The Chalk Artist of Little Italy

Greetings friends worldwide! I’m back!
Sorry it has been a few weeks from the last blog post, but my Summer here in San Diego
has been BUSY! With my Son Matthew going away to school at Humboldt State University in Northern California, to biking and kayaking like a madman, (it's therapy for me) :-) there hasn’t been much time to do all the other things I’d love to do. I really don’t know how many of you.. my fellow bloggers find the TIME to do your thing with family, work and summer fun demands at your doorstep. It amazes me to no end that you can blog your life and interests as much as you do, ahh... but I’ve taken the road less traveled and made my decision to blog when I could and when I had something important to share with you. I thought you might like to enjoy this one.

Here in San Diego we have a section in town called “ Little Italy” and every year there is a huge Festa! Now in its 15th year, the free event has become fondly known as the largest single-day Italian American festival west of the Mississippi and is expected to attract more than 120,000 this year to the hip and historic Little Italy neighborhood in San Diego. This year as usual there are more ways the public can learn about the history, experience live entertainment and get inspired by the united community enthusiasm for Italian heritage.

More than 150 food, art and retail vendors participate in FESTA, with special highlights including: Italian food: All local restaurants are open and overflowing, serving up the best Italian cuisine – everything from pizza and pastries to authentic pastas and giant calamari! In a picturesque urban setting, the beer and wine garden provide guests with an exciting venue to mix and mingle; Tons of Italian entertainment.. Two entertainment stages feature an array of talented musicians and performers throughout the day. There is also Italian-inspired fun and sports: Bocce ball tournament; Stickball exhibition game; Raffle prizes; and an interactive children’s area and Italian art. It really is a very cool day!


One of my favorite things to do is to take my digital Canon SLR, a small foot stool and photograph the artist as they work on the their chalk paintings in the street.
This well-known Gesso Italian Chalk Painting Contest is all about the artisian works that are for display and sale and always takes place in the heart of the neighborhood on India Street (between Fir and Grape Streets). More than 150 artists representing 40 teams from across the nation come to participate in the event, drawing huge crowds to enjoy viewing the creation of their masterpieces. So take a walk with me friends , take a peek through my lens and enjoy the beauty of it all from San Diego..
Click on any photo to enlarge it for better viewing!
I Hope everyone had a BEAUTIFUL SUMMER! See you soon..
Harry
All Photos /C.Copyright 2009/ LENZWORK INC./ A Mojo Enterprise / C.Copyright 2009/

BLAST FROM THE PAST

Greetings Friends Worldwide, I LOVE old vintage cars, guitars and The Beach Boys!
Hey..I drive a 1967 Blue VW Bug Ok? :-) ...It's a California Thang Baby!
Yesterday was a wonderful day with friends enjoying the vintage cars of a bye gone era. Take a short tour with me and take a peek through the lens of my Canon Digital SLR..They just don't make cars like this anymore kiddies!
Thank you all very much for your emails and words of support!
Please feel free to leave me your comments ..I love to read them..and thank you all for the very warm welcome to my new blog home here at " Confessions of a Accidental Rock Star"
Enjoy.. Harry
Greetings from Sandy Eggo!
Sorry there are a few doubles..still getting the hang of this software!
CLICK on any photo to enlarge it!

As a footnote to the “Blast from the Past “ photo blog ..may I direct you to
this article from the New York Times about that Little Deuce Coupe
the Beach Boy made so famous.

Surfers Met Rodders, and a Genre Was Born
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/30/automobiles/collectibles/30DEUCE.html

All Photos Copyright 2009 C. -LENZWORK - A MOJO ENTERPRISE 2009

The Greatest

The Champ Ali and I..

Greetings..before I get started on the MySpace bands music side of things, I'd like to share a few great memories of days gone bye of rubbing elbows with the Icons of our age
in Sports, Music, and Entertainment. This is # 1 in this series.

Many years ago I was working for the Donald Trump Organization in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and driving a limo on the side. I received a call on a Sunday night from my friends at the Sands Hotel and Casino transportation department stating they were concerned about the weather report for Monday. The report was for rain and fog early in the day and if that happened then not one single helicopter could fly from Bader field, a small airport in Atlantic City. So they let me know that if it rains, then Monday morning at 6 am I would be driving Mohammad Ali and his wife and personal photographer to the United Nations. Ali was to speak to the United Nations assembly on a subject dear to his heart, a charity called “ World Share ”. Mohammad was in town at the Sands Hotel and Casino, and he was a guest of Dick Cavett who had a weekend TV program filmed entirely in the showroom there at the Hotel.

That Sunday night after the phone call, I abandoned my fortune to fate and I PRAYED for rain and fog, not just any rain or fog mind you, I asked for forty days and forty nights of relentless weather, a stormy Nor'easter from HELL! Well low and behold, it started raining right away. THE RAIN GODS HEARD MY PRAYER! IT RAINED BIG-TIME! It was a downpour of cats and dogs on such an epic scale, that to this day I smile when I think about it. Yeah man it RAINED ! Any Irishman worth his salt, would have felt right at home that day in Atlantic City.
Monday morning I answered the call to go pick him up at the Sands..On my way out the door that day I had my wallet, keys, raincoat, umbrella and a small Kodak point and shoot camera just in case I could get my photo taken with the Champ!

It took us about three hours to make it to the United Nations, due to the weather and what happened next is one of the most amazing things I have ever witnessed in my entire life. I parked the limo in front of the United Nations, I jumped out to open his back door and the minute I opened his door, Ali stepped out into the pouring rain, I held an umbrella over his head..and BOOM!!!!!!People immediately appeared around the limo, it was extraordinary, there was this huge applause from the streets! all
traffic had now come to a stand still!!..buses stopped! trucks, cars, taxis, people walking down the street..EVERYONE came over to greet him in the POURING rain. I remember one bus driver had opened the doors on his city bus and all the people ran off the bus to see Ali. There were people from every single walk of life crushed around him, they were laughing, yelling, calling out to him..ALI! ALI! ALI!, in the POURING rain! I remember thinking that at one point there must have been one hundred people trying to touch him and talk to him. This was very heady stuff, and I was right next to him the entire time. This was a life moment I will never forget ..it was his moment, our moment, all of us, we were all part of something bigger then ourselves. I was standing with the Champ in the POURING rain! My God! I Was!!
I pinched myself several times, just to make sure.

After his visit to the United Nations I drove Ali to JFK International Airport for his flight back to Los Angeles..I spent about 7 hours with him that day, he would ask me questions about my boxing skills and poke fun at me ..and wanted to know if I was as “Bad As Him” so we talked of sports, the world events at the time and he kept asking me “ When are we going to get there Harry” ? are we there yet? He had the entire limo cracking up! Ali was the most kind, and loving person, with a very big heart!
I parked the limo at JFK and requested a photo with him.. Ali agreed and posed me for his photographer, he knew exactly what to do for the camera..His photographer took the shot with my Kodak point and shoot camera CLICK! One photograph..they were running late, no time for another. Mohammad asked his photographer to tip me for my services, as he had no cash on him, Then the Champ gave me a hug....thanked me and ran to catch his flight . This was a day of total MAGIC!.. that special feeling that embraces landscape and history and our personal associations, of where you were at the time, but somehow goes beyond the sum of them. Lucky me...
http://www.ali.com/
" THE GREATEST "
56 WINS 5 Lost
37 Knockouts
3 / Three time Undisputed Heavyweight Champion of The World
' The Most Dangerous Man On Earth '

“Confessions of an Accidental Rock Star”

One of my friends over the July fourth weekend suggested to me that I should blog my
thoughts of having band's on MySpace. She found that musical environment very interesting and wanted a deeper insight to the social networking of what goes on here
from a Band’s point of view. I think she is seriously looking for material for her next gig! ☺ HA!
She wanted to know about the magic of the music. The people who I have met online in the past two years, and how through MySpace this turned into this one big social network worldwide! She picked my brain for hours ☺ and like some of us, she logs on to My Space under a wacky name and enjoys it big-time. I told her there were over FIVE MILLION bands on MySpace worldwide and she laughed and told me to get to work!
After a few great bottles of white and some lovely salmon with veggies the deal was made. My friend promised to take me to Disneyland whenever I finished four bogs, in a six- week period and pancakes at the “Griddle” in LA whenever I wanted them on weekends! Who could say no to that?..Then she came up with a name for my blog.. “Confessions of a Accidental Rock Star” wow!
What I would like to do is give you an insiders view of the music world we all enjoy here and tell you a bit about the bands, musicians, fans, and people, the good, the bad, and the just plain crazy who have rocked my world for the past two years from just about every place under the sun. So look for my first installment soon!
P.S. don’t worry , some of the names will be changed to protect the criminally insane.

"All of us are sailors on a beautiful sea...Sailing our way through the cybernetic netherfields of space and time on the good ship " Lonely Gnomes" we are eating cheese sandwiches and drinking Irish beer ... forever sailing into a never ending sunset of friendship."

Mojo