I dragged my mom and two sisters downtown to watch the Art Car Parade with me. After some parking adventures, I finally got to see some sculpture, Houston style- big, flashy, colorful, and usually made of trash. I'm glad some people are willing to spend so much time constructing these cars, because I would never do it! I can admire though. My personal favorites are the elephant made of pipes, the triceratops, and the tree character with the tire swing (it's probably a cultural reference I should know but don't; it had a mouth and teeth on the front; but anyone who puts a tire swing on a car gets points from me anyway). The Smartcar pulling the giant grocery cart is up there too! Of all of them, that one was truly the most humorous. I think someone was regretting their vehicle purchase. And there were several neat mechanical ones, such as the hen (the beak opened and closed), T-Rex (mouth opened and closed) and the one that looked like a big wheel being pulled by a dead scarecrow (again, probably something I'm supposed to recognize but I don't); his legs moved as if he were running slowly; really creepy; I'm glad I saw that one in the daylight.
It was a fun way to spend a Saturday afternoon in the sun. This parade was pretty unusual when it began 26 years ago, but now, the difference between an art car and float that you would see in any parade is kind of blurred- other than the fact most parade floats are advertising something, and these folks are just doing it as a hobby. The parade as a whole wasn't spectacular enough to justify going every year. I'll give people a few years to create some new cars before I go again.
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