Andy Chase

02/09/2002 - Heart's Coffee Shop

16918 Saticoy St (at Balboa) • Van Nuys, California

An even sadder place than Johnie's was before it closed, Heart's looks as though it hasn't seen any maintenance at all to its exterior or sign since it opened.

Photographing the sign in its entirety was made difficult due to a couple of factors:

1. A fast food chain who shall remain nameless has erected a sign at the corner of the adjacent lot, blocking half of the Heart's sign to the east.
2. Although it's clear that the rusty heart at the very top of the sign used to rotate, in 2002 it only sways back and forth about 10 degrees in the wind.

16918 Saticoy St (at Balboa)
Van Nuys, California

Sherman Way at Sepulveda Boulevard, Van Nuys, California

This is the same Muffler Man I shot a little over two years ago. Until I got up close, I didn't realize that not only had his kerchief been repainted, but his beard has been painted over with skin color; only the dastardly pencil moustache remains.

From a distance all you can see is his lantern jaw, but up close the flesh colored ridges of his beard look terrible.

Taken during an afternoon coffee break at work. You can see the new tower construction in the background. The lousy quality of the image is due to its original resolution being 320x240. I've tried to compensate in Photoshop, but it will probably still be quite grainy after getting resized to 504 pixels wide.

09/26/1999 - Sherman Way near Sepulveda Blvd, Van Nuys, California.

Much has been written about Muffler Men, but I've only seen three in the wild. You may have noticed the Muffler Man who shows up briefly in the opening credits of The Sopranos.