A Leslie Wong Blog

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One night, while driving through the grove of Eucalyptus trees on US 101 near San Juan Bautista, California, I realized that the sealed beam headlamps on my Alfetta were inadequate. This is the same road that Scottie Ferguson and Madeleine Elster (Jimmy Stewart and Kim Novak) took to Mission San Juan Bautista in the film Vertigo.

A modern car had pulled up next to me in the other lane and I suddenly saw the road ahead. That’s when I realized that I had to improve the lighting on the Alfa Romeo.

Research turned up 5.75 inch (146 mm) Cibie H4 (low beam) and H1 (high beam) headlamps for the quad setup I needed. For the H1 headlamp, I used Osram Silverstar bulbs (NOT Sylvania Silverstar) and for the H4, I used Narva Rangepower High Output Plus 30 bulbs.

This setup is more economical than the Cibie Complex Surface Reflector (CSR) headlamps and I’m only replacing the right side headlamps in my crashed into Alfetta. Osram Sylvania produces a Xenarc HID conversion kit I’ve seen for US$ 588.

I’ve read that installing relays was a good idea for the Alfa, since the factory setup has all the headlight current going through the switch on the steering column. Daniel Stern has covered this and other lighting topics so thoroughly that I didn’t have to look anywhere else.

Comparing the Cibie headlamps to sealed beams is literally like day and night.

The Onion reports, “Star Trek fans are decrying the latest film in the long running series, as a fun and watchable, action packed, thrill-ride.

‘Yes, it was exciting. But where was the heavy-handed message about tolerance, where was the stiff acting?’ ”

-more-

Seero matches the video from one of film’s greatest car chases in Bullitt, with Google Maps, so you know where to play Bullitt when you’re in San Francisco.

Woot! had a contest “to Create a movie poster that reconceives a movie as a summer blockbuster.”

You can see all the selected entries at Woot, but I liked this one by JoeDeeDee – Grouchland.

Film critic Joel Siegel died today. He was significant in my life because he interviewed me in 1976. Years later, as a photographer for ABC, I ended up working with Joel when he did his ABC 20/20 interviews. I photographed him with such luminaries as Eddie Murphy and Andrew Lloyd Weber.

In the fall of 1975, I had been living in New York for only a few months. My mom called to tell me that she had obtained visas for us to go to China, as “Overseas Chinese“. She hadn’t been back to China since she left in the 40′s. President Ford and Henry Kissinger were going to China in December. So were my mom and I.

In 1976, Alex Haley had just published Roots: The Saga of an American Family and Smithsonian Magazine published my roots story in April. I got a call from Joel. He had read the piece and he wanted to do a “roots” story for WABC.

All I can remember was that I was living in a studio in 4th floor walk-up at 21 W. 76th St. The cameraman came huffing up the stairs into my apartment, looked around and said, “This is a great place, where’s the rest of it?” Joel looked at my photographs and asked me about my family. I made an audio recording of the interview when it aired – this was before VCRs – and Roger Grimsby did the intro. Years later when I was working with Joel, I never reminded him that he had once interviewed me.

I found this on Dvorak Uncensored (submitted by TJ Geezer).

Though they seem unlikely to scare any trick or treaters, Starwars.com has some handy printouts to help you carve your Sith, Darth Vader, Yoda or other Star Wars themed pumpkin for Halloween.