IMG_9735, originally uploaded by jillianisaphotographer.

Found on the outskirts of Phoenix, this gem of a Googie sign warmed our hearts. Someday we hope to have the wherewithal to drag this back and mount it to the roof of our office!

IMG_9692, originally uploaded by jillianisaphotographer.

Man just look at this plant. Just look at it! Arizona flora is so crazy and strange and interesting...

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Man oh man, what a beauty. Stuff like this makes us want to launch a side-business just making vintage-looking jukeboxes & stereo cabinets (that have fully digital MP3 guts)! Someday!

IMG_5289.JPG, originally uploaded by jillianisaphotographer.

Simultaneously one of the most impressive looking yet least useful computers ever made, we present the Honeywell Kitchen Computer. The premise was you'd input all the food you had in your kitchen, all your favorite recipes too, and then it could tell you want recipe you could make with what you had. However, the input was via binary switches, and the output was blinking lights. Again, in binary. And it cost way more than the entire kitchen, cabinets and all! I don't know if they ever sold a single one, but then only made a few, and this one lives at the wonderful Computer Museum in Mountain View, CA!

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Raccoons!
I'm surprised that they are letting them in the bathrooms already, though not surprised who they're being grouped with.

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New Orleans holds a special place in our hearts, and not just due to the eaves that look a lot like something we'd do.

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From the side of Mr. Jalopy's old water-break dynamometer that came with his shop. Luckiest guy we know!

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Why we aren't converting old buses into Tiki-themed bed and breakfast rooms in the Arizona desert I'll never know. I think it's time for a new business plan!

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Along with Jazz, Hot Rods are one of the few totally American art forms. What's not to be inspired by?

IMG_6285, originally uploaded by jillianisaphotographer.

Look closely and you'll notice.... these are just standard cement blocks placed in a repeating square pattern.
Love it.
It's so crafty looking, almost like it's been hand done, yet looking closely it's incredibly attainable and affordable.

And I'm a sucker for that 60's Googie style....

IMG_6075, originally uploaded by jillianisaphotographer.

This light is such a great thing for inspiration.
The bulbs are simply shielded by the colored bottles.
So much complexity, and yet none at all.
It gives me so many ideas..... or maybe none at all....

IMG_6293, originally uploaded by jillianisaphotographer.

I really like how these columns taper and meet the ceiling.
We saw these at the San Diego Museum of Art in the Sculpture Court.
There's a nice cafe there too.
go!

We live in Oakland, CA. There is so much cool stuff here.

Recently we went exploring along the shipping ports, and we found a HUGE park. I looked it up on Google maps, wanting to point to it in this post, and all that is shown is a big grey mass. Doing more searching I learned that it is called Middle Harbor Shoreline Park, Located at End of 7TH Street, in Oakland.

The park is made up of rolling grass hills right next to the water. There are telescopes set up at the end of a fake bow of a ship near the water, so you can scan the bay and spy on San Francisco. There is a "goasting" of a huge warehouse building that used to be there. They left the structural support beams so you can see where the building used to stand. There is an observation tower with more telescopes, and..... there is this giant bolt:

connected to this giant propeller:

push that propeller!