Cars land

I've got my cuppa Yorkshire tea and the heated mattress pad on the guest bed at my dad's house cranked up to seven. I'm staying here over the short winter break until classes start again on the 7th of January, because apparently if you have no classes in session right at this very moment, UCLA wants absolutely nothing to do with you. Oh, well, you can stay, but it's gonna cost ya $500 to stay in an empty dorm building for three weeks. And the dining halls are closed. And oh yeah, we're turning the heat off. But you know, I guess you can stay if you want. Psh. So, I'm locked out of my dorm for the next week or so.

My dad and I decided to have a father-daughter moment at the Petersen Museum, which we haven't been to together probably since somewhere around '99. Oddly enough, it looks almost exactly the same, except that the last time we went, we were probably the only people in the whole dang place, but today, the place was jam packed. Burgers and root beer floats at Johnny Rockets, then off to check out all of the cool classic cars. My dad is somewhat of a car collector, or at least he used to be, so being dragged to every single car show and Mopar meetup in the LA region was a big part of my childhood in the 80's. Although it used to bore me to tears when I was a kid, I gradually learned to appreciate my dad's '57 cherry red DeSoto, and classic cars became a way to bond with him. By the time I was in high school, my dream car was an early 70's Plymouth Roadrunner. When my dad sold the DeSoto back around '03, I swore bitterly that I would get "my" car back one day. Ever since, I've always had a thing for classic cars from the 50's and 60's, especially if they were red. This time, I would be able to fully appreciate what the Petersen had to offer. Normally, I would have just let my dad be my tour guide, but this time I decided to take my time and actually read the informational bits and take it all in. Here's a few of my favorites...

Gotta love the real wood panels! I need this in my life.

Totally schnazzy.

Dino soap!!!

 

Tamales and ice cream, who can ask for more? His pipe actually blew smoke, too.

PARADISE.

Can't I just step into the photo? I want to eat there. Now.

I'll take that one. Turquoise or red, I'm hooked.

 

The ultimate dream car. Looks like something George Jetson would drive.

 BAT MANNN!

 

Michael Keaton is Batman. Christian Bale and his scratchy voice can take a hike. He even looks like Michael Keaton... whoa...

 All in all, it was a lot of fun. Even the drive home was great. Rather than suffer through the traffic on the 405, we took La Brea all the way up into Baldwin Hills (which looks like it has been preserved in a time capsule since 1975) and through Inglewood back to the South Bay. While I've been to Inglewood plenty-o-times (a good family friend who used to babysit me lives right off Manchester), I'm not sure I've ever even been through Baldwin Hills. It's always exciting to find a new area of LA to explore, especially one that has so many cool, older (although perhaps a bit rundown) buildings that probably haven't been updated in nearly 40 years. It gives you a sense of what the city once was, before all of the strip malls and mega malls and Starbucks invaded nearly every single corner. I hope that LA never loses its character and pride in its heritage. Then again, the overabundance of generic, brown boxes that have sprung up over the past few years is hardly encouraging. Anyone who lives in LA knows exactly what I mean. But why do they all have to be that horrid shade of muddy brown? Because the paint is cheaper? Easier to paint over graffiti? What the heck is it?? But, I digress...

 

So far, the winter break has been pretty productive. I was successfully able to cook for a 25 person Christmas party without burning or ruining a single dish... That's right, it was all edible, and perhaps even tasty! Unbelievable. The day after Christmas, I had my first serious workout since who knows when, so I'm off to a good start on burning off those pesky holiday calories. AND, I finally finished reading Rob Roy, which, ahem, I was supposed to finish reading in the fall quarter but... didn't. It's pushing close to 500 pages and full of nearly indecipherable Scottish dialects, so LAY OFF. Die Vernon is seriously one of the coolest female characters I've ever encountered in an early 19th century novel. Highly recommended. Unfortunately, I didn't think to bring more to read other than my study Bible (rereading the book of Matthew, atm), so I'm going to have to find another way to occupy some time over the next week. Then again, as soon as I finished Roy, I got an email from one of my winter professors letting us know that we'll have to buy and read Billy Budd (which wasn't included in the required texts for the course) by the second class meeting, so I guess I already have something to do. Dang.