Ten More Childhood Vignettes
Ten More Childhood Vignettes - In other words, using Sora AI (with all its many limitations) to bring to cinematic life things I actually did as a kid. Sora doesn't let me put my features into these - so you get a bunch of different-looking kids. All of these took place in Burbank, California.
1. 1965, Cardboard Rocket Ship. I used to drag home huge discarded refrigerator cardboard boxes from the nearby appliance store and turn them into rocket ships, in which I used to play for hours. Crayons were used to design control panels on the interior walls. Described HERE.
2. 1966, Halloween at school. Growing up in Southern California - Burbank - those plastic Ben Cooper Halloween costumes were hot and sweaty! Even in October...
3. 1966, Police appointment. In Burbank, if you were observed by a cop running a stop sign or some other infraction on your bike you got a ticket. The punishment was to spend an hour of your precious Saturday morning watching a lame Jiminy Cricket cartoon, "I'm no Fool."
4. 1967, Drawing Captain Russian. My childhood comic book creation. It's described HERE.
5. 1967, Stickers in tires. I used to ride my bike in the vacant lot up the street, where the railroad line was. I used to get wicked pointy stickers in my tires, which caused flats. Dad didn't know how to fix the tire and neither did I, so off to the bike shop it went. How embarrassing!
6. 1968 Bike race. It was me on my new Schwinn Sting Ray 5-Speed Ram's Horn Fastback vs. Tom Villalobos's ordinary Sting Ray down Griffith Park Dr. I won.
7. 1968 Miss Johnson. Ugh. I had to write my name on the chalkboard and stay after school for some lame infraction of the too-many rules way too often. That is described HERE.
8. 1968, My last Halloween. My last Halloween door was in 1968 when I was twelve. Me and Richard Springer went out as Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. We knocked on an apartment door and a creepy hippie answered. We didn't dare eat the candy he gave us - probably LSD - and went home.
9. 1968, Hobos. They used to lounge around in a certain field by the tracks. One time me and Richard threw some rocks at them (and missed). But we didn't pedal towards them to get away - and I can't seem to get that through Sora's head. We pedaled away, of course.
10. 1971, Tarot reading. When Viki, the girl across the street, learned that I could read Tarot cards, she had me over to her house for a reading. I drew the Tower of Destruction card and predicted something dire. A couple of days later the 1971 earthquake happened! She was impressed but still wouldn't be my girlfriend.