Pinup Dreams Made True in Vegas

Posted by pikesan on May 21, 2009 in Art & Photography | 1 comment

This story was written by Dave or elmoco40 in his MyRideisMe garage. It’s a story of a guy finding love and hot rods! It’s bring a tear to your eye if Dave’s wife, Larua Lee weren’t so hot!

This is exactly the kind of story we want at MyRideisMe.com! Great times, get’n the girl, what else is there? For Dave’s efforts, I’m sending him a pack of Pinup Playing Cards by Heidi Van Horne and Sabina Kelly. Look for a contest soon where you can win your set of pinup playing cards, or just send us your ideas!

I grew up in so. Cal, in the town of Santa Ana, CA. Growing up I was surrounded by a lot of lowriders and kustoms that were owned by local clubs and gangs. I was always fascinated by the elaborate paint jobs and the use of hydraulics on there cars, so when I was old enough to know what a wrench was and how to operate a spray can, I began my journey into ripping things apart and trying to somehow make’em different, whether it was bikes or big wheels, something was getting slammed and painted.

When I got into high school in 1978-79, I landed a job as a gas station attendant at a mobile gas station; there I learned basic mechanics by helping the guys work on stuff. Another kool thing that I discovered in 1980 was punk rock and the underground rockabilly scene! So now my little knowledge of cars and the music scene collided and so the kustom kulture scene was born. I feel totally blessed to be part of that emerging scene!

Although I was to poor to afford any kind of hot rod, I did the next best thing; I dated somebody who had a brother with one! lol. One of my 1st real girlfriends had an older brother who owned a beautiful 53 Merc, he called ”Maybelline”. It was all original and baby blue! Some of my best memories involved that car! It was so kool to be 16 -17 years old and pull up to a rockabilly show in that, it was rare back then!

Well of course time passed and the mid to late 80’s got weird and the scene kinda died, everybody kinda went there own ways? So fast forward to 1989, after many attempts to try and talk my newly retired parents to not move to Las Vegas, they did anyways? Go figure? Well after visiting them a few times, in 1991, I was at a point in my life where I needed a change so I decided to go stay with them and help them out? Well its funny how God has a plan for us, because after being there 6 mo., I met my beautiful wife Laura, it only took me a few dates to figure out, that this gal was thee one!

Laura Lee was beautiful and sweet and very artistic, I mean she had a beat up vVW bug she painted herself. It was hilarious? Plus she is a 3rd generation native, very rare, I mean her mom actually dated Elvis Presley in the 60’s, how crazy is that! So in 1993, we got hitched and in 1994 we had our 1st kid, wow!

So there I was, newly married, with a new baby, living in a new town, talk about anxiety attacks!

So now its been a good 10 years, since I’ve been to any kind of kool show, there was nothing in this town then, I mean its 2009 now, and the kustom kulture scene is still small, but its gotten a lot more fun. So the whole time I’m praying for something to happen here, I was still broke and still had no ride, although a good friend sold me his Harley on payment plan for a short while.

Then in 1996 a new music show was comin to town and there was a pre 1963 car show attached to it, it was called ” The Viva Las Vegas Rockabilly Weekender”, I was in shock and stoked at the same time! This past year was the 12th VLV event, and I’ve been to them all, and in my opinion the 1st 5 years were the best. When the car show was on top of the garage and there was no curfew and a lot less jerks causing trouble! But it’s still a lot of fun, and now I have a gorgeous wife, who does a little pin up modeling and a kool car to show off!