Dude, where's my digital camera?!

In My Humble Opinion
1

And yet another moment where I wish I had a camera with me, since no one would believe me.

I was driving to work, and in and amongst the SUVs and pickup trucks and lowriders and standard POSes, I noticed a beautiful Cadillac convertible. Powder blue. Big-assed tail fins. Big lights on the back. Trunk you could hide Rhode Island in and no one would be the wiser. Obviously this car was well taken care of. What stood out was the roof.

White with blue Louis Vuitton logos. It looked like someone had taken one huge LV purse, skinned it, chucked out the carcass, and stretched the hide over the roof. Perfectly seamless construction, all seams matched exactly (having worked with repeated patterns, I know how difficult this can be). Definitely going to keep an eye out for this one again.

So what weird yet intriguiging vehicles have you seen, especially ones that no one would believe you without proof?

2

A Louis Vuitton roof.

Damn I wish you had a picture!

3

I remember a Ford Granada that was jacked up in the back with large rear tires, side pipes, Texas scrolls on the side of a thickly padded vinyl roof. The hood had a big snorkel scoop on it. Could not have made an uglier car.

4

I once saw a DeLorean with blue ground effects and a little blue “laser” that bounced back and forth in the rear window.

DeLoreans aren’t that common in central Illinois.

5

Heading back up from Hilton Head to Columbia, somewhere on I-95…my and my SO’s heads whipped around so fast to get a look at this (and track it as we went past it as we were heading north) I’m surprised we didn’t break the sound barrier, for what did we see heading south bound but…

A ‘car’ that looked like it would fit right in at ‘Monster Garage’… if everyone working in the garage that day were sterotypical rednecks/hillbillies/white trash punks on LSD.

Words really fail me when trying to describe this thing. It may have started out in life as a pickup or van of some sort… and it probably started out life a looong time ago. A wooden bumper (2x4 possibly) in the front. Cracked windshield. Dented body panels. It looked like tool boxes were forming the sides of the bed area in the back. Most of it was painted a matte black, making it harder to judge exactly what everything was. Part of it looked like it was a converted outhouse, complete with moon in the door!

But what topped it all?

A rickety seeming smokestack attached to something in the bed area, with a crosspiece anchoring it to the ‘outhouse’ like thing. :eek: :confused: :eek:

But unfortunately, we had no digital camera at the time, and the film camera was in the trunk. :frowning:

<< Coffee-based lifeform. >>

6

I once saw a Chevette that had been modified to be a pickup truck parked on Tichester Road in Toronto…

7

Eons ago, I saw a Chevy Vega sitting on what looked like a monster truck suspension - giant tires and all. What it brought to mind was a little kid wearing his daddy’s shoes!

Very silly indeed.

8

I saw the Ghostbusters’ car from the second movie broken down on the side of I70 between Kansas City and St Louis, westbound.

It was still sitting there when we came back four days later.

9

You see vinyl roofed cars all the time on the roads of Upstate New York. I’m shocked by their absence whenever I’ve travelled elsewhere.

About 10 years ago, the image of a lowrider I saw cruising the streets of Las Cruces, New Mexico has been forever etched into my memory. I can see it clear as the bright Southwestern day … the Virgin of Guadalupe etched into glass, a booming stereo, tires that couldn’t have been more than a foot in diameter, proojecting at least six inches from the wheel well.

Did I mention that it was a powder blue Dodge Aries? Vato Automobile de K, man!

I saw a battered, rusted-out Lotus Esprit in Kansas City not too long ago. A few years ago, I saw a rusted-out Rolls Royce in Buffalo.

The rolling Dale Earnhardt shrines in west suburban Orlando always left me scratching my head.

Any American car driven by an Asian-American. It’s just somethng you don’t see everyday.

A big old Buick, covered in pictures of aborted fetuses.

A Ford F-350 with crew cab and duallies, front windshield sticker reading I AIN’T COMPENSANTIN! Only in the western suburbs of Orlando.

Any Mary Kay car driven by a dude.

Any car not available in the United States, like Ladas, Hyundai Ponys, Azunas and Innocentis from across the Canadian border, and SEATs, Ford Mondeos or Chevrolet Chevys bearing Mexican plates.

Cars with license plates from Belize, Guatemala, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Nicaragua, or a Caribbean island. Seeing a car in Toronto with Grand Cayman plates elicited a long “uuuuuuuuum” from me several years ago.

10

I see an Oscar Mayer Weiner Mobile every once on a while.

11

A local cab company here in NE Illinois has one of those odd-looking (for Americans) London-style cabs, except instead of the standard black, it has an American Express Blue Card ad all over it (the same way they sometimes wrap an ad around a bus). I’ve seen it several times, maybe there’s more than one.

12

Not quite so unique but still kinda interesting… There’s a couple of Z something trucks (I don’t know, some recent model by some big maker) that have been converted into EXTREMELY long limos (a good 5 to 10 feet longer than most limos I’ve seen) around here. Because they don’t “bend” like most other vehicles their length their turning radius is crazy.

13

About ten years ago I saw a VW Golf with Mexican (“GTO MEX”–Guanajuato?) plates outside a convenience store in Mississauga, Ontario, just outside Toronto. I went inside and the driver was at the cash desk and I overheard “It took us seven days to drive from Mexico City…” :eek:

Re: Canadian cars…

You won’t see many Asünas, ever, as they were the Pontiac equivalent to Chevrolet’s Geo (a rebadged pseudo-import marque intended to attract the young import-buyer), and were only sold for a couple of years. The Asüna Sunfire was the same car as the Geo Storm, and the Asüna Sunrunner was the Geo Tracker.

GM sells an increasing number of models in Canada that are not sold in the States. The Epica and Optra are not sold in the US at all, and there are a larger range of Aveo models sold here than in the US.

Jaguar sells an X-type wagon (sorry, “estate car”) in Canada that it doesn’t sell in the States.

And just wait until the Smart Fortwos start rolling across the border. :slight_smile:

14

I was looking to post something like this. A few weeks ago, getting on the freeway. Ahead of me turning left in front of me: a huge 3 story pickup truck - tires as big as my F-150. Shiny black, lots of chrome. Probably a monster truck car club or something. He had some kind of logo - his truck’s name maybe - on the side with other stuff. Good American. Had a very large US flag on a flag pole mounted in the truck bed. Big - 5 x 7 or even 6 x 9 feet. No problem. He wears his patriotism on his sleeve. I fly a good size flag at home, myself. But then… I looked at the side of the truck… and there… right below the flag… in front of god and everybody… there… was a big-ass Soviet red star, completely undoing his message. :smack:
Lets talk mixed iconography here.

15

I’ve seen a new VW Bug painted like a dalmation. Of course the driver had their dalmation in the car with them :slight_smile:

16

A white Corvette Stingray that had been extended and modified into a 4-door.

Now that was weird.