside help coming, we're being warned that the workload probably won't let up anytime soon.

on the up side, it sounds like i may be adding company portrait photographer to my resume, with them reviewing my wishlist of camera gear, to see what kind of budget they really want to throw at the project. as long as i just pretend the ceo is an old chevy, i should be ok.

i also received a bonus, so to celebrate that this week is almost over, i'm sitting in a restaurant, treating myself to a nice piece of steak, a rare treat. too bad i'm by myself, except for the happy hour patrons, who aren't far enough into their cups to be loud and rude yet.

emerald city

one from about this time last year--at dino's bomb squad's blessing of the bombs. haven't seen a flyer for this year, or i'd add it to my calendar.

they said it usually gets packed, but not last year, not while i was there. not when the priest went around flinging holy water around. beaded right up on those shiny polished cars.

i'm sure there was something else going on, so a lot of cars were siphoned off there.

still, nuff pretty cars showed up. reviewing old files, and saw that i hadn't posted this one. i like the color, but it does take some getting used to on this model, being so different from the typical/traditional black.

so close...

dear gary,

i haven't seen you since last year. i was out in chino this morning, in what turned out to be a wasted trip. i thought of you for some reason.

different cities, different car shows, different people get associated.

though i only know you by acquaintance, and you always saying hello, at least to me, (not so much to my better half whom you had never met, but gave a huge stink eye to last year), and dropping a joke once in a while, you are the one that comes to mind when i pass through riverside or chino.

i haven't been out toward your part of town much this past year. i haven't been out much at all. life gets in the way, and all else falls to the wayside.

i was not far from the main drag where the corn feed run will be soon enough. wondering if you are well, and if you will bring the ford or the chevy out this year. the last couple of times it has been the ford, which is nice, but much too perfect and electric green.

hoping the chevy is up and running. maybe you finally sold it. i much prefer a chevy anytime. here's an impala, that was just down the street from your car. nice, no?

it was threatening to rain that day, same as today—maybe it is always cloudy in chino? and probably reminded me of last year's show.

i briefly thought of taking the fifteen minute drive out to belatedly shoot some pictures at the pomona swapmeet. had my bag and tripod with me, in case there was time after my appointment. when that went south, i looked toward the sky and seeing the airplanes, heading toward lax, flying so low they might as well have landed on the freeway, i took that as a sign of impending rain, and headed home.

only rained for about an hour here in whittier, so i don't know how it went out there, but of course, i now regret not going. well, maybe next month—oh wait, shit—i'll be on an airplane then. fine. june fourth.

looking at my calendar, i see i still have time off from work scheduled, ending the first week of april. so if i travel anywhere, i'd be coming home the day of the corn feed run. what to do, what to do. already going to miss the chicano park show because of another trip.

well, things are spinning every which way around me at work and at home, so until we meet again, take care old man.

kathy

go dodger blue

got my oil changed today. and they found a few other things, of course.

i'll be needing a new car soon enough, but not today. not from a dealer. they gouge me a bit more every time i take it in, now that it is over ten years old. but any time i get out of there for less than a grand is a good day.

pomona is tomorrow, but so is some rain. i keep checking; the phone app keeps changing it's percentages. not much cover out there, though i suppose a plastic bag would do for the camera.

i have to be somewhere early anyway, so probably shouldn't cut it so close, only to have to leave quickly. so i guess i'll just sleep in and wait until the next meet.

spectacular fleetline in dodger blue. really brave of these guys with convertibles to drive them out with the top down. rain came down, tops went up though.

night night

has been a hell of a week at work. too much work, not enough time, slipping deadlines. unwanted overtime. cancelled day off. some people got let go. somebody died.

pretty sure i have to work tomorrow and/or sunday. but first i need to get my oil changed.

meanwhile i'm hanging with my kid's dog, who keeps bringing me stuff to play tug of war, and not letting me type more than a few words at a time. he wants more attention, though i've played with him and walked him all afternoon since i got here. and here he is again.

i'll just post this car up because i like it. not quite full dark, but it is from only a single frame from the camera, since all the exposures of the five i did of it were the same exposure time, so i kicked the pixels a bit to bring it out of the background some.

whipped cream

i'm at my parents' house this evening. my dad is slicing off a huge piece of pineapple upside down cake and dumping it in a bowl. my mom is asking him repeatedly if he wants whipped cream for it, each time increasing the decibel level of the question.

he's wearing big ass cover the ear headphones, listening to the tv playing in the other room, no doubt at a mind numbing volume. he used to fly p-2vs in the navy, so his hearing isn't very good as it is.

i was hoping she'd flip a spoonful of it at him and start a food fight, but he eventually he looked up and saw she was flapping her lips at him, and i was sadly disappointed. he didn't want any anyway. pretty sure he poured some milk on it. so ewww.

is this my future? why retire?

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i've shot this car many times before, but not sure i've posted any. owner always always parks at shows and proceeds to take pictures of every car he sees at the shows. he's always stopping to greet his friends, and even me.

i'd have liked this a lot more without those tricked out trucks in the background.

love the rain...oh that sky...