Pops Visit and The Petersen Auto Museum

The Laurel and Hardy Car.
Hell yeah!

Hey Folks,

First off, sorry. I know I've been worse than ever about keeping this thing current. Almost four months since my last post; sorry. I finally got some time off from Columbia to take a nice staycation. Pops visited, and unfortunately it rained almost the entire time he was here. But we made the most of it.

Professor Fate's Hannibal 8 from
The Great Race!

We ate VERY well when Pops was here. First we ate lunch at Ernie’s House of Tacos for lunch, but we were so stuffed we never needed to eat dinner. Later we did the fondue thing at our apartment, and ate breakfast in my neighborhood.

Dad, most of you know, works at Caterpillar, so I knew he’d be someone who would appreciate cars. This gave us a reason to finally go the Petersen Auto Museum. Located in the Miracle Mile across from the LA County Museum of Art (LACMA), the Petersen is truly one of a kind. Some of the cars where so rare I hadn’t even herd of the makers.

1989 Batmobile. Assembled in Gotham City.

This place has every kind of car ever made, from steam engine models to muscle cars, classic models to Electronic and proto-type vehicles. You name it, they got it (though not all of them are always on display). The place is also well-known because the Notorious B.I.G. was killed outside after a party here.

Especially memorable for me were the movie cars. They had the Green Hornet Car that Bruce Lee rode in, Doc Brown’s DeLorean from Back to the Future, the Batmobile, and perhaps the best: Professor Fate’s Hannibal 8 from the Great Race. They also had some models owned by Steve McQueen.

Jen at the Hot Wheels Exhibit
at the Petersen Auto Museum

The place definitely proves once again that cars today are SOOOO boring. Give me a big boat of a car. Yes, they were gas guzzles and parallel parking was a pain, but there’s a price to be paid for cool. I really missed my Cadillac after I went here. Maybe I’ll buy one w/ my tax

return.

The rain finally let up toward the end of Dad’s visit. We took advantage of it to go up to the Griffith Observatory. After that we took Jen to Masa for a Chicago Pizza (the only one in the city worthy). Delicious, and I think I might have eaten the best desert I’ve ever had in my life. Unbelievable.

The last day we went to San Pedro to see the ocean. After that we went to Long Beach to visit Rene. We watched movie later that night, and then I took Dad to the airport the next morning. For the rest of the break, I mostly stayed at home. Great vacation, just what I needed.

The Big Pimpin' Barber Car.
Hopefully only one of these
was ever built.