Going Back Backstage

As previously mentioned, on last year's vacation, we took the Casino backstage tour again. The first time we'd taken the tour was on our 2013 vacation. Once again, here's a remix picture of the outside as a line drawing!!!

I likely could have made a post about just the tour on the previous trip, but never did. I remember our guide on that particular tour was a girl named Porsche that my wife really liked. The closest I did was the years later tale of the Chime Tower post, which I first heard on that particular tour.

As outside, so is it inside!!! A beautiful building, with fine construction. The ground floor houses the theater, which is a work of art. It is also nearly acoustically perfect, and on the tour it was mentioned that it was measured to use the same geometry for some other auditorium, possibly Carnegie Hall or maybe Radio City Music Hall.

Murals adorn the walls, and the ceiling is adorned with gold leaf.

Centered at the top of the stage is a depiction of Botticelli's Venus, our guide noted that the designer had depicted her as a redhead!!!

The construction was right around the time of the transition from silent movies to the talkies, so naturally an organ was included. It's being worked on currently.

Our tour guide had pointed out from the theater the private suite of William Wrigley Jr., but noted that he generally preferred to be out mingling with the guests. This is the view from his suite.

This was also during the big band era, and there were several posters of bands that had preformed there.

The projection room featured several generations of projectors, from arc light projectors to digital projectors. This was our tour guide, I don't remember his name, but it might have been Tom. He did a great job. The wall behind him has several people that have signed their names. Most of them, he said, you probably don't know, but prominently in the middle was the signature of Stan Lee!!!

There were displays with several vintage pictures of the area, and construction of the Casino, as well as the original structure that was there.

On the top floor, the world's largest round dance floor!!! Something new that they're doing now, they've re-purposed it as a skating rink!!! There's a spinning ordainment in the middle of the ceiling that Surrogate wanted to get underneath and take a picture of. There weren't too many people skating up there, and I told him he probably could just stride out there like he was supposed to be there, lay down and get his picture and no one would give him any trouble!!!

The tour finished up on the outside promenade. Our guide was fielding any questions, and I asked him if he was familiar with the story of the Chime Tower, and why the ramps were no longer carpeted. He wasn't, and I was able to relate the story as I had been told on our previous tour.

After the tour was over, we worked our way down to the next level where the restrooms are located. They had this nice bar area, where they had a video playing about the old days of Avalon and the Casino.

And as teased in the previous post, the selfie in the restroom mirror!!!

Remix Review

I've been using the photos remix tool quite a bit. The younger says I'm a Facebook mom with it, that's fair. I figured I'd do another “instant” post with some of the pictures from the past year re imagined.

To start off, I took the picture of the Simian Button Man from the cover artwork of Down at Flathead, from the literary stack post. Looks like it changed 'em into a rodent Button Man!!! I enjoyed the read, but it felt like it lost the thread and found other threads. When we were on Catalina, I asked a few of the locals if they knew the author, I wanted to ask him what happened to the moon buggy!!!

I'd made mention of having gifted a stuffed Alan to a friend, who now has it on her shelf next to a plastic Perry the Platypus. Since platypuses are already a strange mix, remixing the picture made him into a duck!!! And Alan looks a bit like a dinosaur.

On the same post, I'd shared the X-ray of my broken metatarsal. It got the break fairly accurate, but I'm missing my second toe!!! It's hard to believe that it's been a year since I broke it, it's mostly fine now!!!

I'd made a post from a couple of events, the belated Valentine's Day dinner, and our trip to a Kings game. From the first, I took the picture of my wife with her chocolate malt, and it changed her into a Disney mom!!!

I took the picture my wife took of me doing the re creation of the burrito and quesadilla attacking pictures, and... well, it took it from a side view to a front view, and less of an attack on the food!!! Also, now that I think about it, kind of made me into a Disney dad!!!

And, the selfie of us in the stands at the Kings arena...

And Bailey waving the Kings flag!!! I'd done it as a claymation look, too, and it changed him into a human!!!

I did a lot of car stuff this year. Most of it was on the Studebaker and Kutcher. The main thing that I accomplished with Zonker is to get her to pass smog!!! At some point in there, I'd decided that I didn't have nearly enough pictures of Zonker with the top down, so I took some time on a sunny afternoon and drove over to a local park and took a few shots. As always, the drawing look of remixing the picture yielded a nice result!!!

Another shot, it made it into a hard top!!! As far as I've been able to tell, only the Pontiac sibling came as a hard top. There have been a couple of companies that have done hard top conversions, but you know what??? I don't think I'd want it as a hard top!!!

Had the engine rebuild and swap done on Scruffy, as well as replacing the battery and getting some junkyard parts (including that very cool instrument panel!!!) for her. More on the engine swap to follow...

Another thing that I did a good amount of this year was going to the beach!!! I had been thinking of going there today, for New Years, but it was drizzly most of the morning. Anyway, I did another line drawing of the composite picture I'd done of the younger and friend at Horny Corner, and it came out pretty good!!!

Did a second of the same picture in the claymation style, and it came out funny!!! Looks like they're buried in the sand!!! To be fair, the original was only from the waist up.

Did the picture I took at Grill 'em All of Surrogate giving his sister the side eye. Not bad. Funny, it put a boat in the background with an umbrella instead of a sail!!!

And a shot of the sunset at Santa Monica beach as a painting!!!

And the inheritance of the Studebaker... has ended up taking up a good amount of my time!!! I have yet to finish the intended upgrades to the fuel system, and once I do hopefully it will be fairly roadworthy!!! Remix made it into a cartoon!!!

And in the drawing style, it came out great!!! Also got the Falcon in the picture!!!

The Gaslight Anthem and Counting Crows concert was a great show!!! The drawing of Adam came out great...

The claymation look rendering of the same picture, not so much!!!

I love the way this picture of the Casino from Descanso beach came out in something of an art deco style!!! This is actually an older picture, because we never made it over to Descanso beach this year. I had done a drawing style of a picture I took from the ocean side, and it came out pretty good. Then I did the same picture in the claymation style, and it came out looking not the same... it showed the front side, with a sign on the top, “Avalon Casino”.

I love the way the picture I took of Surrogate making breakfast came out!!!

Not shared, but one of the pictures I took while we were on the Casino Tour was of one of the restrooms. It looked very period correct, and upscale from what you see today. If I ever do manage to do a full post on that, it may be included, but for now, here's a selfie of us in the mirror, remixed as a drawing!!!

And the picture from when we bought our hats in 16-bit!!!

And from the ridge tour we went on...

And Sid!!! Can't forget the world's greatest cat!!! Here's how he'd look in his tube in 16-bit!!!

The picture I took of the guys in their Halloween costumes came out looking great, they look considerably more menacing in the remix!!!

When I had the engine swapped, I'd asked the guy to hold onto the engine he took out (which, if you're keeping track, was the one that originally was in 3). I'd not followed up with him afterwards, and had figured he'd probably recycled it by now, but he called me about a week ago about it. I asked him if he could break it down and give it a cleaning, and I'd pick it up. This Monday I picked it up, and it's much easier to move around when it's in pieces!!! As predicted, the crankshaft is scored, but he says it'll clean up no problem. Anyway, I stored the block, head, and crankshaft in a basement corner and took a picture before I put the box of covers and internals on the top, and remix came up with an interesting take!!!

And that time that Sidney was curled up in the trash can!!!

From our trip to the fondue place on our anniversary, I actually had AI modify the picture. I asked it to change the pot to a cauldron full of a questionable green liquid, and put a hooded cloak on me!!!

Keeping in the same theme, I took another picture from years ago, our crow friend on the iron chair, and it remixed it to be quite Halloween-ey!!

Winter Wrap Up Random

So as usual, there's been a lot that goes on!!! Figured I'd go random and encapsulate a bit of it!!!

I'd mentioned that I bought a new set of tires for Kutcher, and took 'em to get aligned. I had the whole motor mounts fiasco with that, and still had the rest of the front end to rebuild. I bought all the stuff, and managed to get it done in two days, one for each side, with nearly no damage to myself!!! It was before our anniversary getaway, I saw and took this picture of a bruise I'd given myself while we were on that trip.

I was making good progress, and would have continued onto the other side, but this time of year the sunlight fades far too early. Plus side, the weather was good for it!!! Don't think I've ever mentioned, but I bought myself a cool little LED work light years ago. It has a built in battery, and came with a wall and 12-volt chargers. I broke it out when it started getting dark, but I think it was the first time I've tried to use the 12-volt charger, and it isn't working. Not long after we got Sidney, he hopped up on the counter and ate through the wall charger cord. I had bought some sleeving to re wire it with an armor coat. I laid it on the floor to take a picture of the light and the repair, and Sid had to come along and posed with his victim!!!

Here's one of my favorite new shirts that I've recently bought from a thrift store, the Polaroid of Shrek and Donkey after they've just listened to the “Welcome to Duloc” animatronics!!!

The final segment of Scruffy's dashboard lights finally decided to get with the program!!! Looks good!!!

Sidney is as people cat as ever, even though he never become the shoulder cat I'd hoped. Younger will pick him up and baby carry him, he's been doing it since we got him, and he... tolerates it. He's not really much of a lap cat, either, except when I'm in the bathroom!!! He's also a big fan of sink drinks. He does leave his mended leg sticking out straight when he's lounging, though, I hope it doesn't bother him. Got this shot of him sitting with it sticking funny, and a cat yawn!!!

I've picked up a few more books to read. I was in the midst of one when I bought The Left Hand of Darkness, and my wife thought it looked interesting, so she had started in on it. I don't remember exactly when it was, but I always watch Jeopardy, and one of the contestants was a science fiction book fan, and said that it was her favorite, so that was the impetus to get it. I have yet to start in on it, because when I finished the one I was reading, my wife had it. She's since declared it “too weird”, so it's next, but in the meantime I'd picked up Wuthering Heights, since it's one of those classics that's spoken of often. I read it, and was able to track it without any difficulty, but it seemed like a bit of a slog reading through it. I see there's a movie of it coming out soon. I don't think I'll be going to see it. Atlas Shrugged, I'm reading right now, and within the first few pages, I knew I'd like it!!! It is just so well written!!! I'll probably be reading more Rand in the future!!!

I'd mentioned looking into getting a Kangol hat, just because it was mentioned in a Counting Crows song, so of course they keep coming up in my suggestions. I went back and looked again, and once again didn't see any I'd be willing to pay the asking price for, but there was one that had “Make an offer” as an option, so I did, and now I've got a Kangol hat!!! It was a reasonable price to me, but still may be one of the most expensive hats I own!!! So far, I've worn it once.

We made a follow up trip to the junkyard!!! Primarily, it was to get the $10 core for the hood, but they also had the correct year Saturn SL2 there, and I was able to get the bumper bracket. Not mentioned on that post, surrogate had it parked at his work, and something fell over and cracked the passenger side fender, so we were finally able to get a replacement fender as well. I put the bracket on, but the fender still needs sanded down and painted, then installed. I think the window for the core on it will expire soon, if it hasn't already. Anyway, a couple of cars over was a Cadillac, with a full set of center caps. I didn't know if they would fit, but I grabbed them anyway. Unfortunately, when I was trying to get them off, one of the faces came loose. I used double stick tape on the back of it and got it back in place, but it's since parted ways. They extend a bit wide, but at least I had a full matching set for a while!!!

I bought this shirt at the same time I got the Shrek and Donkey one. They were both tagged with the color that was on sale for $1.99 that day, and I liked the design on this one. I tried to use the Google Lens to translate it (since I didn't want to have something I didn't know what it was, or if it was somehow offensive) and it came up with something like “Let summer bloom”, which sounded good to me, but I found out later it's a Bad Bunny album title, more something along the lines of “A summer without you”. Cool artwork.

For Halloween the younger wanted to go as a character from Team Fortress, the Scout. I think there had been talk among his friends to go as various characters, but that didn't happen. We went to the thrift store to try and find some headphones, and located some black and white shoes and the red shirt. I hacked off the one side, and fabricated a boom mic with some wire and a cork.

Surrogate went as a bank robber from another video game franchise, and another friend of theirs re purposed the goat skull mask from a couple of years ago.

On the same shopping trip that I got the aforementioned sale shirts, I also saw an aloha shirt with gray tone background. I took a closer look, and the print is of different colored monorails!!! Sold!!!

7-11 has been featuring Mountain Dew Pitch Black on tap. I quite like it!!! It's been a regular go to for me for a while now. Don't believe I've ever mentioned, we've been to Applebee's a few times, and they have a Dark Berry Bash flavor there that I also really like. Interestingly, the Pitch Black flavor is actually a fairly light blue color!!!

We went to Subways for the first time in quite a while recently. When it was topping time, I told the sandwich artist to give me as many olives as he was allowed to, and he came through with flying colors!!! I had to take a picture, then I whispered to surrogate, “This is going in the spank bank!!!” I usually don't tip at fast food places, but for all those olives (he did my wife's up proper, as well) I stuck some in the tip jar!!!

I was out in the yard recently, and Candy Pain drove by in what I assume was the same Toyota she had before. The fuzz has been removed, and it's been painted red, with a Coca Cola swoop on the the side and her name. It was there and gone before I could even think of taking a picture, and the only ones I've been able to find have the old look.

We had Thanksgiving at my mom's retirement home. She reserved a private room, and we had our own server. It wasn't that late, maybe noon or so, but you know, old people apparently eat early. They had traditional Thanksgiving fare, but when the server gave us the menus, he apologized and said they'd already run out of turkey. He was taking our order, and my mom asks for turkey. Once again, he apologizes and says they're out of turkey. My mom replies, "Oh. Well, I'll have the turkey!!!" I don't think her hearing is very good. Afterwards, we headed out to the patio and played a couple of card games, then played a Jeopardy card game my wife had given me for Christmas a couple of years ago that we hadn't played yet. I took the first game in a runaway, then played Alex for the next round, and the younger took that game, also in a runaway!!! Makes a dad proud. I'd also brought a game the older had down in the basement, Cards Against Humanity. We'd played it before with surrogate, and maybe Wolf of Cheese Ball (or maybe both, it was a while ago) but my wife and mom had never played it. We had a blast!!!

We have a friend who is a single mother (of 5!!! and recently adopted an infant from someone who couldn't properly care for him!!!) who was having some car issues. She said her brakes needed work, and when she had a tire replaced recently, the guy told her the bushings on one of the front control arms were shot. I offered to do the brakes and replace the control arms (figured both sides would probably be in similar condition), and did it a couple weeks ago. I had some difficulty, but nothing like the motor mounts fiasco. Got another nice bruise, this time on my arm, so I get a chance to show off my tattoo!!!

I had gone out to get some burgers back in October, and stopped in at the Arco AM/PM for some beverages, and it had burned!!! It didn't take the whole place out (amazingly) but it charred the underside of one awning and melted the sign!!! They had the point of origin pump boxed up with plywood, and have yet to do anything with it. I told the girl at the counter I was glad I wasn't around when it happened!!! I have a history with fires at Arcos...

When I was doing Kutcher's front end, I had the windows down and the radio playing, which is what I usually do while I'm working on a car. When I finished up, the battery was low enough that it wouldn't crank. I boosted it, and didn't have an issue from that point on. A few weeks later, surrogate and the younger had borrowed it, and had left the lights on while they got some lunch, and once again, the battery was too low to crank. They jumped it, and had no more issues, but I was wondering about the battery's condition. I stopped in at an Auto Zone and had them check it, and they said it indeed was beginning to fail. It was a 3 year warranty battery, and I asked when I'd bought it. They said it was three years back in July or August, so it was out of warranty. It was still working, so I let it go while I shopped around to see if I could locate a Die Hard battery. It doesn't appear that you can get them anymore, but I found that Wal Mart has a AGM battery with a 4 year warranty for $20 less than the 3 year Auto Zone battery!!! Sold!!! I had it shipped, and it has a $12 core that I still need to cash in on.

And finally, the second shirt I picked up on our anniversary. It's a Detroit Muscle shirt, and it has a lot written on it, and the profile of what looks like a 30's sedan delivery rod. It's roomy on me, and has a faint smell of oil to it which doesn't go away no matter how many times I wash it. Which I kind of like.