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We're a tad crazy about cars out here. Everyone knows that. We have that Peterson Automotive Museum down on Wilshire, filled with the cars that the stars drove in the twenties, thirties and forties. And the California hot rods of the fifties are legendary - all engine, no fenders. Since nothing rusts out here, the streets are filed with really fine old Detroit machines from the old days, some all tricked out and some that just kept rolling. And the rich folks now have their Bentleys, or the Ferrari or Lamborghini - visit the showrooms down in Beverly Hills. And there are low-riders and whatnot. It's all pretty cool. You can drop by LA Car - "The Cars and Culture of Southern California" - for a fix.
Of course, sometimes bad things happen. There's Ellen DeGeneres and this, from September 1, just down the street - "DeGeneres and a passenger that appears to be her girlfriend, actress Portia de Rossi, were stopped at a red light at the corner of Sunset and Laurel heading east on Sunset in a 2006 Porsche Carrera. A 2002 Buick LeSabre was stopped behind them. The Buick was struck by a third car, a 2002 Porsche Carrera, driven by an alleged drunk driver identified as a 52-year-old woman. The stopped Buick was then allegedly pushed from behind into Ms. DeGeneres' car, moderately damaging the back of her Porsche."
That's the corner right here. She's fine. And they just announced she gets to host the Oscars in February, so all is well. It's too bad about the Porsches. (No photos - I was in the other end of Hollywood at the time.)
And there's Paris Hilton the following Thursday - arrested at Selma and Wilcox, just a mile east of here, for driving under the influence. She was driving a Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren - the sticker price is 455,500 but that includes 2,500 freight and the 3,000 "gas-guzzler" tax. Benz says that they will build only 3,500 of these in a span of seven years, with an annual production of only five hundred (and here it seems they're recalling all 433 in the United States as the electrics do tend to catch fire). The Paris Hilton tale is here.
And there's Angelyne - a model and sometime actress who has become an icon out here - best known for purchasing billboards advertising herself. Those started popping up in the eighties. She says, "Barbie wishes she were me." She doesn't give here age or date of birth in interviews - but she seems to have been born in 1958 as Renee Goldberg. She was one of the candidates in the 2003 California recall election, finishing 29th in a field of 135 candidates (click here to see her campaign poster). She was also a candidate for Hollywood city council in 2002 - if it was to secede from Los Angeles. The secession thing failed. She just drives around Hollywood in her shocking pink Corvette.
Here she is on her way to a shoot at the Geisha House on Hollywood Boulevard -
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