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Today at the pump

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Under here.

February 8, 2011

Both Of Them

Tuesday. What I'm calling a rather “fitful” night's sleep last night, although I feel well rested, and “fitful” may not be the right description. I awoke briefly a number of times, changed position and went back to sleep. Off to breakfast after getting up with the alarm, back now at eight with a haircut appointment coming up at ten. A “hectic” day on my calendar, nothing like tomorrow with a guitar lesson in the morning and a Photoshop class in the evening (three Photoshop classes in a row now, a camera mounted strobe class coming up on Friday), but a “hectic day” none the less. We're exaggerating, but there's an aspect of truth in thinking about it, if not in the doing of it, oddly enough.

I'll finish up Sunday's head shots today (hup! hup!), maybe run a couple of prints to bundle along with them, and play with the PocketWizards. I guess I'm determined to learn how to use the small strobe lights, use them in the sense of learning the more subtle adjustments, how to light a face in various flattering and less flattering ways. The PocketWizards themselves are easy, the lights themselves more complicated with a good bump at the beginning of the learning curve. I may yet find I want a studio again one day. Not today, but I'll keep at this lighting business and who knows, maybe I'll come up with something I actually want to shoot and a studio could be the result. (hup, hup)

As a money making proposition?

As a hobby. As an amateur we're allowed to throw terms around like “art” with abandon, so we'll call the motivation art. No one's looking over our shoulder to wrinkle their nose or comment.

Later. Clear, bright, but windy and a bit cold, if you're not out in the sun. A bus downtown, no hint of double vision, a haircut (cheating a bit as the after hair has been combed with a little water), a walk back to the apartment noticing the mouth was beginning to feel “metallic” and “foul”. Well, yes, “metallic and foul”. Another ocular migraine? Dear god? So far no, but I've been taking it easy for the last hour, listening to some radio, getting it together now that it's noon. We'll warm up the guitar, finish Photoshopping those head shots, keep an eye out for ocular monsters.

Later still. An hour's nap, no sign of trouble, more guitar now the idea. I think I practice enough, but I often play riffs and routines other than those needed for my upcoming lesson. Not sure why. A not overly serious outlook on this project? More fun to goof off? Mess with the teacher? Are we still in high school? Grade school? Kindergarten?

Does it matter?

No. As long as my guitar teacher doesn't notice.

Later again. The day is winding down. Not sure what I've accomplished other than getting the hair cut and spending a decent session on the guitar. I noticed my domain name had become available and so I got it. I have no idea what I'm going to do with it, of course, other than add even more to the world's ongoing ocean of drivel on the web. Keeps me entertained. Keeps me busy. Keeps me getting up in the mornings, these little hobbies I guess you'd call them. Better than gardening, anyway, particularly for someone who doesn't have a plot.

Have you ever kept a garden?

My parents did when they were younger. When we lived north of Seattle near Edmonds we had a couple of acres of ground and my father built a little green house in which he and my mother raised cuttings. We had a vegetable garden just outside the back door and I can remember picking corn off the stalk and dropping it into boiling water. Haven't had anything as fresh since, but then I was young enough and that was long enough ago I don't remember the difference. Lots of old (and young) sots keep gardens, though. You never know, given the opportunity, I might.

That's not the old you talking.

The old me has gotten old and he's thinking the occasional thought and doing the occasional thing once considered strange to the both of them.

The photograph was taken at the Vietnamese Tet Friendship Festival in Santa Clara with a Nikon D3s mounted with a 70 - 200mm f 2.8 Nikkor VR II lens.

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