Prop 8 demonstration down Wilshire

It was one of those days where I just was trying to get home in LA traffic on some side roads thru Westwood. Coming up Ohio I ran into a blockade at Westwood Blvd. Got off my Vespa to take a look cuz I saw tons of cops and tons of people. Hmmmm, wish I had my Canon 5D and not just my iphone. But my iphone is all I had. So click on each pic and it will look way better, bigger, and more interesting. Promise.

The crowd was loud and so were the motorcycles, helicopters, and boatloads of sirens. I had wandered into the response of the community to the Yes vote on Proposition 8 banning gay marriage. I was so upset when this BS passed and these people were even more upset and it was an incredible sight.

But then the crowd moved on toward the Wilshire and Westwood intersection and before I knew it there were tons more police showing up. And I mean tons more. Imperial storm troopers coming down the road.

As the crowd passed the boys in blue moved in fast. They were doing an excellent job of crowd control and it was tough. Tons of traffic on Westwood Blvd and thousands of people. They were not fooling around.



And as the crowd crept closer to Wilshire you could sense the excitement of the crowd. The chanting was louder "equal rights NOW".



I looked back up Westwood Blvd and
saw this.
Hard to see but behind the
CHIPS are a battalion of police and a healthy supply of police cars and some special fellows. Click on the pic and you can see the multitudes of cops behind the bikes.

These guys showed up next and I started thinking this was gonna get real interesting real fast.

This was the scene as I got to Wilshire Blvd.


It was chaos for a while. The police had the intersection blocked off. There was not really a good place for the crowd to go. And you could tell where they wanted to go. They wanted Wilshire Blvd so bad. You could start to hear the calls out loud. "We want Wilshire, We want Wilshire".
Then they just started going for it. And once it started there was no stopping it. It was damn impressive.



I had to walk in support and take pics ---very fun and inspirational all in one.






















All of a sudden the crowd had to stop. LAPD put up a serious roadblock on Wilshire and the crowd was jammed against a line of motorcyles and police on bicycles. And they were not giving an inch. No one got thru.


They were patient - both the police and the crowd. No one was rude and no one got hurt that I saw. But they were not going to let one person pass. And there were a lot of people to control.



Even the police had to videotape the incredible sight. And still no one got thru. Until one man came up on the police truck and spoke into the megaphone. And he said some cool words to the crowd.


He said he had just spoken with the Mayor. And the police were going to move the motorcycles and everyone was going to march right up Wilshire all peacful like. The mayor said so. The mayor said it was OK..

And damn if the motorcycles and police didn't just move away - without a word of protest. And it was so cool and so peaceful and so happy. Horns were honking in support and that made everyone yell and yell and yell.



Not sure who this guy is and what he's doing on Wilshire in the yellow suit/thing but I love the fact that he thinks there is some great pics to be had and I think he is a great pic to be had.

Who are you?



Oooohhhh we are getting close to my neighborhood. How cool. Wish I could just walk home when I was done here, but my Vespa is way way way back down the road.

As the crowd moved further into Beverly Hills I started my journey back to the bike. And Wilshire going East was empty. It had been closed down for the heroes of the story and it was bizzare to see no cars going East and bumper to bumper going west.

Until I saw something else weird coming my way. As if there wasn't enough already happening to keep me precoccupied.

I heard it first - it was loud. And then I saw another boatload of police cars coming fast down Wilshire- all with sirens blaring--loud.

This was the final pic. My iphone was giving up for the day. I am proud of my iphone cuz I asked a lot of it today.

Every car and every light coming at us in the picture is a cop car with lights on and sirens wailing. Blow it up- click on it and it looks great.

Kind of a cool end to a meaningful evening.

Fun driving home from Mammoth Mountain, Mammoth Lakes California

What do you get when you combine some photos taken in a speeding car, corrupt digital files, and plenty of photoshop?

You get these.

I've driven to Mammoth a lot. Just love to ski and that mountain rocks. I took these a couple of years ago while my buddy was driving and I was bored. It's a 5 hour drive and after the first two everyone gets a little bored. Till we remember why we are going!

Honestly these pictures were a little flat. And when I opened two of them they were corrupted with that boxish stuff on the lower half. Uncool.

So I used apply image, curves, highlite shadow, gradient, some masking, and these came out. On the funky one in the middle I filled in the sky with a custom jelly brush I made. How to make the brush is in Sept 08 Photoshop User magazine. Something different anyway. They used it to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Feel free to leave a comment on these. I'm not sure these are good, bad, or whatever--but they were fun to make.

Not as much fun as actually skiing on Mammoth Mountain!

Ferris Wheels make all the difference

After a long day I decided to write a post and wax prophetic. But after trying to find a serious, good picture my mind kept saying "keep it light" and "not so serious tonite".

My searching the crazy organization of my hard drive led me to Ferris wheels at night on the Santa Monica Pier. Perfect for the mood I"m about tonite. Nothing says lighten up and don't take yourself so seriously like a Ferris wheel.

Hard to hate your neighbor if you're sitting next to him on a ferris wheel. Hard to be in a funk with your GF if you're riding in a ferris wheel. Hard to argue politics if your flying high in a ferris wheel.

But it sure is easy to relax, smile, laugh out loud, be in awe, and enjoy on one.

As always, click the pic to make it real big. Bigger is better when it comes to ferris wheels!