Saturday Night Surprise Party

On Saturday night there was a surprise birthday party for Greg Sharp. A hundred or so of his friends and family were there to celebrate. Donna (his love), the girls from the museum and Donna's family put together this wonderful surprise for Greg, and he was surprised.

I took only a few photos and mostly video. The video is long (15 minutes) even though it has been edited down. Here it is.


Greg and his cousins.


We wrote a note to Greg.


Anthony Lugo asked Louie Senter to sign his Indy brick.

Greg's coat and tie were removed immediately.

Carl with Louis Senter.

Louise McClelland made a fabulous quilt for Greg. She is so clever.

Shannon drew a portrait of Greg and sent it from New Zealand.

CHRR Bakersfield 2010

Carl left for Bakersfield on Thursday morning to be with the fellow Cacklefesters at the CHRR. More time with the guys is a good thing, besides they had to report in at the driver's meeting to make sure everyone was on the same page when it came to firing up these old/restored gems.

I hitched a ride with Pete because we only wanted to go up for the day on Friday and return after the honoree presentations that evening. His buddy, Tom Prufer, was being inducted and I wanted to take pictures of Shannon's portraits, and also see everyone get inducted. It's always such a nice tribute to people who have made their mark in all aspects of racing.

We arrived at Famoso Raceway at noon. I joined up with Carl and Kuhl and the gang. (not Kool and the Gang "It's a Celebration..") You can click on the pictures to see larger, more detail, up-close, you know the drill. Then click again and you can see really close.

It was friggen' hot and humid.

The "Fast Guys" planning their next move.

Each group took turns firing up the dragsters.

Roy, dad, made a few of his old SPE throttle pedals and gave one to the Wiebe guys, Wayne and Gary. They were thrilled and showed me how it looks back in the car. Really NICE guys.

Greg was checking up on me to make sure I hadn't opened up a booth, selling my wares, without going through the proper channels and paying, like last year. Ha! Donna looks like she's having fun, trying to stay cool.

Art Chrisman chatting with his buddies.

Great banner!

I walked the length of the drag strip, watched a few cars run, while leaning on the fence at the end. Took only a few photos this time. This is a restoration of Burt Munro's Indian Motorcycle that ran at Bonneville.

I visited dad's tree, dedicated by Pat and Mike. First I had to get a wet paper towel from the guy selling beer, to wipe off the bird crap that was all over it.

It has grown to be a lovely tree, providing lots of shade. Notice it branched into two, one from Mike and one from Pat.

I like the look of this pick-up.

I suppose it's almost Halloween and these guys are ready with their haunted panel truck.

Mike found the reason that one of the cars wouldn't fire up. This little plug was stuck in the fuel pump. They'll never live it down.

Just before we left the track to go to the Double Tree Hotel, we talked Eddie into taking an helicopter ride. He has never flown on anything, so this is it.

Eddie's helicopter ride video. I made up a short video for him to remember his first trip up.

The traffic getting off of the freeway to the hotel was horrible. Turns out some bonehead crashed into the Carl's Jr. light post and up into the parking lot.

Here are the photos of the Honoree Portraits, all drawn by Shannon. This is Bill Bagshaw.

Don Long the chassis builder.

Tom Prufer.

Steinegger and Eschenbaugh. Al Eschenbaugh still races and just became a Bonneville 200 MPH Club member last year. Larry Steinegger passed away in 2006 (I believe) and his son was there to receive the honor for him.

This is Tom Hanna, famous car builder and current Bonneville race car builder.

Al "Mousie" Marcellus. He sure had a lot to say up there, some stuff pretty juicy.

And the surprise of the evening, Dave McClelland received a special honor for his dedication to the reunion and the museum and drag racing. He got his own Wally Trophy. Shannon drew this extra portrait without anyone knowing.

Video of Dave McClelland receiving a Wally trophy.

Dave with his portrait.

All of the honorees (less Hanna)

After the reception, they fired up 3 race cars in the hotel parking lot. Then Pete and I blasted home. Carl stayed, the cacklefest was to take place the next day, Saturday evening. He was home by 10 pm Saturday.

So that's the reunion, from my perspective.

Kathy

A Funday Sunday

I get Westways magazine from the Auto Club and they have a calendar with upcoming events. Under the Halloween happenings section I saw an exhibit for "BUG INVASION" at the Discovery Science Center aka "The Cube" in Santa Ana.

So I called the kids, Lacey, Brandon, Dean, Amanda, Keith, Ryder, Kristen and they were all up for a day of adventure. We met at 11:30 (some of us were late, hahaha).

Off of the 5 Freeway in Santa Ana there is this huge cube. I always wondered about it. Here's a little information about the Cube. There are three perfect 3D geometric shapes in nature: the sphere, the pyramid and the cube. Architecturally, the sphere has been built at Disneyworld and the pyramid has been built at the Louvre, the Luxor in Las Vegas and the California State University, Long Beach basketball arena.
The Cube has not been built before. Thus, Discovery Science Center architect Bernardo Fort-Brescia of Arquitectonica thought that The Cube would be the perfect icon for Orange County’s science center. The Board of Directors concurred and it was incorporated into the center’s plans.
Go to the web for more information. www.discoverycube.org I highly recommend taking your kids there. Or you can just borrow someone else's kids if you don't have any.

A replica of the Spaceship Endeavour sits in the parking lot.

Dean, Bubba and Lacey.

We waited for a while for Keith, Amanda and Ryder to show up. That's OK, the weather was great. I gave Dean the gifts from Mel, Craig and Ruby and he held onto them waiting to give Ryder his gifts. A Kiwi bird and a Rugby ball.

Finally Batman (Ryder) arrived and got his goodies from Dean.

On the schedule of events on the web, they listed a "Halloween Spider Mash Dance and a Costume Parade" at 2:00. The Ryder wore his Batman costume and looked very strong. Unfortunately he was the only kid in the place with a costume on, but that didn't matter because he WAS Batman. As we were leaving at 1:30 kids showed up in costume, but by then we were starved and wanted to go.

The girls, waiting to get started.

The mandatory "gift store" on the right and a dinosaur hanging from the ceiling.

The first activity was the "bed of nails" Bubba went first.

Then Kristen.

Very brave of her.

There was a screen and you danced in front of it.

Bug Invasion - a HUGE Praying Mantis. I think Ryder was shocked.

He wasn't sure about going in there.

That thing was about 25 feet or more. Here's Kristen.

There were all kinds of bugs on display. This is an educational place, hence the "Science" in the name.

Giant carpenter ants. Bubba happens to be an exterminator, so it was pretty funny.

You put on 3-D glasses and walked through a fog curtain to a maze of flourescent 3-D flowers and bugs on walls.

Amanda in the 3-D room.

Rats to pet. NO THANKS! The kids liked them.

This is a smoke ring maker. You push down on a large rubber ring.

And a huge ring of smoke (dry ice) flies up to the ceiling.

Dean and Bubba made the smoke rings too.

Water ran over sand to show erosion.

We went inside the Cube and there was a rocketship capsule

This is a wind tunnel. The wind shot down at 78 mph. Lacey said it was really a strange feeling, dried out her eyes.

Keith and Ryder went in.

Then Dean and Ryder. They loved it. They weren't crying, that is an excited face.

Dean borrowed the batman mask for a while.

Simulated Hockey game, Keith was the goalie. He would watch a screen in front of him and a hockey player would shoot a puck at him and the puck would shoot out of the wall. Keith caught a couple of them and blocked some. I think maybe one slipped by on the ground.

Amanda the Zamboni driver. The Zamboni is the machine that resurfaces the ice rinks. Sort of moves like a forklift.

Here she is on the Zamboni, wearing the Batman mask. Big fun!

Ryder was a hockey player.

Not sure about this face. I think it may be nap time.

So we left the science center and drove down the street to the Block at Orange and had lunch at Dave and Buster's. It's basically a funzone with all kinds of electronic games, but with bars and dining tables all through it. The food was great. The boys attached their Kiwis to their straws.

After eating, they played some games. Here they are on a motorcyle simulator.

Then they went on a Jet Fighter simulator.

I had a wonderful time with the kids, old ones and little ones. We should get together again soon, maybe a bonefire at the beach before the weather cools down. Thank you guys for hanging out with this old broad. Love you all.

Kathy