My cars look they're ready for Halloween with their ghost costumes. They're also ready for bed. Kinda sad, but it's that time of year.
Our local car club Kent Island Cruisers has their annual Halloween show this weekend. Here’s a past pic of my Dodge before I painted it. I put the spider webs on the crappy flat black paint with chalk…
Hello, With the advent of large pumpkin contests all over the place to see who could grow the “big one,” one has to decide how to get it to a party or a Halloween gathering. Otherwise, within days, it will start corroding within itself. We tried to grow a large pumpkin in our backyard garden. It was propped up on a platform so no soil contact was underneath corroding the pumpkin shell, once it grew to respectable size. But, withing days of no more growth, the pumpkin started its descent into oblivion. We tried to use what was left of the large pumpkin, but it was a lost cause. At least our pumpkin could be identified as a large pumpkin and not a odd shaped, squashed shell of a blobby version of Jabba the Hut, as most events are now down to labeling the largest pumpkin... Our large or fairly large pumpkin ended up as baked snacks, broiled seeds and other items of edible nature from the whole orange ball. So, it served our family well. The custom Halloween 1950 Chevy El Camino would have made it simple to just go get the largest one we could find in our local farmer’s growing field. But, several modifications would be necessary to accommodate the large pumpkin in the back of the modified El Camino. In its black, lurking stage, it would remind our son of a chomping toy opening and closing with a touch of a button, to swallow up those unsuspecting “trick or treaters” coming up our driveway. Ha! Happy Halloween In our old neighborhood, several blocks away were some open fields. No one in our young group wanted to trick or treat in that portion of the area. Despite being only three blocks away. We knew the area from walking around during the daytime all summer and over to friends’ houses, but not at night. There were older homes than our tract homes and some of the yards were empty with tall grasses and weeds taller than the fences. Plus, the fences were the old rail top and middle style. So, the weeds grew in between. The very old homes were the older homes built before our 40’s tract was built. So, they did not look like our stucco sided homes. Old wooden planks, and wooden lapped over siding was the norm. The row of homes backed up to the open field that ran all the way to the Los Angeles River bank. (until the LB Freeway was put in) Although it is in a city, it looked as if it could have been in a country side with rows of corn and other plants growing all over the place. So, access to that area of emptiness aways was shaky at night. No, although it was very dark at night, we did not park there during our driving/dating days. It was just not the place to feel secure. Especially in the dark. Yikes! Jnaki We knew of several old cars that were parked in the driveways. During the day, they looked harmless. An old Ford truck, rusty and looked as if it was falling apart in the driveway. Also a couple of old Ford/Chevy sedans, also rusty and dented. But one was a 40-50 Chevy sedan and this is where I got the idea of a Halloween special modified truck in the more modern times. The freeway backs up to those homes with a chain link fence. The homes have gone through some remodeling and now command an outrageous price or two. Several years ago, one was featured on an old “Flip or Flop” remodeling show. It was funny as the old house was several blocks from our last old Westside of Long Beach house. The inspiration for the custom 50 Chevy El Camino pumpkin delivery truck. There was this old 50 Chevy sedan on the other block closer to the main drag that we always saw. It eventually was owned by a kid we knew from our elementary school through high school. But, he was not a hot rod kid and left the 50 Chevy sedan relatively stock looking. Art comes through with different outlooks for the old Chevy sedan. YRMV
The Jalopy Journal
