park it like itz hawwwt

this chevy is such a fluorescent orange it hurts my eyes. owner keeps it very clean. it's a ’64, i think, but is it a truck, a wagon, a custom...? i dunno.

anyway, he asked me to take a picture of it once before, the first night i stopped at the broiler, and i never really did anything with it. you can see it here. he showed up again at bob's a couple of weeks ago, and again asked if i could take a picture of it.

i like this one a little bit better, since it wasn't crowded into a parking spot, and the angle is better. i also like the earlier shot, as the night's darkness and lights have their own interesting qualities. maybe i'll see it again when the fall is coming, the skies are more spectacular, the sunset earlier, and create a happy meltdown of all the best qualities i want in a picture.

suits me to a t

always wonder what these hot rods once looked like. at what point does someone think, "i'm going to remove this, insert that, repaint it...," when they have a perfectly good car. some of these come out great in the end, some have earned the ratrod title.

this 1928 ford model t (maybe the owner is just monogramming his initial on the radiator) was pretty well done. has the required big engine thing (wall-E), and i love the added extra big fat tires on the back.

i should have done a panorama here - wish i hadn't clipped off the front of the chevy. live and learn.

if i had wings

would this a be a bat or a raven if it were a bird? this sleek ’59 impala was at the garden grove main street show a couple of weeks ago. back when it was still cool outside. who turned up the heat overnight? guess i'll be going to fewer shows now, and glad i have a stockpile of images to play with. went to fuddrucker's yesterday and about had a heat stroke. not really. i wasn't feeling too good to begin with, add the heat and the sweat, and it was just enough to drive me away too early.

i believe that's the owner, camouflaged in his camo chair, just his leg peeking out. maybe the chair was swallowing him...

i think these are just about my favorite car. gotta be the fins. or wings. “dear god, make me a bird, so i can fly far. far, far away.”

one twenty

i look forward to days like this. overcast skies, which add more drama to a picture, as well as softening the light. only trouble is, it keeps a lot of cars away from the shows. either the threat of rain ruining a perfect wash and buff job or it's just too cold to stand around outside for a period of time.

i'd seen this packard several months earlier, but had shot it from down low. just a big shot of a grill topped with a hood ornament. interesting to me, but not enough to bother with here. and here it was, not too crammed in with other cars because of the weather. the owner was nice enough to chat and move his chairs away from the front of it for my shots.

i suppose he's long since given up seeing it here...i warned him it could be a while. well, really has been only a week or so. so many pictures to choose from, and i remembered him. thank you for moving your chair. now if i could only have gotten the next car over to move somewhere else.

oscar is no grouch

i was making the rounds at ruby's, waiting for my hubbie to arrive from a late evening at work, and stumbled across this beautiful 1957 chevy nomad. it's another car that i've rarely seen out and about. usually only see it at the whittier uptown car shows in august. it's my better half's favorite car of all, and when he finally arrived, i mentioned that it was here, he headed straight for it. he got this shot and this one.

just a fine example of this model, but it stands out over others with its glittery roof job. can only guess how many coats of paint it took to get a good solid cover of sparkle. i'm no girly girl, but i tried to do that with fingernail polish as a kid, and could never never get a nice solid coat.

i tried to catch some of the roof here, but i can only get a little bit of it, being that i'm not that tall. maybe i should keep a little ladder in my trunk for such occasions. might even make for some more interesting angles for other taller cars. better that i don't come straight from work in a skirt and use it either...

well, my hubbie chatted the owner up, and found out they won't be at this year's whittier show, being otherwise busy, but will be at a show in pomona, i believe they said, in october. might be out of town then, so glad to have caught it here.

third time is the charm

three posts in two weeks of the same car? well, you have to admit it is cool. but mostly, he is interested in buying prints, and i know he's good for it.

i'll restrain myself from going all cadillac all the time, and i do have several very nice ones to work on for future posts...

racing of the bull

well, my day has sucked so far. was driving up to san luis obispo this morning, to go see my kid play baseball. got as far as the big hill on the 101 heading down into camarillo and blew a tire. little tiny shoulder. crawled out on the passenger side. people insanely speeding down the hill. thank goodness for the aaa guy. don't envy his job changing the driver side front tire with all those "sweet" drivers barrelling down that hill. found a tire place in camarillo and got a whole new set – had over 78,000 miles on the original tires, so it was probably time anyway.

anyway, got that done and no way was i going to make it to the kid's game at all, so with assurances that he was going to have a ride home, i turned around, and here i am playing with my pictures. was too late to even drive out to some car show in ventura, though a very nice old woody did pass me while i was stuck on that hill.

hubby has taken his mother and nephew out to disneyland for the evening, so i'm blasting some music and getting sleepy at the same time. 

enough of my busy day. you're really here for a picture, so here's an interesting hot rod. caught it just before the owner drove off...he was going home to fetch some other car for the show here in tustin. here's what's left of a 1928 essex super six somewhere under this customization. the spider web detail seems a little unnecessary, but i do like the bull's head hood ornament.

falcon sans snowman

yesterday, i happened to be in anaheim on business. not far from the show at angelo's burger joint. i'd stopped there several months ago, where there happened to be only two guys standing in the lot with their cars at the time. that had been disappointing.

happily, there were definitely more cars, though i didn't stay long. i was still dressed in my work clothes, and it's difficult, but not impossible to do my ground crawl in a skirt and dress shoes. i did a few anyway; hope i didn't flash anyone.

so the owner of this falcon closed the trunk and moved his chair so i could shoot his car. thank you ever so much. then, since it was early and not too many cars had shown up, he told me about the history of his car, the model in great detail, the development from the falcon to the mustang...the guy has an encylopaedic knowledge of the old cars, makes, models, engines, bits and pieces, nuts and bolts. really amazing to listen to, and listen i did for at least ten minutes, if not longer. it was interesting, though a lot of the detail went over my head.

his baby here, he said had three previous owners, all female. last one just had too many cars, and sold this one to him, pretty much in the condition you see it. he did mention that it had been repainted with a special acrylic enamel paint that you can't get anymore, the interior had been redone, the engine had been reworked or rebuilt. that it had a super secret feature on the gear shift that most owners didn't know about, that i can't begin to tell you what it does, because i've forgotten the details already. maybe it has a steering wheel like speed racer's, with buttons that do different things...maybe it makes that cha cha cha sound effect when it jumps... i've gone off on a tangent

he said he lived the american graffiti life as a kid, and often hung out at harvey's, now known as the bob's broiler in downey.

he also carried pictures in his wallet of his friend's cars, and his other car – i know it was red, and it was worth about $60,000, but i'm having a brain fart, and can't remember what it was. i know it has wheels, and was very cherry. it's almost 11 p.m. as i type this; i've had a long week, been to two car shows this evening, and my eyes are tired, so i apologize for not remembering some of the stuff.

he mentioned another car show up the road a few miles, so i decided to drive by. turned out to be the cypress show. i drove around the perimeter, but didn't stop, as i was tired and not dressed to do a decent job on the cars that i saw. maybe another time, now that i know how to get there.

gotta get some sleep; i may have to drive out to san luis obispo tomorrow :)

got some ’splainin to do lucy

i took this picture a while back at the show in dove canyon. the lady running the show told me they named the car "lucy." i didn't ask the owner at the time why or who it was named after, and now i suppose i won't find out...apparently they've canceled all the rest of the shows for the summer, perhaps it's permanent, i don't know. too bad really. small show, nice cars, convenient location. guess they'll go on to other shows nearby. heard san clemente has started a show, and that's probably what killed this one. maybe i'll check it out.

as i've said before, i've been sooooo busy lately. lots of work. my kid's baseball games. stayed too late at the broiler in downey tonight – up past my bedtime again. makes it more difficult to find time to work on a picture to post.

i took a lot of pictures tonight, with several requests for possibly buying prints. you'll have to be patient, they take time, and i'm probably driving up to san luis obispo this weekend for baseball games, so even less time again.

such a prix

not posting on tuesday, as i plan to have dinner with my boy, then perhaps hit the fuddrucker's show in el toro. so here's a second post for today. enjoy!

the pinstripe detail on this ‘76 pontiac grand prix is amazing. you really must see this one in person. the color is gorgeous and the wavy cross hatching on the center of the hood is so meticulous, it's hard to imagine how painstaking it was to achieve, unless you are familiar with masking for airbrushing back in the day.

found it this day in the back lot of the downey broiler, but also saw it two days later at ruby's in whittier. should have got it a ruby's with the sun setting on it...the color was irridescent....but i didn't...don't know why. should've would've could've. maybe next time.