I'm gettin' that itch again

Ever since i was a kid, i've always had a thing for the '62-67 Chevy II. I don't know what it is about that car. i think its the simplicity of it. its small, to the point and just flat out makes a mean, kick ass little muscle car.

I'll be in the market for a new used car (why used?) next year, and i need to get something dependable. I need a decent truck that will get me around for a few years and haul my bikes around texas. I just can't kick that urge to buy a project car for a couple grand and go to work on it for the next couple years until i achieve that bad ass little shoebox nova i've been dreaming about all my life. I'm not the kind of guy to keep it in the garage either. I would drive that thing everyday. I'd also want to drive it from the first day i bought it, which makes things tough. i'd have to make sure i still had another vehicle handy, cause more often than not, your saturday project runs into wednesday and you're stuck without a car. My point is that as much as i want to start the process now, i just can't. I also don't really have enough garage space... even though i have two garages... weird.

Pistons and Paint

I went to the annual Pistons and Paint car show with my son on saturday. it was pretty cool. i love the old rusty rides. i'd prefer it over a new shiney car. i want a car that pisses people off as i drive by. my arm hanging out the window that i can barley see out because it's chopped so low. my son in the passenger seat hoping one of his friends from school see's him in his dad's hot rod. theres just something special about those cars. they have attitudes.... history.

i think that why i love the movie American Graffiti so much. the 50's are rad. i really want an old coupe, but i'm also looking foward to getting my hands on my dads old '56 Ford pickup thats in cailfornia some day.

here's a restored '56 from the show...



here is the current state of "my" '56 in SoCal...



and i would LOVE to build a ride like this... it makes my mouth water...



i love old race cars and bikes. the old daytona beach racers with the extra set of grips below the number plate for aerodynamics... or an old salt flat racer from the 50's.... mmmm..... if i could, i'd collect them.

I really wish i had some more knowledge about it all... building, fabricating, the history. i would have appreciated what i was seeing at the car show much more. someday i'll be able to play with it. for now i'll keep dreaming.

you can find the rest of the pictures from the show here

3,500 mile week

ever wonder what driving from texas to cali looks like? i took a picture every 30 minutes....



refresh your browser to start it over... click on it to see a larger, slower version.

what a freaking trip. dallas to my parents (ft hood), to LA, to Victorville, to my parents, to austin, to my parents, to houston and finally back to dallas in 10 days. all driving. if i spent one more hour in a car i woulda kicked out the fucking windshield.

trip to cali was crazy. our uhaul truck sucked and broke down on several occations. the reason for the breakdowns was the tranny getting hot.... so we would break down in the middle of the desert. sitting in the middle of the desert for over 2 hours in 110º heat sucks balls. on top of that... we couldn't use the AC. we drove for 6-8 hours in 105-118º temps with no AC. the wind coming in the truck literally felt like it was burning your face.

picts from under the bridge we forced the truck to get too so that we'd have some shade. i went on top of the bridge to see where the road went... no where. just a dirt road in both directions going as far as you could see off to the mountains.








here's a random 50 foot baby in the middle of no where arizona...





going through el paso... one side of the freeway is texas, the other is mexico... you can see mexico here...





our first del taco stop (the first one you'll see on the way to cali... between tucson and pheonix). mmm.... we love del taco.





heres all the wind mills near palm springs... theres thousands of them...





finally we're in LA (redando beach to be exact) and we can relax for a couple days...




manhattan beach


i made dad drink a pitcher of pabst... he didn't like it.



so... as some of you know, one of my goals was to pick up my dads old '56 Ford F150. we couldn't get ahold of the guy who has it ahead of time, so we just showed up... he was there, the truck was there, but we were headed back to texas in like 4 hours, so we didn't have time to arrange a truck to take it back to texas. so we left it. i'll go get it later this year i hope.



here's *some* of the other random cars this guy had... lots of potential rides here...