[elky] Re: Do I know how to have fun or what?

  • From: STILLFRANKSFAULT@xxxxxxx
  • To: elky@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Sun, 3 Jul 2011 13:27:29 -0400 (EDT)

Damn Ray, never a dull moment. It's not just retirement, it's an adventure. 
 

Smokey Mt Frank  

 
In a message dated 7/3/2011 12:01:55 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
rbuck@xxxxxxxxxxxx writes:



I shot the biggest show in the  state yesterday.  It's called the Cache 
Valley Cruise-In and is held in  Logan, Ut, which is 90 miles north of me and 
the home of Utah State  University.  I shoulda listened to the little voice 
in my head that said,  "just stay home today."  

Of all the shows I've shot over the  years, that particular one is the only 
one I really dread doing.  I won't  be going back.  There are 3 major 
problems.  First, the  lighting.  It's held at the Cache County Fairgrounds 
which 
is full of BIG  trees and the variegated light makes it a bitch to get 
decent  shots:



The front of this 61 Chevy is in shade,  while the back is lit by direct 
sunlight.  I dunno if I can do much with  it or not.  I used one camera to 
shoot with available light and another  with the flash unit (the 40D does 
better with the flash, so I used that one  and the 7D with power pack for the 
majority of the shots.)  

The  second problem is the unfettered brats running free and into one's 
photos (as  well as adults who wander into the frame while picking their noses) 
and  smearin their grubby mitts all over the cars.



This 34 Chevy seems  to have had a little mishap.  Maybe a gang of those 
rug rats ran headlong  into it.  :)

Final problem with that show is just the bad attitude  so many of the 
people seem to have there.  I won't list all the little  aggravations, but let 
it 
suffice to say that there were plenty.  Well,  one of 'em was a guy whom I 
asked politely if he'd mind backing up a couple of  feet so I could get a 
shot (I'd been waiting patiently for him to move for  several minutes) and his 
reply was, "I hate photographers."  Ohh...and  one more.  I ran into a guy 
who paid me a $20 advance for a CD of photos  at the Autorama in March.  I 
sent him email and left him voicemail  telling him that it was ready, but 
never heard back from him.  When I ran  into him yesterday, I said that I had 
his photos and he said, "I ain't payin  $100 for no pitchers."  That wasn't 
what he told me when he wanted me to  shoot 'em.  I just told him that the 
deposit he'd made wasn't gonna be  refunded and left.  But I've had enough of 
all that stuff at that  show.  No more.

The absolute final straw was that happened after I  decided to leave after 
shooting about 2/3 of the show.  I stopped at a  convenience store, got a 32 
ounce bottle of Gatorade and headed outta  town.  About a mile down the 
road the power steering and AC quit and the  engine temp started to rise 
rapidly.  I pulled off the road (I had an  idea what was going on) and opened 
the 
hood to find this:



3 of the 4 studs  holding the water pump pulley in place had sheared off 
which allowed the  pulley to wobble and toss the serp belt.  Thank God for AAA 
(funny, I can  thank God for AA and AAA, both <G>).  I got a rollback to  
haul me and the Burb to an Autozone (where the water pump came from) and then 
 spent 3 hours, first trying to remove the studs, then giving up and 
replacing  the whole pump in their parking lot.  I finally got it done, but not 
 
before I got this burn on my arm:



Real bad photo, but it illustrates a little  inconvenience I could do 
without.  The blisters have already broken and I  hope it's on its way to 
healing 
up.  Still hurts almost as much as my  back from everything including 
bending over that damned radiator while trying  to get the thing running again 
with very limited tools.  I gotta say one  good thing:  The guys at Auto Zone 
were great.  They bent over  backwards to help me out by loaning tools, 
giving me some miscellaneous nuts  and bolts and helping get the serp belt back 
on.  I'm gonna write an  email to AZ corporate praising their help...and I 
won't mention that it was an  AZ alternator that caused the initial problem, 
nor the AZ water pump and studs  that were the root of this one.  Anyway, 
they were really helpful and all  in all, good dudes.  

Very last photo:



This is a section of  I-15 about 50 miles south of the Idaho border.  There 
were several miles  of these concrete "things."  I don't know what they are 
and all I can  think of is either test strips to see how the concrete wears 
(it'll last  forever cuz like me, everybody else had one pair of wheels on 
the shoulder and  one between the concrete rumble strips) or implemented by 
some maliciously  deranged UDOT engineer to make drivers even more miserable 
that normal on that  stretch of road (the narrowest part of I-15 between 
Salt Lake City and the  Idaho border...at least that I can think of.) 

Just one more little bit  of fun for the day.  The new water pump and studs 
lasted until I got  home, even with the AC running (I tested it after I'd 
driven quite a distance,  including a 7800 ft pass...Logan itself is 4300 
feet above sea level, so that  pass has a  fairly significant grade to it.)  
After I send this, I'm  going out to re-tighten the nuts on those studs and I 
think I'll see if I can  find some good grade 5 studs and replace what I 
think are Chinese junk (no,  not the boats.)  I'd left home at 9 am (I was 
running behind cuz I was  thrashing to make the new Canon printer work with the 
laptop) and got home 12  hours later, somewhat worse for wear.  But I lived 
to tell about it and  it's another day today.

Do I know how to have fun or what?   :)

r




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