Posts Tagged: automobiles
Ace Lincoln, El Cerrito, CA. © Neo Serafimidis
Procrastination. Mine knows no bounds. Sometimes it kicks in at the metalevel wherein I put off doing a task that I only began in order to avoid what I really ought to be doing in the first place. This could be a virtuous chain if I could bend it back around to the thing that started it off.
Tonight, I seem to avoiding finishing my taxes and doing the work I brought home on Friday, among numerous other things. And why would one bring work home unnecessarily unless there was something else waiting that one was avoiding at all costs. To be honest, I did manage to send off a couple emails, shuffle some papers, and by golly these photos are not going to process themselves, you know. So, I’m getting something accomplished. Maybe after this I’ll go bury the dead pet mouse stored in the freezer. Dang, why didn’t I think of that while it was still light out?
Continental Divide
Lincoln Continental
One might suppose that on the day before I start a new job I would be focused on preparing myself. Such leisure would have been most welcome. Instead, it was a crazy day of non-stop errands too numerous to list here, but ending at midnight with the completion of the dessert item for the international potluck in Theo’s second grade class tomorrow. Somehow, I managed to get this shot of the Continental in between taking my mom back home and getting parts at the hardware store. So, all that running around was good for something after all.
Childhood Relived, part 2
Still from It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.
Having purchased the DVD in a bargain bin a few months ago, I managed to pass on to Theo another small part of my own childhood experience just last night: It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. I first saw it on TV when I was about 8yo. Unfortunately I never saw it in the theater, since this is shot in some crazy-wide Ultra Panavision.
I had not seen it since I was a child, which is to say, a long, long, long, long time. Consequently, this film held an exalted place in my idealized memory of childhood and of comedic film. In that sense, seeing it again after 40 years was ever-so-slightly disappointing, though I still enjoyed it a lot. (I would have enjoyed it more if we had a decent size flat screen. What we have is a small 30″ diagonal, and every once in a while, the size matters.) But more importantly, Theo enjoyed and managed to get through it despite it’s 2-and-half-hour-plus length. He even awoke this morning talking about it.
I’m still not sure who among this ridiculously huge and incredible cast steals the movie: Phil Silvers or Dick Shawn. Ok, or maybe Jonathan Winters. Or maybe it’s the automobiles! I was in awe of the array of vintage vehicles, from modest Dodge Darts to Chrysler Imperials, and most of them destroyed during the course of the film!
Still from It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.
Still from It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.
Firebird, will you forgive me?
1969 Firebird
My first car was a ’69 Pontiac Firebird. It was black on black, in beautiful condition, exactly like the one pictured above. Being 16 years old, I basically thrashed it and sold it after a couple years for a mere $800. I think I paid about $1500, so I suppose that is not so bad. Just seeing the photo above made me queasy with nostalgia and regret. God I loved that car. I wish I still had it. For years, and I mean many years, I would periodically have dreams wherein I would suddenly find it somewhere, or remember that I had it somewhere, or otherwise be reunited with it in some totally illogical way, and be SO happy. Then, I would wake up and be SO disappointed.
Well, it looks like I could replace it for about $20,000. I suppose that’s not so bad either. If I had a garage for it, I might consider such a thing.
I’ll admit I’m also sentimental about Pontiac in general and can barely believe it really doesn’t exist anymore. There were a lot of Pontiacs in my youth. My childhood friends Richie and Debbie were a Pontiac family. Their mom drove a silver Bonneville and their dad drove a red ’67 Firebird. Eventually, my cousin Tommy bought the Firebird. By then it was a metallic root beer brown, kinda like the color of my Schwinn Varsity 10-speed bike. In high school my friend Mike had a silver ’76 Trans Am. Another friend had a GTO. The list goes and on. How Pontiac came to the point of building the Aztec (ugliest car ever) and then disappearing from the face of the earth is still beyond me. But so it goes…
Old Habits Die Hard
Blue Rambler / © neo serafimidis 2011
I left work just a bit early today in the hope of getting to the computer repair shop across the street from UC Berkeley, Fix That Mac, to pick up my revived laptop with the new hard drive. It went quickly enough that I decided I would try to get to the lighting shop, Metro Lighting, and pickup two pendant lights we ordered for our kitchen. I was guessing that they closed at 5 pm, and it was now 4:48. I could make it if I didn’t dawdle. I was doing well enough until I passed this guy somewhere about Bancroft and Sacramento. I pulled over, jumped out, and took a few fast photos. This was my favorite, which has me relying on the same old formula I’ve been beating like a dead horse for a couple years now. I can’t help it. I try to do something else, but cars just beckon. Then I got back in my car and drove. Yes, I made it just in time.
Corvair Square
I recently changed the route of my bike commute to work. I was simply trying to get away from San Pablo Ave, which, while it is the straightest shot to my workplace, is also very bike-unfriendly. There are lots of cars, obstacles, freeway on/off ramps, and debris.
I decided that I would try to slide over to Hollis Ave through Emeryville, and this took me into west Oakland. The result is a new crop of photos, and some incubating ideas for future series.
Blogger’s Block and Art Walk Therapy
Vista Cruiser and Barracuda For Sale
It began with writing. I found it harder and harder to do. The entries slowed to a trickle and then virtually stopped. It spread to the camera. I was able to shoot, but not with any focus or care. Going through the results at the end of the day, or week, became more and more confusing and difficult. And yet, I feel the need to get the expression out more than ever before. There are many parts to the problem, some of them seemingly contradictory. On one hand, I feel at a loss as to what exactly to try to develop in my photography or how to go about it. I feel like I’ve burned out on square format, color-tweaked, cropped cars. Everything I’ve done seems so dull and amateurish. On the other hand, I have so many ideas floating around that seem like good starting points that I can’t focus on any one for very long. Or even get past the contemplation stage. Underlying all of it is a vague feeling that I should not be thinking about this stuff at all, given my current under employment and other life obligations.
A small breakthrough tonight after returning from a “flickr photographers” show at Vox in Sacramento. Flickr friend Tom Spaulding had some nice work in the show. The show was inspirational, as was art at a couple other galleries, and the whole art party craziness of the Second Saturday Art Walk. It was my first time seeing it, and I was impressed by the sheer size of the turnout and number of galleries, music, clubs, restaurants and other participants. It was definitely worth the hour drive.
Browsing and organizing shots from the past month or so, I came back to this shot of the Vista Cruiser and Barracuda and just really liked it. It vaguely reminds me of Robert Bechtle, whose work I really like and whose name has come up in conversation with artist friends a couple times recently. I tried it in black and white, and really liked that too. It feels like the start of a return of clarity. If I can just keep at it, one shot at a time…
The Junked Edsel and the Biodiesel Carnival Bread Truck
The Junked Edsel and the Biodiesel Carnival Bread Truck, originally uploaded by neocles.
Last Friday, May 30, while biking to work, I stopped to take some quick shots of this junked Edsel parked off Murray St. just west of 9th in Berkeley. I rode through the empty lot, which is essentially an old railroad right-of-way, and set my bike down against the curb. This was far enough back to not have it appear in the shots I was taking. Near the bike was a large white pickup truck parked at the curb.
I had taken just a few shots and had my back to my bike taking the shot above. That is when I heard a loud snapping and crunching sound. I turned around to see the big white pickup running over my bike!
The truck, from Berkeley Unified, pulled over, and the driver got out. He looked pretty surprised himself, saying, “Jesus, that scared the hell out of me.” He apologized and was generally nice about the whole thing, as was I. I was too stunned to be angry or to even take a picture of it, if you can believe that.
The driver said, “That’s the problem with these big diesels, you can’t see right down in front of you.” My bike was a ways out in front of him, so I am not quite sure how he missed seeing it. Maybe he did but misjudged the location as pulled away from the curb.
We exchanged numbers and he drove off, leaving me to assess the damage. Fortunately, he only got part of it, mostly the handle bars. Most of what’s up there was crushed to bits: bell, light, gear shift, brake handle The bars, gooseneck (do they still call them that) and the seat are pretty bent up too. Surprisingly, the rest of it was in good enough shape that I could slowly ride it to work and home again. A professional inspection will tell what shape the frame is in.
Hopefully, I will be able to get the issue settled and bike repaired so I can get back to saving fuel, money, and greenhouse gases. And shooting more commute shots from the safety of the sidewalk.
what hath flickr wrought?
Maverick Xpro, originally uploaded by neocles.
My photographer friend, Joe, who himself pulled a Houdini on a substantial flickr presence, IM’d a link to me today. It is to Tim Connor’s blog post about a New York Times article about flickr and the rise of a flickr style of photography. I found it very interesting and cause for reflection about what I think I am doing with with the creative impulse, photography, and flickr. I don’t have any answers to that rumination just yet. But I did notice that telephony is not yet one of the technologies by which this came to you. So far, it’s newspaper, blog, IM, blog. If only I could have twittered in to your wireless refrigerator or toaster oven. Or something.
In any case, let me know how you think my stuff like the shot above fits in to the “style” described, or not.
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