Car Crazy

If you didn't know I am a car nut. Ever since I was little I have loved cars. When I like 9 I had a subscription to Rod and Custom. Muscle cars were my early love. My favorite American car is a Mercury Sedan '49 flavor.


This is the car but if I were to own it. It would not look like this.

When I was 12 my uncle Jesse taught me to drive stick in an old Jeep in the parking lot at Sav-Ons Drug Store in North Park.

When I was 14 my dad bought a 71 Chevelle in Malibu trim. He had it painted red with black racing stripes. I was to be mine on my 16th birthday. Long story short that didn't happen.


Not the actual car just what it looked like.

When I was 16 my uncle Andy would let me drive his truck when I lived at my grandmothers house in Lomita.

I didn't get license until I was 18. Since I was 14 I had been taking the city bus everywhere. This was to be my freedom...finally.

Since it had been years since I had driven a stick it was time to learn all over again. I took my mom's car unbeknown to her and taught myself on the 163 in Balboa Park during rush hour all by myself. I stalled so many times. It was a rough outing.


Pic taken during the '03 SD fires.

It wasn't until I was 20 and I after having to share my mom's '84 300zx with my sister that I decided to buy a car. I had my eye set on a '99 Chevy S-10 LS Xtreme edition. After a couple days of looking I had it. My first car err truck.









I had it for 3 years and about 45k miles. Lots of races and trips in that car. Trips to LA for car shows, Palmdale for races and cursing around causing trouble. I had one accident in my truck where I did a 180 into a guardrail causing $6k in damage.

I eventually traded in my truck for a '98 Honda Civic. This was my first car that I bought my self. No cosigner and no one to help me with the paperwork. I bought this car in '02.









In '04 my neighbor across the street was selling her '87 RX7 Turbo II. I picked it up for $500 and was instantly in love. The purr of the rotary engine, the injector leak. This was by far my most favorite car to date and least driven. This was my project car. I tore that thing apart and put it back together. It was a fun car that still had a lot of life left on its original seals and rings.









Since I now had a car I didn't have to worry about breaking and being stranded I sold my civic. I needed a tow vehicle and a '01 Toyota Tundra Limited fit the bill. Power was always on tap and the luxury interior was nice. Unfortunately 2 years later in '06 gas had skyrocketed. When I bought it gas was about $55 a tank and it was now creeping to $85 a tank. It was time to buckle down and get rid of it.





That's when I bought my current and longest owned car. A '04 Honda Element. And that's the reason for this post. The odometer recently tripped 90k miles. Of all my cars I have had I have owned this one the longest. And while I would love to get another car. I plan on keeping it until it is paid off. I still have another year left. I have also driven the most in this car. 2 trips to SF, 3 trips to Dallas and countless trips to LA from SD and SD to LA.




Fresh off the lot

I am always thinking ahead or at least try to. And for my next vehicle I am thinking about either a jeep or a lexus sedan, LS 430 if I can swing it. But those will have to wait a while.

WEEK 4

This week has been a blur. Lets see, Monday was pretty typical. I presented my homework in class and Sean likes the direction I am taking my project. I can't recall if I have mentioned what I am doing. If not, we are taking KFC and rebranding them. My direction is being all about fried chicken and owning it. After class I went grocery shopping before going home.


Rain during the weekend brought snow to the San Gabriel Mountains

Tuesday was printmaking and for my next project I will be doing a 2 plate print. Specifically I will be doing a soft ground intaglio print. After seeing the soft ground technique done with a transparency I decided going this route as opposed to doing a photo plate of the same images. I think this will give it a really rough and unique look.


Printmaking

After getting home I had to do my Art of Research homework. I was working on this forever. It was a slide show and presentation on more research. I was up til 6 finishing it up. I slept for about an hour and a half. I woke up at 7:30 and went to school. I felt like a zombie at school. My presentation went well.


AOR

After class I had to go to Carson to buy an airsoft set up for my packaging class. I got a pretty realistic gun which is a replica of the Hk USP .40. After doing some more research on the gun I found out I had actually used this gun before. After getting home around 3 I pretty much passed out 'til 2am. Being asleep for so long Jesse thought I might have died. lol




Airsoft place

Thursday was another busy day. I laid in bed trying to fall back asleep til but wasn't able to. I finally got out of bed around 5. I was super hungry so I went into the kitchen and started washing dishes and making chorizo and egg burritos for breakfast. After that I got ready and headed off to school. I needed to talk to Steve, the assistant to the chair in graphic design so I could map out next semester's classes. I had heard some classes were already full so I wanted to figure out what I could and couldn't take. I was pleased to find out that if I wanted I could graduate in 7 terms leaving only 3 more left after this term. I don't plan on graduating early. I want to take full advantage of my time here.


He likes chorizo and eggs

After meeting with Steve I came back home to work on some things before heading back to school for our AIGA meeting. After the meeting I went to the CMTEL lab at school to see about possible materials for my packaging project. CMTEL is the Color Materials Trends and Explorations Laboratory. I got some good ideas for my project. Afterwards I met up with Frank in the cafeteria to grab some lunch. Amelia was also there and it was nice to be at school on a day off not having to worry about class for a change.


Material from CMTEL


Amelia trying to give Frank her pony

I left school and headed back home to start on my packaging homework that was due the next day.

Friday morning's modernism class was the usual wait for break to eat and then count down the time left before class is over. Left class and came home to finish working on packaging and print it out. Packaging was individual critiques so I was done pretty quick. Head to the cafeteria after class to meet up with Jesse, Frank and Amelia.


My airsoft stuff for packaging


HK USP .40 replica

It wasn't long before it was time to head home and be done with school for the week. I headed off to Bevmo to get some beer. For this weekend it was Karl's Straus's Amber Lager. I was nice and relaxed before Jesse and I headed to Round Table for some pizza. A couple hours later Gabe showed up making his way up from Chula Vista. He made the trip up because of an audition on Saturday to get into USC for theater. It was around 10 when he arrived. After talking and drinking it was around 4am before calling it a night.

Saturday I woke up and got ready to go to printmaking. I needed to bevel my plates, and then do the soft ground etch to them. I have no idea how these will print. It will be interesting for sure. Either it will look amazing or terrible. I know the individual plates should print cool its the plates together I am unsure of. Have to wait and see. I plan to print them on Tuesday. After printmaking I came home to eat. I was going to go take pics for Art of Research. Being that it was already 5 I wasn't able to go take pics and before I knew it, it was time to get ready. Ready for what you say? The Album Leaf would be playing at El Rey. After heading to Amelia's to pick up a lens we were on our way to Hollywood to see the show.

Jesse is working on a magazine for his editorial class. A couple days before the show he emailed trying to get a photo pass to the show. Well we were in line and were almost out of time to get my camera into the show. After getting into the show we hit the merch table to see if the girl running that could help. She directed us to a guy that happened to be walking right towards us. After a short talk with him there was a decent chance that he could get us a wristband. After a couple mins he was back with a pass.

The opening act was Sea Wolf. They were pretty good. The Album leaf is from San Diego and I have seen them before at the Casbah. This show they were playing with a string quartet. Unfortunately I didn't notice a difference. The show was ok. They played a lot of their new stuff. I took a lot of pics for Jesse but I wasn't very happy with them. Here are some of the pics I took.











After the show we tried to meet up with some friends of Jesse but didn't have much luck. After driving around Hollywood for a little while it was time to go home. We made a pit stop at the taco truck on Sunset and Alvarado. Pretty decent carne asada burrito for LA.

Sunday I slept in til 12 which felt so good. I mulled around the house til about 4. That's when I headed over to the 110/5 interchange to take some pics for art of research.

That was busy week and weekend. I am dreading starting my homework for tomorrow. Maybe I need the day off. We will see what happens.

Random Photos of the Week


Gonna try to make it school to see this. Hopefully I have time.