Catching up

on my posts is what I am planning to do this week - the combination of the final rush of the election (woowoo!) and the new job (also woowoo!) left me mute all fall - although 'big things [were] happening, wow things' - i.e. move, new job, car wrecks, the aforementioned elections, etc.

But for now, let us start with fall in the east:

It makes me want to watch all the Gilmore Girls that I own - alright, not true - it makes me want to watch Gilmore Girls seasons 1-5 and selected portions of season 6. I never want to see all of season 7 again, and do not own it - although if I had access to the one episode featuring the ginormous all-Gilmore screaming fight at some point, I wouldn't mind watching it again.

Just a quick 'hello'

from fake Virginia . . .

Friday.

Tired.  Worked all day.  Stupid bench brief.  Watching What Not to Wear.  Can't move - just learned that the next show on TLC is a whole fracking show about picking out wedding dresses - I'm totally going to watch it.

That is all.

(Update - Oh my god - its at Kleinfelds - this is the bomb!)

I Really Am Here

There has been, shall we say, some ambivalence about the move - not about being in DC - but about *not* being in Chicago.  I miss my peeps.  I miss knowing where everything is.  I miss knowing that good croissant are attainable (even if I only eat them 2 or 3 times a year).

But now my stuff is scheduled to join me.  I'm here, and here to stay, so time to accept it - and part of acceptance is, of course, reporting on the goings on out here.  So here, without further ado (drum roll please) badabadabadabadabum       ...     is my journey to work.

VdW's abode - he has been the primary victim of my ambivalence - I'm not so much moving out of his house so fast.  I anticipate loneliness when I go.  I will be sad.  And yet, the move *is* scheduled.

On the way to the metro - the brick sidewalks - they reek of the picturesque, yes - but it sure makes reading while walking more challenging.  (I'm reading Brideshead Revisited by the way - for the first time.  I find it excellent - like a British F. Scott Fitzgerald.)

:

Eastern Market is my current stop.  There was a fire in the actual Eastern Market, so it is not operating right now, at least not in its historical digs, so I did not take a picture of it.

The metro.  DC trains - and train stations, are freakishly, Orwelianly clean.

Arriving at the work end - Clarendon.  More tomorrow.

A moment for Andre

Last weekend I was down in Indiana with Melike et al to see Andre (nee Neil) take his initial vows as a friar - it was a really lovely ceremony, with an amazing lunch to follow at a convent.  Those with me in Italy know I have a thing for nuns.  I have often been heard to bemoan the fact that nuns in the US don't wear habits anymore - I just think the whole nun thing is cool.  Also cool, however, initial vows - naturally, I took pictures:

Bells and Whistles Anyone?

I'm in the office this morning (Saturday) typing up my own charts for the weddings today - today we have a wedding which features *all* of these items (weddings usually max out at about 3 - possibly 4 (if the couple is very young) of these features):

1. (Large group of attendants) 6 on each side

2. (Children) 4 flower girls and one page

3. Greeters (as distinct from ushers)

4. Unity candle (which we have been informed we should remove from the box carefully as the couples names are on it - in gold)

5. Pew cards for those not being honor seated, but seated up front nevertheless

6. Brass Quintet (one trumpet is more common)

7. Kneeler

8. Bagpiper

9. Wedding bells (although it is tricky whether to count these at it is almost everyone chooses this - but then again, it counts in most people's 3-4 extras)

10. Bubbles

11. Cathedral length train

12. Cathedral length veil

13. With blusher (this is my first wedding with an actual blusher)

I told A (the wedding director) yesterday that I wanted to be selling these people entertainment equipment.

Happy Independence Day!

I'm at Starbucks, with a mint-mocha-chip Frappucino, my computer, and my external hard-drive, preparing to do the mother of all photo uploads.   In preparation for that, here are a few shots from my July 3.  Here in Chicago, they do the big city fireworks on the 3rd - I've never been before - the thought of all those people - but happily, Sparks talked me into it (with an assist to the thought 'hmmmm, I could take my camera.')  Here are a few views of the scene.  

Doing my bit - Obama '08

There is no here here, I am merely linking to this because of this blurb.

*#&*@%$

I'll get around to Italy soon (still sorting through 1,415 photos), but in the meantime, can I just say: DAMN IT!!!

As I feared, the bastards are getting peanut butter all over my delicious RDJr chocolate - and not in a good way - from the Variety review of The Hulk...

"To anyone wondering why the Marvel team would so soon embark on a makeover of the growly green giant after all the angst endured on the previous one, the answer is provided by the final scene, in which the star of the most recent Marvel [boxoffice] smash unexpectedly turns up to ask, 'What if I told you we were getting a team together?'"

Frack!! FrackFrackFRACK!!!!!! No Avengers! No!

Watch this space!

Or, actually, don't - at least not for the next ten days or so as I will be in Italia!  In fact, I will be here for a large portion of it!!!

My only slight sorrow is that, after months of frustration, agony, obsession and even a bit of campaign work, I will not be here when* Obama clinches the Democratic nomination.  I have prepared to the extent I can for celebrating that happy day - even from Tuscany.  I am packing my Shepard Fairey "Hope" t-shirt, which I have been saving for the day, and I have 'created' a 'concept' album/CD in four 'acts' (with hoped for one song epilogue). I mocked myself even while doing it - but was unable to stop myself.

See y'all in 10 days! 

*Knock wood.  Which I have to say because whilst "I'm not superstitious, I am a little 'stitious."

Indy.... (with SPOILERS)

Disappointment.

I loves me some Raiders of the Lost Ark. I enjoy The Last Crusade. However, as many know, I loathe Temple of Doom with the sortof loathing only comparable to the loathing I feel for such horrors as Brave Heart and Forest Gump.

And I find this latest - The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull - to be between The Last Crusade and Temple of Doom on the 'pleasing summer fun' / 'I can't believe I just used up two hours of my life on this - and paid for the privilege' scale (and "between," in this instance, should be understood not to be halfway between, but about two thirds of the way toward the low end of that scale).

I sat around thinking 'why is this not working for me?' (and, yes, that tense is correct, as the thinking was going on while I was watching the movie - specifically at the point where Shia was engaged in a fencing match with Cate - that's right - fencing with swords - while they were each standing up on separate truck type vehicles - while said vehicles raced off-road through the jungle). I'm not sure when the Indiana Jones franchise decided they could lift sequences from Return of the Jedi (sans Jedi). I mean, is Lucas's imagination cupboard really that bare? Of course, since the film centers on the principal conceit of Close Encounters of a Third Kind...

You know what I like about the Bond reboot? Within a Bondian context, it seems reality based. The most outre set piece is prolly the race through the construction site - and at least Sebastien Foucan really can [do] parkour (I don't know if 'parkour' is a noun or a verb) so it seems at least conceivable that a really well trained Bond could parkour too (I have randomly assigned the 'verb' designation).

And Bond gets beat up.

Remember the Raider's boat scene? The charming quiet moment where Indy whined and moaned about the injuries sustained in the car chase from the dig to the docks and then collapsed into sleep? Tres adorable. Well, nothing like that to see here - either on the 'quiet moment' front or the 'actions have consequences' front - despite Indy surviving a nuclear explosion.

That is right - I said 'nuclear explosion.' Could I make that up? Would I make that up? C'mon now.

And, while it is true that the plot doesn't really hang together, and is five kinds of predictable, and the script forgot to bring the funny, and picks up and drops plot points with abandon and the ending is trite and unsatisfying - in the final analysis? It just wasn't realistic enough.

It made me want to go back and watch Ironman again. That's right - a dude who has an electromagnet powered by a car battery imbedded in his chest, which electromagnet keeps him alive by preventing shards of shrapnel from entering his heart, and which later powers his armored flying suit? A masterpiece of practically documentary-type realism in comparison to the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

Playing with Food

Ms. Gooch and Ding had a lovely cocktail party this evening, so that we could meet Ms. Gooch's best friend from high school and her new husband (both lovely) - but is it any surprise that I took the time before the guests of honor arrived to practice some food photography?

I am informed that these bee-yoo-tiful cherries cost more than $10.00 per pound - but don't they look worth it? (They tasted as good as they look):

Mmmmmmmmmm - cheese......

mmmmmmmmmm - cheese with cherries..........

Goofing around with glass:

More goofing around with glasses - but this time colored martini glasses behind the elephant:

A few more Parade shots

After starting the last post saying how parades are great for taking pictures of people, I realized that only one of those photos even shows a person's face.  Weird.  So here, above and below, are some which actually show people:

These gentlemen were the greatest - note how, canes notwithstanding, they are in perfect step:

So there are some people proper - people and one dog:

Scope for Imagination

So parades!  Here is what I discovered - parades are the bomb for taking pictures of people.  Yes, I've been practicing on buildings and statues - and part of that is to get used to the WonderCamera - but part of it is because I never take pictures of things not-people.  Of course the risk is down with people - composition?  Pish.  The storytelling aspect of people steps into that breach nicely.  So I spent well over 3 hours taking photos (and this was the time-loss referred to in the last post - I would not have guessed that it could have been so long) - and I took who knows how many hundreds of photos - I kept deleting as I went along.  But I wound up with 36 shots that I am happy with and maybe 6 that I am particularly happy with - and I'm a sucker for bokeh, so you can guess what many of my favorite pictures heavily feature - or thanks to the glory of technology, you could see them:

Capital F. U. N.

I had losing-track-of-time capital F, U, N fun yesterday - here is the set-up.

M-Bee showed me how to use a white card to set the white balance on my camera - but, again, not being a technical person, I forgot how. So I had to read my manual (I know!) - and it showed me how - but also recommended using an 18% grey card - so that was thing one I wanted to acquire before Italy, but I've been having trouble finding one on-line.

And then I was online again, and realized I really really wanted a wide-angle lens for shooting buildings, but really, really didn't want to spend $300+ dollars on one. So I was telling TG this on Friday night. And she suggested this store for all things camera - including used lenses (the art school students (of which TG is one) sell stuff there post-classes). Without further ado, I present, Central Camera:

And, as per below, you can see that the store lives up to its billing - including the report of super helpful and knowledgeable staff (which you can't see, but I can report that it is true).

(Aside - you may notice that both of these shots are taken wide-angle - and, as evidence of the super-helpful-and-knowledgeable staff - when I told them what lenses I had (all of which I had with me) the man helping me showed me how to push a lens I already had into a wide-angle lens - so - free wide angle!)

Anyway, this shop is easy walking distance from my place, so I headed out on Saturday, May 23 - with all my gear in tow (I needed some filters and hoods in addition to the grey card) and that is when I ran across this:

! More on that later.

Sunday CD

Here I am, back at Starbucks for pre-work CD importing and working on reducing 10 hours of gospel music down to an hour or hour and a half CD for Italy.  Again - how in the world did I manage to collect 10 hours of Gospel music - and how will I manage to take off any of the songs from the Alan Jackson "precious Memories" CD I received from MLee at Christmas?  They are all wonderful - but I have to narrow it down to 2 or 3.  Oy.

And how can I choose between the versions of "I'll Fly Away" - a song which I love - by Alan Jackson, Kanye West, and Alison Krauss/Gillian Welch?  Ditto that question for "Run On" - Blind Boys of Alabama, Elvis or Moby?

And then there is the question of whether any of the other women I'm traveling with will *want* to listen to an hour or hour and half of gospel music.  But I can't be worrying about that.

The photo is just because I like to slap photos up here - and it is a goofing around shot that I can't seem to delete, and at this moment it seems to me gospel-y.

Markers

When does a trip to somewhere warm enough to wear a swimsuit start to feel like it will really happen? When you book your wax and nail treatments, that is when.

This I just did. Woo-frackin-woo!!!

Who you gonna call?

I'm just saying - that is all I can think of when I look at this photo. And then I start scrolling through lines in my head:

"Where do these stairs go?"

"They go up."

"Shhhh - do you smell that?"

"Something that could never ever hurt me - the StayPuft Marshmallow man."

Thank you for joining me on this mini-tour through my pop-culture crammed mind.

Sculpture

I mentioned before that I wanted to get over to try some stuff with the new Lear statue, which I did over the weekend (RGN, I didn't make it during the week - but we should still do lunch sometime).

I think the sunken eyes are very Learian and mad and effective.  And creepy.

Yesterday, trying out the new lens, I headed down to Millenium Park.  I just love the Bean. It is so shiny (in both a reflective sense and in a Firefly sense).