The site has moved slow but on the days where you may not see an update here, I invite you to check out The Chronicles Facebook page. Even if you don’t have a Facebook page yourself or just plain don’t like Facebook, I still would love it if you guys would go on there and bookmark the page. If you don’t see an update here, most likely I am busy working on something. Even when I am working however, every free moment I have I’ll try to throw something up on the FB page. The FB page has been moving consistently lately so you will see photo uploads there often. It’s much easier for me to upload something to The Chronicles Facebook page on my phone or when I’m on the road than uploading something to the site…

Anyways, work has picked up quite a bit lately. I am currently working on finishing up a story for Honda Tuning magazine but last week, I spent much of the week working on the annual Super Street Honda Issue. This year’s Honda Issue has a different feel to it than the past two years where I think this year’s is much more diverse with Hondas ranging from all over the world. The stories I finished up for that issue are from Japan and the east coast. I think you guys will enjoy it  and it’ll be great like every Honda Issue that comes out from SS every year. I also finished up a pretty lengthy feature last week for the international magazine that I contribute for, Total Honda. I’m really happy with how that story came out and I’m excited to see how the photos and everything come together when it goes to print. I closed out the week doing a story for Honda Tuning about a Honda from the midwest and am currently knocking out a story from a really clean CR-Z from out here in the west coast. Once I get that knocked out than I will be working on some pretty interesting builds from Japan for Import Tuner magazine… My hands are pretty full with work but things are good right now and I am enjoying it. I’d love to take on as much work as I can because it’s great to see different builds from all over the world. One of the great parts of having my job is that I get to see a lot of diversity. While I focus a majority of my time on Hondas for The Chronicles, my actual job has me devoting my time to vehicles of all makes from everywhere…

I don’t want to leave you guys without anything to look at so I took the liberty of taking some photos yesterday from my day down at the Rywire facilities… My buddy Takeshi Kobayashi made a surprise trip out here from Japan for business so we’ve been trying to dig up some time to hang out with him. He just went home to Japan a little over two weeks ago but then a customer of his requested that he find a Acura CL from over here in the states. He located one in the exact condition that the customer was looking for and arranged to complete the sale and transport immediately. He came back out here and hit us up so of course we were going to spend some time with him. Takeshi is one of our good friends from overseas that we often don’t see for months at a time so it’s important that we make him feel welcome while he’s in the U.S. Though he was out here on business, he even stopped by Saturday to help David move into his new place. That shows how close of a homie he’s become to us over time. The man is out here from Japan and he’s still down to help move. There are people out here that know David for a longer period of time that aren’t even down to help, haha…

He’ll be on a plane on his way back to Japan by the time he sees this but yesterday, Takeshi met up with me over at Ryan’s shop because he had to pick up some Chronicles t-shirts for his customers. We were going to meet up to make the exchange and also to meet up for a final dinner before he headed home today. After I arrived, a couple of the other homies showed up for dinner as well so I just decided to stick around for the rest of the day. Takeshi was capturing some photos with his camera so I felt inspired and decided to take some photos. I always bring my camera along with me to Rywire anyways since there are times when Ryan needs me to take product photos for him. There aren’t any particular back stories to a majority of these photos, I just took them for shits and giggles. The ones that I’ve posted up where there is a meaning behind I’ve left comments, otherwise, they are just random photos from stuff that I saw around the shop… Enjoy… There are a lot of photos of incomplete builds that are currently in progress. While I’m sure you may have questions about certain things related to the builds, I will address them at a later time when I get photos of the cars in more completed states. If you must, you can always ask a question in the comments section and I will try to answer them for you…

For those inquiring, the first two shots were shot with a Canon 70-200mm L-series lens. The rest are from a 50mm 1.4…I am no expert so I probably can’t answer any of your other photography questions, haha…I am however, randomly listening to Taylor Swift’s first album while I type this…why? I don’t know, I find it quite enjoyable and I still haven’t gotten over the fact that TBS stopped showing Saved by the Bell episodes from 3-5am…

Thanks for looking…

This is actually Alex Doan’s S2000 from the shop next door, Ballade Sports, which operates out of the L-Con facility…he’s the guy that used to own the completely Spoon’d-out black S2K. This is his current project…

Rywire Ryan’s Acura NSX on custom black Rega Evos….

Our Japanese buddy, Takeshi Kobayashi, checking out DPK David’s EJ1 Civic coupe…

Supertwinz John’s E-AT Civic build…progress has been slow on this project but he’s been busy with regular life stuff as well as with his job over at AEM…

His mil-spec harness mount and power connection to his battery…there is just so many cool details about this build that will be unveiled when he finally finishes this thing…

Speaking of slow progress, DPK Darryl’s EM1 is still posted up at Rywire… Darryl’s been working on it slowly but as you can tell from the passenger side window, this thing is getting no love…haha…

The engine bay is starting to really come together…he went with an interesting valve cover choice which some of us like while others are still on the fence about…

DPK David’s TE37s showing some of its age…eventually he’s going to re-do the wheels in a different finish so new decals will go on the spokes when the time comes…

Just a man alone with his thoughts, perfecting his craft and building his brand…

Always good to see Ryan’s CR-X at the shop…. word has it that this may not be his car much longer. It may have a new owner and the car will undergo a drastic transformation so this vanity plate may be appearing on another one of Ryan’s upcoming projects…

Darryl’s Mugen Active Gate brakes…

Absolutely love John’s re-conditioned BBR Comps….

Darryl’s Mugen lip for his coupe…

If you haven’t noticed, Darryl is quite the Mugen-whore…

I thought this was a cool shot…I might be wrong…

Darryl kept insisting that John put his front bumper on for photos but I think that we’ll have plenty of opportunities to see this Civic with a bumper on later…for now, it’s cool to see it in its raw state…

It’s only right that a AEM employee run AEM products…

Checkerd Sports steering boss on John’s E-AT…

Supertwinz John catching up on his NWP4Life content before we headed out to dinner…

Random but there was an Accord fully decked-out with a Black Widow body kit getting dropped off at Ballade Sports for a new transmission… It was transported to the future from 2001 since transmissions were too expensive a decade ago for these cars…

As stated, it was Takeshi’s last night in America so we all decided to get together for dinner. A couple more of the homies showed up for dinner and it turned into a full-on guy’s night out. We didn’t want to make everyone drive everywhere so we decided to grab dinner at a local spot called Brodard. If you follow this site then you’ll note that we’ve eaten there on numerous occasions. Takeshi is from Japan so he doesn’t have very many opportunities to try out Vietnamese cuisine so it was a good chance for him to expand his palette…

One of the guys that decided to come out to grab some dinner with us was PG+K Jay. Jay’s made the move out to the west coast so he’s gonna be a regular here on The Chronicles. He’s always been a regular but now you get to see more of his mug and the shit he eats when he’s out with us now…

Brodard is famous for their Vietnamese spring rolls so we always get a couple orders of that when we are there….

Jay ordered a 33…

Brodard isn’t your traditional Pho noodle spot where you just have noodles, broth and meat. Their food is from a different region so their menu varies from the average…above is my Pho Thai that I always get there…

J.P.’s beef stew came with a French baguette…

Takeshi ordered a more traditional broken rice platter…

After we grabbed dinner, we headed back over to the shop to chill some more before we said our good byes to Takeshi…I shot some more photos…

John’s battery and custom battery mount fabricated my Louie from L-Con….

Another shot of the BBRs on John’s E-AT…

For those wondering about specs, they are 15×6.5 +45…. I am a fan of them on his car but he also has a set of Mugen NR10Rs which are just perfect for this E-AT….

Ryan’s AP Racing brake caliper for his ITR… yes, it’s still over at ASC and no I don’t really have any news on the progress…

Random snap of Ryan’s Bride bucket…

Supertwinz John’s coil-on-plug set-up with the Rywire coil-on-plug mounting plate…

We were talking about E-AT Civics and got to chatting about John’s other car, which is an E-AT straight from Japan. He bought it off of Yahoo! Auctions Japan a couple years ago and it’s also been a slow work in progress. John was describing to Takeshi how mint the car was and then showed him some photos of it the day it left the dock in japan and was shipped over here to the states…

After looking through some photos it was time for me to head home to finish some work I had pending…. Here’s a shot of a custom coffee mug that belongs to J.P…. pretty cool stencil of him and his EG from his Honda Tuning shoot years ago….

That’s a wrap…

It was May’s birthday this week so I really wanted to throw a surprise party for her. She’s thrown a couple for me in the past so I thought it would be cool to try to surprise her. I didn’t go in with high hopes because she tends to ask a high volume of questions for everything but I just decided to do what I could to surprise her. I just needed a couple of distractions here and there. She took a couple days off from work for her birthday as well which made things more difficult to organize but luckily I have some great friends who were willing to lend a helping hand. We went out to dinner a couple times on the nights leading up to the weekend, which we all hoped would lead her astray from thinking we had anything planned. I also had to take care of some stuff for work so it was good timing that the girls had to get together in the morning to go do their thing…

I woke up early in the morning to meet up with DPK David to shoot his EJ1 Civic coupe for a U.K.-based magazine (Total Honda) that I recently started to do work for. Many of you who are familiar with his coupe know that it’s been featured twice here in the states within the last 6 years or so, but I thought it would make a good feature vehicle for an overseas magazine. It’s a popular build here in the states but I feel that it is still mostly unknown outside of our borders. We’ve always talked about me doing the story on his build in the past, but things just never came together for that to happen. When his car was featured back in ’06 for Honda Tuning, I wasn’t even working in the industry yet and when it appeared in Import Tuner mag a couple years ago, I hadn’t started doing work for IT yet. I don’t feel that the U.K. has very many well-known K-swapped Hondas yet, especially coupes, so I thought that it would be cool to get David in there. I think a lot of people sleep on his build too because of the fact that it’s a coupe and not the more popular hatchback. In any case, the opportunity came up for me to finally man the feature for his build and I seized it. It’s cool of Total Honda U.K. to put their trust in my abilities to pick a good car and that’s why I like doing work for them. Hopefully their target audience enjoys the story. If not, it’s all good though because I would have shot the car just for fun anyways. He’s recently added a couple new things here and there and this current look is probably the best yet….

We got to the shoot location around 7am and the sun had just risen. Rodrez from Honda Tuning was also shooting at the same location not too far away from us as well so he stopped by to hang out for a bit after he finished. The weather was surprisingly pleasant compared to the last couple weekends I had shot out in L.A. so I wasn’t interrupted with constantly having to blow my runny nose… It took a couple hours but I was pretty happy with the overall results. After Rodrez took off to go home and take care of his baby, my buddy Jae Bueno randomly cruised by to say what’s up. Jae runs his own blog as well (www.jaebueno.com) where he does something similar to what I do here, but for the ever-popular Socal Lowrider community. Jae has been a fan of this site for quite some time, even though he isn’t a Honda head himself, and has always been very kind to me whenever we have run into each other at events. He also shoots for Lowrider magazine and he was down in L.A. that morning to shoot a car. He set-up down the way from us and after I finished shooting David’s coupe, we cruised over there to check it out…

We loaded-up my camera gear and drove a couple feet down to where Jae was. His wife was busy shooting the model alongside the Chevy pick-up and I chatted with Jae for a quick minute before he was called over to help. I asked if it was cool if I could grab some shots for the site and he obliged. The location was a perfect spot, I think, for the shoot but I don’t envy him having to shoot a build that had dark paint which mirrored everything around it. The curves of the truck also looked like it would be challenging since it would reflect everything around that area. On Saturdays it also tends to be busy because the adjacent businesses are still open, unlike Sundays when it’s a ghost town in the early mornings…. Click here if you want to see a larger version of the above photo….

I only stayed for a couple of minutes because I didn’t want to intrude but I remember Jae Bueno telling us that this model drove all the way out from New Mexico just for this shoot… With the way gas prices are, I would imagine it would have been better to fly but she didn’t want to miss out on the chance to be in Lowrider magazine so she hopped in her car and made the trek out to the mean streets of L.A. in her bikini, haha… Click here for a larger version of the above photo…

After saying bye to Jae Bueno and his wife, we decided to get out of the area and head back home. Rodrez had mentioned that there was an event going on that afternoon at one of the Source Interlink offices so I hopped on Facebook for some details. It wasn’t a heavily advertised event but it wasn’t too far away so I went. It was a small meet that Super Street and Import Tuner put together to coincide with the Formula D tech day that was going on down at the Irvine offices. There was an interesting mix of cars but it was a pretty small turn-out in comparison to most meets. They didn’t expect much from it anyway since there wasn’t much promotion behind it….

I’ll be perfectly honest, I don’t follow drifting much these days and I didn’t even know when Formula D was taking place, but it was interesting to see all the new drift builds popping-up. I am not even involved enough to know if drifting is even remotely as popular as it once was but apparently there is still a pretty strong following… I didn’t recognize any of the cars besides the Garage Boso S15 so I used that day as sort of a re-introduction into the drifting scene…

We stayed for maybe an hour or two and I managed to get a pretty solid batch of photos. I’ll post them up tomorrow when I finally get a chance to go through all of them but this is all you guys will see from that event today. The SC430 drift car is supposed to be a pretty big deal and from what I saw while I was there, this thing is pretty intense.  Just the custom fabrication alone was impressive. It didn’t matter that the car wasn’t finished and without a colorful graphical livery. We chatted with some people that were more familiar with the car and they said it was Achilles Tires newly-sponsored drift vehicle. I got more pics, but again, I’ll post them up tomorrow…

The girls coincidentally were in the same area as us so they drove by and met up. Rodrez and Tes also came by with baby Maddox…

This little guy is growing up so fast and will be the first Chronicles regular before he’s even spoken his first word, haha….

Most of us had woken up early in the morning so we parted ways to rest-up before the night’s festivities. Everything had come together pretty easily for May’s surprise birthday party so it was just a matter of getting to the restaurant that evening….

This photo was taken this past weekend but the owner of this Civic, Sam Ip-Nguyen, is the owner of the restaurant that we’d be having May’s party at. Sam is a great guy and was more than happy to host the surprise party for us. His girlfriend Linh also helped out and prepared everything from the food to the decorations for us so I basically had nothing to worry about. For those wondering, Sam’s restaurant is called Hoy’s Wok and it’s on Sunset Blvd. It’s a Chinese food spot and the food is great. He’s there 7 days a week as the main chef so I highly recommend going there if you like Chinese food. The guy knows how to cook and has great taste in cars. Support your fellow enthusiast and stop by when you guys get the chance. Peep the website for his restaurant here….

As usual, we got there a little late but it worked out since a couple others were also stuck in traffic on Sunset Blvd….When we got there, May was greeted with our usual car-friends as well as her old friends from high school. It’s rare to have everyone in the same place at the same time since both are completely different groups of friends but I was really happy to see everyone together…I don’t always throw surprise birthday parties, but when I do, apparently they are pretty successful, haha….

The birthday girl was all smiles as she cut her cake…

Random but May’s cake isn’t your traditional birthday cake because these cakes from “Nothing Bundt Cakes” are one of May’s favorites. I figured people aren’t always down to eat regular birthday cake anyway so why not just get something that May would eat even if it wasn’t her birthday. Nothing Bundt Cakes isn’t really close to my area but Rodrez and Tes came through in the end and picked it up for the party….

Hoy’s Wok isn’t that big but Sam reserved half of his restaurant just for us…There was probably about 25 of us when it was all said and done….Kind of hard to see everyone but guys like Ejay, Rywire Ryan, Supertwinz John, Parnell Navarro, Rodrez, Big Mike, Downstar Frank, and PG+K Jay where all there to celebrate….You can also see Rodrez sitting all the way in the back with Tes and the baby while DPK David was chillin’ against the wall…

Big thanks to everyone that came out…I really wanted to get a group shot of everyone that was there but there were a couple that had to leave a little early due to prior engagements… Here is most of the party outside of Sam’s restaurant….

After we departed from Hoy’s Wok, a couple of us met up down at Diddy Riese in Westwood to grab some of their famous ice cream sandwiches. It was pretty cold but the girls sure love their ice cream… Sunday was pretty uneventful for us since we knew there was a huge storm coming. We stayed in and just watched TV all day…but….

Meanwhile, at the DUB Show in Anaheim…

Holy shit…haha… Jae Bueno mentioned that there was a DUB event this weekend but I had no idea it was on Sunday. I jacked these photos from my FB buddy Jose Romo, who apparently decided to go check it out….When you think of the DUB show, you imagine seeing stuff like this…

I am unsure of what this is, but it was taken hours before the storm hit Anaheim, CA….

You would also expect to see stuff like this…which also actually happened at the DUB show that day…dogs standing on girls asses? Sure, why not, it’s the DUB show. There was probably a couple of fights that went on as well as a concert…but torrential downpour? Nooo…..

Shout-out to all the people that stuck around but fuuuuck, that shit looks horrible! Haha…I can’t even imagine standing in that and attempting to have a good time. Take a look at the pic two photos above again, that pile of blue mess was once a fold-up canopy! What a mess….

At least these guys looked like they were having a good time…Shit is coming down hard…You can even see the Chrysler 300C with the Camaro front-end I posted from Hot Import Nights not too long ago in the background, haha…. I was curious so I looked at some coverage online of the DUB event and they were dry for most of the day but damn, when that rain came down, it wiped out the whole show….Props to those that got through it…I’m all for rain or shine events but a lot of those builds that regularly attend DUB events aren’t ever meant to see water or spend a lot of time outdoors. I don’t know what steps they took to prevent their cars from getting hit with all this rain…Imagine Lowriders with 10K+ paint jobs with no tops and custom interiors…plus a rainstorm…yikes….

That’s a wrap for today. Life is good, I can’t complain…

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” – Margaret Mead

How it all started is a little mundane, but here is how the story goes….

As you all know, I am a freelance writer/photographer for various automotive publications, and one of the main books that I work for is Honda Tuning magazine. Rodrez is the head editor over there these days but even though he spends much of his time putting every issue together, he still continues to shoot many of the stories in the Socal area. I will shoot for him occasionally, but for the most part, if time permits, Rodrez will knock out the shoots. I received a text message from him last Wednesday and he asked me if I could shoot for him over the weekend because he had a prior engagement in San Diego. He notified me as to what car it was and the owner and I remember chatting with the guy at the Evasive Motorsports open house, so I told Rodrez that I would do it. May was out of town in Dallas, Texas on business so I had some free time on my hands. If I could occupy that time and make some money, why not? I try to help out Rodrez whenever I can now as well because he has a newborn baby and I would much rather he spend that extra time with his family than shoot a car when I can easily knock it out…

Randomly during the week, I also found out that our buddy Takeshi Kobayashi from Japan was here in the states. He flew out to handle some business matters but he would have time in the evenings to hang out. We always try to spend time with him whenever we can because he’s just a good guy and we want to show him around. I notified the owner of the car I was shooting that I had to push the shoot back to Sunday because not only was it a complete ghost town on Sundays where we shoot, it also gave me some more time to hang out with Takeshi. We only get to see him a couple times per year so it’s important that we get to see him. The owner was cool with it so we were set to meet him on Sunday morning. Come late Saturday night though, I was a little hesitant about shooting early because me and a couple of the guys were having so much fun just hanging out at DPK David’s house and catching up with our Japanese friend. I made my way home, got everything packed up for the morning and went to bed for like, 3 hours…I got up, threw on my contacts which made my eyes burn from the lack of sleep and set out to Downtown L.A. for the shoot…

On Sunday mornings, this particular area is just DEAD… I mean, it’s an industrial area and located down in the warehouse district so the majority of the businesses aren’t even open on Sundays. The owner arrived on time (which tends to be sort of rare these days) and I found a spot to shoot at. It’s a familiar spot, I’ve shot there a couple times and this location dates all the way back to the days when DPK David got his first magazine feature (not shot by me because I didn’t even know how to turn on a camera then), and that had to be like 2006 or so. After I had set-up my light stands, I grabbed my camera to catch a candid shot of the owner and his car. He was busy preparing his car and that’s usually when I try to get some behind-the-scenes photos for this site….

I snapped this photo and it wasn’t particularly good, but whatever…my eyes were still pretty tired from being up late the night before so I just looked around to see if anything caught my eye in an attempt to snap me out of my early morning funk…. In the distance, down the street, I spotted a puppy walking around… it wasn’t very big and it’s furry white appearance instantly grabbed my attention. I didn’t think anything of it, other than it being a little sad to see a puppy run about in a ghost town by itself…

So the dog ran off, turned a corner, and the owner of the car was ready to shoot, so I got to work… I had him position his car at the angle I wanted and started snapping away…I wanted a low angle profile shot of the car so I laid down on the ground. After getting the shots I wanted, I got up to stretch, looked around and saw the puppy again. I guess the dog had noticed us too and came a little closer to see what we were doing….

I snapped this photo of the puppy just hanging out in the distance. It didn’t want to get too close to us because we were complete strangers and it probably didn’t even expect to see any one in that area that morning, but it sat down on the pavement and watched us… As the minutes turned to hours, the puppy started to come closer, to the point where it was now walking around right next to us. I continued to shoot but my attention was turned to the puppy often, and every free moment I got while I had the owner re-position his car, I spent it staring at this puppy. It just seemed happy to have some company…it had no idea what we were doing, but it didn’t matter… you can tell that the puppy was lonely, tired, hungry…but undeniably friendly, fearless…as I walked around to different areas to get different angles of the car, the dog would follow me. I don’t think it expected anything, it was just cool to be around another living being. The owner of the car I was shooting took out a bottle of water and poured some out for the dog, and it happily obliged…

There was some broken pieces of plastic on the floor, probably from a child’s toy that had been run over by a passing car, and the dog snatched up a piece of it with it’s mouth, and started to play. It seemed excited to have company, which gave her energy to be playful. It’s fur was tangled and knotted, and the rain from a couple days before had probably stained it’s fur and gave it an almost greyish appearance. Even though the dog was tattered and dirty, it still had a cute face… I snapped the photo above after it had stopped for a break from running around the car….

A couple hours go by and I figured I had taken all the shots I needed for the magazine feature, and started to pack-up….Again, I was pretty beat in the morning from lack of rest so I had to cycle through the usual shots I take to see if there was anything I missed. I was half finished packing-up when I realized that I needed to get a detail shot of the wheels on the car so I pulled my gear out again. I usually have a towel that I kneel on or lay on top of when I shoot so I don’t get dirty, especially on the streets of Downtown L.A. For the wheel shot, I had to lay down and shoot upwards so I laid the towel out. I pick-up my camera from my camera bag and I walk back over to my towel, and the puppy is laying on top of it. It probably hadn’t had anything soft to lay on top of in awhile so it laid down comfortably on the towel. I let it lay there for a little bit until it decided to get up. I took the spot, got the shots I wanted, and packed up the rest of my stuff once again. The entire time, the puppy was hanging out in our area, as happy as it had been in awhile…

I walk over to my car and the puppy followed suit. It didn’t bark or even make a single sound the entire morning, and just seemed to be a really kind, friendly puppy. It didn’t try to jump in the car or anything, but it didn’t seem like it wanted us to go…I shake hands with the owner, chat with him for a couple seconds, and send him on his way. He gets in his car and drives off…

I think the puppy knew that we were leaving so it looked up at me as I toss my camera bag into the car…I will be the first one to admit that I am not a dog person, by any stretch of the imagination…I am not even a cat person, but I have two cats that live with me because my sister just loves cats. I’ve grown to really like cats over time, but dogs were just not animals that I ever thought of as a pet. I never wanted a dog and I have no idea really how to even take care of one, but I was completely enamored by this puppy. It just seemed to project this sense of innocence. It was so friendly, quiet, fearless…it needed a home…but I just wasn’t the person to provide that home…I felt really bad about it because I knew I would have a whole lot of regret to deal with later on. I captured this last photo of her to remind me of this once-in-a-lifetime meeting with this little puppy…

There was a point in time when I wanted to take the dog, but I had no idea where to take it…an animal shelter would have worked, but I don’t know what would happen to a dog like that. I don’t even know anything about animal shelters or their procedures…what if it ended up in some kennel where they would put it to sleep? Shit…I wanted to take the dog, I really did, but tossing an animal into the car with an unknown state of health from the run down streets of Downtown L.A. just sounded really sketchy. I could make an endless amount of excuses for not taking the dog, but it didn’t make me any less regretful…

I said bye to the puppy and it just stared at me, still never making a sound…. I got in my car and began to drive off. As I drove away I looked into the rear view mirror and saw the puppy chasing after the car…I felt so bad…I think I even got a little choked-up, and I’m usually a pretty emotionless guy… I made a right back onto the main street and looked behind one last time and saw that the puppy had stopped running. It just stopped and stared, realizing that it couldn’t catch-up to me…it probably just didn’t have the energy to…

The whole time I was driving home, all I could think about was this dog. I had completely forgotten that I was just so tired and needed to go back to sleep…When I got home, I pulled my memory card out of my camera and moved the photos of the puppy to my desktop…. I felt compelled to tell my story to someone, so I decided to make a post about it on Facebook. The second photo of the puppy staring at us in the distance was a story that could be told without words…

I wrote a little blurb about it and it instantly attracted the attention of my Facebook friends…More than I expected… many were sad, some were upset that I didn’t take the dog with me, and a couple people even wanted to know where the dog was because they wanted to go get it. One of the first people to ask was my buddy Arn…

Arn (pictured with all smiles above) is the owner of a K-swapped Integra that you all should be pretty familiar with. He lives deep in the valley, way north of Downtown L.A., but was willing to make the drive to go get the dog. In the comment above, you’ll see that he makes reference to picking up the dog for “jr.”…”Jr.” is his baby boy and Arn had recently started a family. Being able to have a puppy in the family sounded like a perfect piece to add to the puzzle of his life. I commented back right away with the address where I shot at, described the surrounding areas, and laid down to get some rest. I laid down in bed, constantly checking my Facebook updates to see if he had actually gone down there, as well as to read the rest of the comments from the post…There was abour 40 people that had something to say, and I was genuinely surprised by the reaction that this little puppy generated…I eventually dozed off though and fell asleep on top of my phone. I think at one point Arn even called me because I turned and heard a faint “hello?…hello?” on the phone in the midst of my slumber…

I woke up a couple hours later to a text message from Arn, which he sent probably an hour after I knocked-out…

“cant find dog “

That was it…all hope was lost…

I responded and told him that it was okay…he tried…and he was a better man than me for making the effort. I also apologized for falling asleep and missing his call. I hop back on Facebook to see if there was any updates…Another person on my FB page also decided to head to that area in search of the dog. In an attempt to further his search, I once again posted-up more details on the surrounding areas where I last saw the puppy…

A couple minutes later, I received a text from Arn…

“found and rescued looking for a groomer who will clean her up”

What?! He found the puppy!! What great news it was after it seemed that all hope was lost. Looking back at the timelime of messages and during the time that I fell asleep, Arn must have been down there looking for a couple of hours….There were a lot of sad faces on Facebook in regards to my story on the puppy, so I decided to update everyone with great news…

The comment I put along with the photo said it all…. Arn was indeed the man, he did what almost seemed to be the impossible. For those of you who don’t know what that area looks like…trust me, it’s a very vast area. A lot of buildings, a lot of cars, though it was empty throughout the day, finding anything is difficult. There were also a lot of places where the dog could have hidden, even a train and train tracks not far away… I was just so happy to hear that Arn was able to locate the dog and take it home. I text him back and I told him to give me updates when he could and also send me a photo of the dog after they had it cleaned up…

The other individual that made his way down there also posted and said that he had no luck finding the puppy, and that he was happy to hear that it was picked-up when his wife saw the update on Facebook and called him to let him know. He too deserves some praise for making the long drive down there in an attempt to give the puppy a home…

As I said on Facebook, in this instance, social media actually did quite a bit of good for a change…for all the bullshit that we see on Facebook of people posting up stupid ass shit, we were finally able to make some use out of Facebook and changed a life in the process…

I sent him a text message to see where he found the dog and he quickly responded…

“a few streets down under a car. u were right she is super friendly”

Well, I assumed the dog was a boy the whole morning and it turned out to be a girl….

“thanks joey, anthony (Arn’s baby boy) has a new buddy now! by the way we’re naming her Joey”

If anything, Arn should have named the puppy Arnette or something because he deserves all the credit for saving her… I did nothing but tell a sad story about an encounter I had with a stray…nonetheless, I was honored. The post in response to Arn finding the puppy was just overwhelming. For all the sadness that people felt early that morning, they were all amazed to hear the good news. Arn has been a great enthusiast to look up to for his automotive endeavors, but we will always know him as a hero and a utterly amazing human being for what he had done….

Some time passed by into the late evening when I got a notification on my Facebook application on my phone… It was from Arn…

The little girl cleans up pretty well I must say! Haha, doesn’t even look like the same dog after she got all cleaned-up. She was still very frail and thin, but still dressed to impress, and she had food and water. Apparently she seems to be pretty photogenic as well!…Seriously, you can’t even make this kind of stuff up…

As for the post I was notified of on Facebook, I’ll let Arn tell you his side of the story…

Here’s the post that I copied and pasted. I figured it’d be easier to read here than on a screenshot….

“whoa, what an adventure today. i started my day as usual on facebook and found joey lee’s post about this dog that caught his attention. i asked the boss if she wanted a dog and thats where our journey began…

we drove from the SFV to downtown LA in search for this special dog. we got to the area where the dog was last seen and slowly drove around the cuts for about 45 minutes looking her with no luck. so we took a break from the search and went to lunch at aloha cafe.

after lunch we continued our search and in the last minutes of the hour we found her under a car, trying to keep cool from the hot sun. i pulled out some leftovers and began to feed her. she ate everything then with no hessitation she let me pick her up to put her in the back of our SUV.

when we got back to the valley we wanted to get her cleaned up so we drove to 3 groomers to find that they were all closed. luckily the people at pet people they were able to direct us to a groomer that was open on sundays. we got to top dog groomers in northridge and dropped her off to get pampered. a few hours later they called and told us that she was ready for pick up.

so without any further adue…we welcome JOEY L. (Lucky) REYES to our family. =)”

You just can’t help but smile when something good like this happens…. It was definitely an emotional ride, and I’m just happy that this story has a happy ending….I know it’s not your typical car story you’ll see here on The Chronicles, but it’s good to remind ourselves that we are all human sometimes, and outside of all this madness with cars, there are a lot of great people within our community. Congratulations to Arn, his family, and his new puppy. I hope she lives a long life and they make great memories together…

Larger Version (1400x799px) *Please don’t post this up anywhere else yet because there is one more final revision I would like to make!

Today, I would like to formally announce the official date, time, and location for The Chronicles’ 3-Year Anniversary Celebration…Man, I can’t believe that it has already been another year. Seems like only yesterday that we all gathered together at the Eibach Springs facility in Corona, CA for the 2-year anniversary meet which I dubbed “2YRS”. To go with a similar type of theme this year, I will deem this event “Year.Three”….creative right? Haha…with the three and the year…you know… Anyways, this meet will be basically the same format as last year, being that last year’s was so simple and easy to organize. We will be returning once again to the Eibach Springs facility because they have been generous enough to offer the lot to me once again, and because the size of the lot makes it very easy to get cars parked and people inside. The annual Eibach Honda Meet is so successful every year, many of you have become very familiarized with the venue so it should make it very easy for you guys to find. I am making the announcement today because tomorrow will make it exactly one month until the event will take place. Believe me, there’s been quite a bit of planning already and there are some pretty cool ideas floating around in my head so it’s definitely not going to be a last minute thing…

I make the announcement with it being just one month away because like last year, I want to keep this meet relatively small (compared to some other events) and keep it so that the people there are there because they are fans of the site and not merely going just because it’s just some car meet. I want you guys to know that I really do appreciate all your support over the years and I hope you guys respect my wishes and invite people that you know that actually know what The Chronicles is. It’s like bringing some random ass fools to somebody’s party who have no idea who the other person is, you know what I mean? Things will flow much better if we keep it to the people that follow the site, because they know what I’m about and those people know what type of attitude I expect from people. The lot was kept very clean last year, everyone was respectful to one another, and the meet was just a overall great time. If you plan on bringing some friends, please let them know that I don’t want them to act a fool, or to bring a dog and allow it to shit on the floor without anyone picking it up, or to change their babies or some shit and leave the diaper on the floor. I hate that shit, and the people over at Eibach hate that shit even more, because we have to clean that shit up and I don’t pick up shit for my own friends let alone some stranger…

I will be adding a couple new things this year just to make it more fun but for the most part, it will be very much the same as 2YRS. May will be making her treats once again for everyone to enjoy so make sure to say thanks to her for slaving away in the kitchen to put snacks together for you guys. I will also have a very small number of vendors this year as well who are hand-picked by me, who I feel have supported my site since the early days. Please don’t hit me up for a vendor spot. If I want to have you there, I will ask you personally. I think also that I might even throw out a couple awards this year like “Best of” or “Best Engine Bay” or some shit, I’m still working on the final details on that. As for parking, it will be the same as last year, parking around the rest of the Eibach lot is free, but if you want to park up front, there will be a fee. It won’t be a crazy amount like a car show or whatever, but this helps in the organization process of parking cars as well as paying for various things for the meet, like port-a-potties, materials for certain things, etc. Again, it is up to you if you choose to park in the front. IT IS YOUR DECISION TO MAKE, so don’t fucking bitch about having to pay for a parking spot. It’s going to be a decently-sized meet so parking will be limited. If you want to act like an asshole, believe me, you will be asked to leave promptly. As for it being an “only Honda” affair, like last year, it won’t be but the ones that aren’t are usually friends of the site or heavy supporters. If you guys know me or are friends with the other homies who are basically a part of The Chronicles family, then by all means, you are invited…

I will post up more details as I get to them. I’m currently down in SD attending to some personal matters but I will post up a FAQ section like last year when it’s ready….

Thanks for looking, and I hope to see you there on October 22nd….

With that said, I am proud to say that I can now put down “Import Tuner Magazine” on my list of publications that I have done work for. Charles Trieu, who was once a vital part of the Super Street magazine staff, has since moved onto become the head editor of Import Tuner and I guess he liked the work that I did previously, because he asked me to jump on board and do some work for IT. It’s a pretty cool feeling to say that I have written and shot for Super Street, Honda Tuning, and now Import Tuner. This month’s issue (on newstands now) marks my official debut over at Import Tuner and I’m proud to say that I am very happy with how my first two stories over at IT came out. I’ll fill you in on what exactly it is that I did further below…

On another note though, I was contacted by Jereon Willemsen (You know him from SPEEDHUNTERS) via Facebook early yesterday morning with a very pleasant surprise. He’s over in the Netherlands so it’s probably easier for him to get a hold of the mag but he let me know that The Chronicles is in the newest issue of Performance VW magazine as “The Site of The Month”. What I’m doing in a publication solely dedicated to Volkswagons is beyond me but apparently the editors over there found my site one day and enjoyed it so much that they decided give me that honor. It’s pretty crazy to think that not only is this a VW mag, but it’s also a publication that’s not even from the United States. It’s wild…I gotta say though, it is quite an honor for them to even mention me in their magazine. Jereon even sent me a couple photos of what the spread looks like…

They ran a couple of the photos from my event coverage on the page as you can see…. It’s so random but pretty amazing that they would give me that kind of recognition so I have to thank the guys over at Performance VW… They also emailed me too that same day that Jereon did and let me know that they were going to send me a copy of the magazine. If you’re from Performance VW and you’re reading this…thank you very much, I truly appreciate it….

Now, onto this month’s reading material…

If you haven’t already done so, make sure to pick up the October 2011 issue of Super Street magazine. Not only is it “The Stance” issue, which I’m sure many of you will love, it also marks the 15-year anniversary of Super Street magazine. They have a story inside with some of the more notable import models from the last 15 years and it’s a pretty good read. Also there are some pretty good shots in there so some of you guys can re-live your younger years and beat off to some classics…haha…it’s like reuniting with an old friend with your penis…

In this particular issue of SS, I shot Dennis Kongvongsai’s Subaru STi from Team Hybrid. I’m sure you guys have heard me mention his name a couple times in my coverage of events. I actually had never met the guy until that day I cruised down to San Diego to shoot his car but he is a pretty chill guy. The car looks good on those mag blue Volk RE30s and the car has a whole is a different look from most usual Subarus that you see on the road nowadays with some fucking Rotas on them and shit… The story is pretty good too where I talk about the current “state of stance” and sort of give some good insight on the whole “stance” movement…

While Super Street’s current issue deals with all style and wheel fitment, Honda Tuning this month has devoted an entire issue to all things race-related. Just like last year, Rodrez has put together “The Race Issue”. I’m sure there are those of you out there who have absolutely no idea about how to make a car go fast and only care about how your car looks but that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t pick up this issue. It’s a very informative look at some of the top Honda/Acura race cars in our industry today. I did a story on a FG2 Civic race car from Segs Motorsports and even I managed to learn something during the process and I usually have zero ability to learn shit…

One of the coolest stories in this issue is about Tony Palo and Chris Miller, who today are at the top of their game in the drag racing world. They fill you in on their thoughts on drag racing and their rivalry in an interview from Rodrez himself. The cover features an Amuse widebody turbo S2000 and a K-swapped Civic hatchback, both owned by Ryan Novak. Also in the issue is a cool story about the Spoon Sports Civic Euro R democar…

My debut in Import Tuner magazine actually features a two stories, one of which I also did the photos for. Charles is always trying to feature Hondas so he hit me up to shoot a very clean Honda Civic that belongs to Brian Jacobe Arias from the AS1 crew…

Nothing crazy, just a very simple, street-spec Civic. I know there are a lot of you out there who aren’t into the track-themed builds these days or the cars with the crazy tucked bays and this is the Civic for you guys. There’s nothing trendy about this car and it’s a Civic that will probably be relevant in any era. Brian is also one of those very quiet, humble guys and he was super stoked when he found out that his car was going to be featured. He’s the type that actually appreciates stuff like this and doesn’t go out of his way to constantly ask for a feature or expect it, which is also VERY refreshing to see, especially considering how a lot of enthusiasts are these days….

The other story I did for Import Tuner was on this Lamborghini Giallo Orion Yellow widebody Amuse S2000…I personally have never seen or heard of this particular build before so when I first saw photos of it, I was pretty blown away. I mean, you see a couple Amuse S2Ks floating around these days but the thing that really impressed me about this car was the engine bay…that shit is CLEAN. You expect S2000s to always be supercharged these days with a half cluttered engine bay but this one is definitely not one of those. It’s turbocharged and the bay itself is completely shaved and tucked. I would go as far as to say that it’s probably one of the best S2000 engine bays I have ever seen. I’ll give props to Sheepey all day for having an AMAZING bay, with the crazy dump tube set-up and all, but you guys have to see the bay on this yellow S2000, it’s fucking clean. Both are very different cars but if you were to compare the engine bays…ehhh, it definitely makes things interesting. It’s not really a competition though but I’m just saying, people are going to compare… Also, there is some fucking money in this car…every aspect of this S2000 has been touched-upon; motor, aesthetics, custom audio….EVERYTHING. It’s a sick S2000 build….I would have gone a different route with the wheels but fuck it, it’s not my car…my opinion isn’t important, but seriously… If there were some bronze Volk CE28s on this car, I would spontaneously combust, haha…

***oh also, let me add this…ATS Ben brought it to my attention that the horsepower and torque numbers on this S2000 in the story are incorrect….that is not MY fault. It was an error on their part and there was a mix-up when they were doing the numbers for the Auto Select Skyline on the cover and this car…It is in no way a claim made by me or the owner of the car that it makes 800HP and 650lb-ft of torque. If that were the case with this S2000, I think the owner would either by Tony Stark aka Iron Man or Jesus…haha. Just don’t come complaining to me and thinking I’m an asshole for making up some wild numbers for this car…

Anyways, make sure to go pick up these magazines and give them a good thorough reading. It doesn’t even matter if you don’t have to shit at that particular moment, just sit on the fucking toilet and read the shit outta these magazines…SUPPORT PRINT ALWAYS!!…

Thanks also for supporting my ass…

I know a lot of you are wondering what happened to the “HELLASUNK” decals that I’ve been selling for awhile now. They’re not available currently in the storefront because my vinyl cutting machine is still a little screwy so I am only selling the stickers that I have on hand. I do have a new HELLASUNK decal in the works though and once my machine is fully operational again, those will go up on the storefront. Anyways, if you guys ordered something and have yet to receive it, it’s either on it’s way already or about to go in the mail box to go out to you guys. There are two orders where I have to issue refunds however, because I had an error in my inventory and those items are out of stock. I will contact you soon if you are one of those two individuals. I apologize for my error and you guys will get your money back as soon as possible….

Alright, time for bed…thanks for your support. If you missed the NWP Summer Nights 2011 coverage, it is below…

THE OFFICIAL CHRONICLES STOREFRONT

Thanks everyone for their support…Part 1 of the Motion Auto Show Coverage should be up late tonight/early in the AM…

I’m making this post, because we need your help. If you know anything about this, heard something from someone, or have any information regarding this matter, we would all appreciate it if you would contact me and let me know. We are offering a finder’s fee, so don’t worry about that and it will be completely anonymous. If you have any information regarding the theft of these wheels, please let me know. It fucking sucks when stupid shit like this happens and if it ever happened to you, I’m sure you would want to know where your stuff is. Again, completely anonymous…I won’t narc you out on the internet or anything. If you know the whereabouts of these wheels, we would really like to know where they are. Everyone please be on the look-out if you know someone selling a set of black 16×7 Volk CE28s or sees an ad or whatever where a set of these suddenly pops up for sale. There are certain things on it where we will be able to identify whether or not they are the wheels in question. Any information would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Where it happened: City Plaza in Artestia area off of South St. (Where Teastation, Sweetee Thai, Micasa Bakery are located)

When it happened: Between 8pm – 11:30pm

What happened: A set of black 5×114 16×7 Volk CE28s were stolen out of the trunk of a white DA Integra

If you know anything about this or can direct me to where we can locate these wheels, please contact me at stickydiljoe@yahoo.com or contact me on Twitter.com @stickydiljoe

Fuck thieves!!!

West, east, south, whatever…Got it covered. The Chronicles IA 2011 coverage coming tomorrow. Later ya’ll….