Fuzzy Wuzzy

I feel like it's been a long time since I've posted, but it appears I've gotten in at least one a month so far this year. I've got one, maybe two more in me. As far as updates go, I finally was able to dispose of the shell of 3 two weekends ago, nearly a year after the incident. One of them is yet another pet project, but for now, you get this!!!

On my walk the other night, I came across this... very fuzzy Toyota!!! While I don't think I'd ever (never say never) do or have a car like this, I kinda love that it exists!!!

I wasn't aware, but apparently there's a lady wrestler named Candy Pain. In finding a picture of her, I came across the name of the artist who did this to the car, she's named Peggy Noland, and naturally, she's also based in L.A.

Don't Mess

Coming soon...

Our vacation stories from this year's trip, but for now:

This was in the state, former Republic of Texas capitol building. Check out his firepower!!! I've been in many government buildings here in California, and the most I ever see is sidearm pistols.

Don't Mess with Texas.

A Clue???

Some time back I made mention of the 512 address at Disney's California Adventure. I had no idea how it came to be, but today I may have stumbled on a clue...

I happen to know the address of a nuts & bolts location of Disney's Imaganeering operations. Today I checked out the street view (hence the low quality graininess), and the opposite end of that address happens to have the address 512!!! Sounds like just the sort of inside inspiration those guys would use!!!

So much more to blog about, one of these days...

The Viral Elephant

I've gotten a small degree of fame about the workplace for my various creations of labels. Since the label killing goes on in the last couple hours of the work day, this is primarily limited to the second and third shift crews.

Having done nothing great since my construction of the Firefly, I was up for any fresh ideas. I was just making up squares one night while killing labels, and several people were inquiring what I was making now. Didn't really know what, so I was open for suggestions.

One of the girls suggested an elephant. Hmmm, I could probably do that!!! Started off just making an oblong into a body. Actually it looked quite a bit like a peanut while it was being done, proving the old adage "you are what you eat". At one point I was going up a level after one of the supervisors and dropped it. He asked what it was, and I told him "It's an elephant!!! See all the wrinkles???" Then onto a pair of ears, a head, and the legs, tail, and of course a trunk. then put it all together. Came out pretty good.

I showed it to the supervisor previously cited. He was amazed, and took a couple pictures. I gave it to the girl who'd suggested it. She was thrilled, said how cute it was. She tells me the next day I see her that her dog wanted to get his paws on it. Seems like he thinks there's something delicious on the inside!!!

Here's where it goes viral. She posts a few shots of it to her instagram, cites me as a genius. The next day a bunch of people are going on about it when they see me!!! Several from the early shift, who I'd never really though about not having seen my creations. The next time I was killing labels, the latest department head comes up to me and tells me she saw the elephant, asks me how I did it (a question I get asked a lot) and if I ever take requests (hint hint). How can I turn her down???

Momentus X3

I'm so very behind, so I'm going to roll three into one!!! I've got Ren Faire & vacation & pictures of the blood moon to do, but for now here's this:

It's been an eventful year for the oldest. He had his prom. Unfortunately, mom STILL hasn't got the flash on the camera down, so the only decent pictures we got were of them getting into the stretch limo...

Of course, he also graduated!!! 2nd highest marks in his class, I've been told.

It was all the way down in San Pedro, right in the middle of drive time traffic. I call bad idea. Supposedly they weren't going to call him up on account of his participation in the Senior Prank, but they ended up doing it anyway.

Finally, just a week back, him and his girlfriend became proud parents to their fur-baby!!! Ain't he cute???

I've Seen Fire & I've Seen Rain

So tonight I was unloading the pics from my camera with the idea of putting together a post of the younger's birthday celebration from last weekend. Those plans have gone awry for now.

Instead, you get this!!! A pair of shots from the night before the event, and a few more from today. The night before, I had been doing a bit of painting in the bathroom, and as I headed outside to wash up the brushes, I saw the chopper I'd been hearing for a while but hadn't even really registered. Looking around (namely at where he was training his spotlight) I located the flashy lights of several fire trucks and the glow of the fire.

My younger & I headed over a ways closer, then up the hill to try and get a better look. A bit hard to tell exactly where it was at in the dark, and we didn't get that close. Sadly, one of my neighbors, a World War II veteran, died in the fire.

The weather changed this week, and we were told by the local media hype that we would all be swept away by buckets of the hard rain that was gonna fall. The first wave swept through on Wednesday night while we all slept, and it was bright & clear the next morning, which of course made my commute take roughly twice as long. Almost no rain that day, and Friday morning there was a light drizzle coming down as I left the house. It picked up once I was to work, but then was dry enough that people were eating lunch and taking breaks outside. Saved it up for the afternoon and today.

This afternoon it was actually coming down pretty good for a bit, as well as having some nice long rolls of thunder. I had my camera ready at this point, and took a few shots of it coming down good, making the canyon and gutters into raging streams. Near the end of the time I was shooting, it was letting up and the sun was glinting off the waters.

Pictured in a couple of the shots are some block retaining walls. The last shot has the latest one I had put up, just a couple weeks back, or more to the point, just in time. Upon having returned from our weekend in Carpinteria, we discovered that a few of the cement slabs had slid forward and a good amount of dirt had come out from between them. The slabs were looking quite precarious, and I took several out and dug some out from behind them until I could get the guy out to put a wall. Naturally, I got busy and it took a while before I dug up his number. He did a great job again, only as you can see, it tends to pool water behind it. I dug out a drainage channel when the rain had let up a bit.

All these great picture opportunities, and I get to title a post with a James Taylor reference!!!

Let's Try That Again...

Once again, back from vacation with many a picture and many a tale!!!

This vacation, due to the financial constraints imposed by the sewer repair from earlier this year, is something of a revisit of two years ago's vacation where everything broke!!! This year came out somewhat better than the last one, but there were a few rough patches along the way this year, too.

The first couple of shots here I'm thinking of entering in my works second photo contest. I entered a couple shots in the first one, and didn't prevail with either. To be fair, there were a LOT of great shots entered!!! The first shot is of Descanso beach, where you go to start the zip line tour. Yeah, we did that again this year, on the first day we were there!!! The price has gone up, but they've improved the course with automatic braking at the end of the runs. They've added night runs, and that was (kinda) what we got. It was actually a twilight run, which could have gone until it was full dark, but the tour we were on only had two other people besides our group. Only had to have our headlights on for the last line. The younger is heavy enough to go on his own now!!! The second shot is from the top floor of the Casino building.

We went paddle boarding & kayaking around the harbor the next day (or the day after??? It's all a blur)... after we'd gone parasailing!!! Another that the younger had wanted to do, but chickened out on last time. He made it this time, though, and thoroughly enjoyed it!!!

A couple of new things we got to do this time were the inland tour (on a 1953 Flxable bus!!!) that made it to the far side of the island with a stop at the Catalina airport, the Airport in the Sky, and the behind the scenes tour of the Casino. Both were very cool, and both could get a post of their own. See if that happens!!! First time I've ever been inside the Casino, even though I've been to the island probably a dozen or more times since I was a kid!!!

I'd meant to put a shot or two of the Airport in the Sky... still could, but if I don't maybe I'll get to doing a post about that trip!!! There's the bus...

And there's a group shot from on the bus!!!

What about those rough patches??? They were both due to online travel sites, or at least so it seems. First one came on the day we arrived in Catalina. We caught the shuttle van up to the hotel, same one we'd stayed at last time, and went to check in. The desk clerk checks, and lo and behold, no reservation!!! She looks a bit further, and finds it... three days later, the day we were supposed to check out!!! Of course, there's no available rooms of the class we'd reserved. The desk clerk was awesome, and it took about 45 minutes and four hang ups on the phone from Expedia, but finally they got them to fax over an overwrite, and they put us up in an open room... the executive suite!!! Awesome room!!! It has a separate master bedroom, full kitchen, huge bathroom with a two person whirlpool tub and a giant shower stall, and two balconies on either side!!! EPIC!!! Better than our home, but a bit smaller. If I win the lottery, I'm moving in there for a few weeks straight!!!

The second came back on the mainland. To avoid any vehicular mishaps, a la last time, I had a rental car reserved. Headed over to pick it up, and, surprise, no reservation!!! Furthermore, no, we don't even have any cars, so you're out of luck!!! This was in Long Beach, so I headed over to my parents house to use their computer and retrieve the reservation information. Half an hour on the phone with Hotwire (much of it on hold) and they finally connect me to Budget rental company: "Oh, I see you've got a reservation with us... yes, we have that and we have your car waiting for you..." Funny how now they do... Needless to say, I'm not much impressed by either of these companies. From this point on, I called ahead on every reservation to verify.

There's the minor outline of the island portion of our vacation, as well as the worser parts. Back on the mainland we hit several parks, but none of them for a full day. We did a night in Buena Park, with an afternoon and evening at Knott's Berry Farm, then the next morning Knott's Soak City water park. Down to Carlsbad (same resort as two years back) and a morning at the Lego water park (which you have to go through the Legoland park to get to) then left for lunch with the thought of returning to Legoland for the afternoon-evening. Both boys were tired out and stayed back, but mom and I had to return to retrieve our stuff from the locker, as well as go on the Dragon coaster and check out Miniland some. The next day we went to Legoland some more, then down to San Diego. We went to Boomers mini golf & fun zone that evening, where we rode the go-carts several times, did the batting cages, rode the world's weakest bumper boats (but with a cool built in water cannon) and played 18 holes. Our last full day we headed off to Sea World until around 2 or so. I know there's a lot more I could tell about, but we'll save that for another post!!!

Delayed ARRRR-gain!!!

Aye, there be no good reasonin' that I'ma not sharrin' about me vacation yet. Truth be told, aye've the pictures & much text just a-waitin' aboard. Howbeit, we were on a voyage o 7 days, aye we were, yet here it be "talk like a pirate day" again, and aye were constrain'd to be puttin' up a proper pirate-y post!!!

So, here be it!!! One of me souvenirs of me voyage. Right pirate-y Aye do say!!! Every time I be passin' the window, I'da be admirin' it. Avast, when I actually be gettin' in the shop, turns out the scurvy bilge rats be carryin' no stock but in youth sizes!!! Betimes, aye were layin' me eye on the first that I came upon, and it be a youth XL... Perchance it be fittin' on yer old pal Aye!!! Indeed, it 'twere!!!

Keep an even keel, more be a-comin' over the horizion!!!

This is me Tomorrow...

Soooo much!!! We went up to the mountains again a couple weeks back, last weekend had the celebration of my sister & my birthdays, took several pictures worthy of sharing...

So what do I end up sharing??? Another cat picture!!! This was so cute, he was being his lazy self, and then he went & covered his eyes with his paw!!! Not real easy to see with the black on black furs, but there it is.



In other news, I've finally upgraded my laptop. Bought some memory to bring it up to 4gb, bought a hard drive twice the size and faster, and (the finally part) installed Windows 7, up from Vista. So far, I'm reasonably pleased. I have yet to try and install my favorite imaging software, PaintShop Pro (don't even know if I'll be able to, it's an older version), but instead used MS Paint to work on this picture.

Oh, and I seem to have lost the little round ball off the end of the ring in my piercing. One day after the cat tried using it as a play toy. Hmmmm...

No Time for Blogging

I wanted to put some kind of picture to go with this post, and found something random I shot quite a while back. It's EL DOCTOR RESTAURANT, where after you eat, it might be a good idea to see EL DOCTOR!!!



I still have yet to post in depth about the bachelor party, mother's day, and the Phil Lesh concert, and now I've got another weekend full of events to post about!!! It never ends, I tells ya!!! Anyway, thought I'd put something here to remind me to post about these other things if I ever get a chance!!!





A few highlights, though, the company cruise and the wedding were both amazingly awesome. My bank gave me a hard way to go, yet again, and I ended up a little stressed about the trip down to the cruise. Ended up not taking my camera for that reason. I took public transit down and back, and that was an adventure in itself. Far better on the money that way, though. It would have been $6 just to park, not counting gas, and it was only $5 for the day pass on the trains. Three different trains each way, the most I've ever taken.





OK, next time (barring further complications or procrastinations), a restaurant I used to love that I thought had gone extinct, the bachelor bus, the absent minded stripper, the acrobatic stripper, the stripper who I thought to be totally not my type who won me over in short order, and the best deal in the club (that I would go back again for alone!!!)...